On
this date, 13 September 1946, the Nazi Butcher A.K.A Amon Goeth was executed by
hanging in Kraków, Poland. I got the information from Wikipedia and I will post
a news source from The Daily Mail.
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| Amon Goeth in 1946, shortly before his execution |
Amon Leopold Goeth (represented in German as Göth pronounced [ˈɡøːt]) (11
December 1908 – 13 September 1946) was an SS-Hauptsturmführer
(captain) and the commandant of the Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp in
Płaszów in German-occupied Poland during World War II. He was tried as a war
criminal after the war by the Supreme National Tribunal of Poland at Kraków and
was found guilty of personally ordering the imprisonment, torture, and
extermination of individuals and groups of people. He was also convicted of
homicide, the first such conviction at a war crimes trial, for "personally
killing, maiming and torturing a substantial, albeit unidentified number of
people". He was executed by hanging not far from the former site of the
Płaszów camp. The film Schindler's List depicts his practice of shooting
camp internees.
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Amon Leopold Goeth's
mug shot (1945)
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Native name
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Amon Leopold Göth
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Born
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December 11, 1908
Vienna, Austria-Hungary (now Austria) |
Died
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September 13, 1946 (aged 37)
Kraków, Poland |
Allegiance
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Nazi
Germany
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Service/branch
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Schutzstaffel
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Years of service
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1930–1945
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Rank
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SS-Hauptsturmführer
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Service number
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NSDAP #510,764
SS #43,673 |
Unit
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SS-Totenkopfverbände
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Commands held
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Arbeitslager KL-Płaszów
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Spouse(s)
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Early
life and career
Goeth
was born on 11 December 1908 in Vienna, then the capital of the Austro-Hungarian
Empire, to a family in the book publishing industry. Goeth joined a Nazi youth
group at age 17 and was a member of the antisemitic nationalist paramilitary
group Heimwehr (Home Guard) from 1927 to 1930. He dropped his membership
to join the Austrian branch of the Nazi Party, being assigned the party
membership number 510,764 in September 1930. Goeth joined the Austrian SS in
1930 and was appointed an SS-Mann with the SS number 43,673.
Goeth
served with the SS Truppe Deimel and Sturm Libardi in Vienna
until January 1933, when he was promoted to serve as adjutant and platoon
leader of the 52nd SS-Standarte, a regimental-sized unit. He was soon promoted
to SS-Scharführer (squad leader). He fled to Germany when his illegal
activities, including obtaining explosives for the Nazi Party, made him a
wanted man. The Austrian Nazi Party was declared illegal in Austria on 19 June
1933, so they set up operations in exile in Munich. From this base, Goeth
smuggled radios and weapons into Austria and acted as a courier for the SS. He
was arrested in October 1933 by the Austrian authorities and was released for
lack of evidence in December 1933. He was again detained after the
assassination of Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss in a failed Nazi coup
attempt in July 1934. He escaped custody and fled to the SS training facility
at Dachau, next to the infamous Dachau
Concentration Camp. He temporarily quit the SS and Nazi party
activities until 1937 and lived in Munich while trying to help his parents to
develop their publishing business. He married on the recommendation of his
parents, but was divorced after only a few months.
Goeth
returned to Vienna shortly after the Anschluss in 1938 and resumed his party
activities. He married Anny Geiger in a civil SS ceremony on October 1938. The
couple had two boys (Werner and Inge) who were born in 1939 and 1940, and a
daughter who did not survive childhood. The couple maintained a permanent home
in Vienna throughout World War II. Initially assigned to 89th SS-Standarte,
Goeth was transferred to the 1st SS-Sturmbann of the 11th SS-Standarte at the
start of the war and was promoted to SS-Oberscharführer (staff sergeant)
in early 1941. He soon gained a reputation as a seasoned administrator in the
Nazi efforts to isolate and relocate the Jewish population of Europe as an Einsatzführer
(action leader) and financial officer for the Reichskommissariat für die
Festigung deutschen Volkstums (Reichskommissariat for the
Strengthening of German Nationhood; RKFDV). He was commissioned to the rank of
SS-Untersturmführer (second lieutenant) on 14 July 1941.
He
was transferred to Lublin in the summer of 1942, where he joined the staff of
SS-Brigadeführer Odilo Globočnik, the SS and Police Leader of the Kraków
area, as part of Operation Reinhard,
the code name given to the establishment of the three extermination camps
at Bełżec, Sobibór, and Treblinka. Nothing is known of his activities in the
six months he served with Operation Reinhard; participants were sworn to
secrecy. But according to the transcripts of his later trial, Goeth was
responsible for rounding up and transporting victims to these camps to be
killed.
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Villa of Amon Göth,
commandant of German Concentration Camp Plaszow. 22 Heltmana street, Kraków,
Poland (3 May 2012)
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Płaszów
Goeth
was assigned to the SS-Totenkopfverbände ("Deaths-head" unit;
concentration camp service). His first assignment, starting on 11 February
1943, was to oversee the construction of the Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp,
which he was to command. The camp took one month to construct using forced
labour. On 13 March 1943, the Jewish ghetto of Kraków was liquidated and those
still fit for work were sent to the new camp at Płaszów. Several thousand not
deemed fit for work were sent to extermination camps and killed. Hundreds more
were killed on the streets by the Nazis as they cleared out the ghetto.
On
3 September 1943, in addition to his duties at Płaszów, Goeth was the officer
in charge of the liquidation of the ghetto at Tarnów, which had been home to
25,000 Jews (about 45 per cent of the city's population) at the start of World
War II. By the time the ghetto was liquidated, 8,000 Jews remained. They were
loaded on a train to Auschwitz
concentration camp, but less than half survived the journey. Most of
the survivors were deemed unsuitable for forced labour and were killed
immediately on their arrival at Auschwitz. According to testimony of several
witnesses as recorded in his 1946 indictment for war crimes, Goeth personally
shot between 30 and 90 women and children during the liquidation of the ghetto.
Goeth
was also the officer in charge of the liquidation of Szebnie
concentration camp, which interned 4,000 Jewish and 1,500 Polish
slave labourers. Evidence presented at Goeth's trial indicates he delegated this
task to a subordinate, SS-Hauptscharführer Josef Grzimek, who was sent
to assist camp commandant SS-Hauptsturmführer Hans Kellermann with mass
executions. Between 21 September 1943 and 3 February 1944 the camp was
gradually liquidated. Around a thousand of the victims were taken to the nearby
forest and shot, and the remainder were sent to Auschwitz, where most were
gassed immediately on arrival.
By
April 1944, Goeth had been promoted to the rank of SS-Hauptsturmführer
(captain), having received a double promotion, skipping the rank of SS-Obersturmführer
(first lieutenant). He was also appointed a reserve officer of the Waffen-SS. In early 1944 the status of the
Kraków-Płaszów Labour Camp changed to a permanent concentration camp under the
direct authority of the SS-Wirtschafts-Verwaltungshauptamt (WVHA; SS
Economics and Administration Office). Mietek Pemper testified at the trial that
it was during the earlier period that Goeth committed most of the random and
brutal killings for which he became notorious. Concentration camps were more
closely monitored by the SS than labour camps, so conditions improved slightly
when the designation was changed.
The
camp housed about 2,000 inmates when it opened. At its peak of operations in
1944, a staff of 636 guards oversaw 25,000 permanent inmates, and an additional
150,000 people passed through the camp in its role as a transit camp. Goeth
personally murdered prisoners on a daily basis. His two dogs, Rolf and Ralf,
were trained to tear inmates to death. He shot people from his window of his
office if they appeared to be moving too slowly or resting in the yard. He shot
to death a Jewish cook because the soup was too hot. He brutally mistreated his
two maids, Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig and Helen Hirsch, who were in constant daily
fear for their lives, as were all the inmates.
As a survivor I can tell you that we are all traumatized people. Never would I, never, believe that any human being would be capable of such horror, of such atrocities. When we saw him from a distance, everybody was hiding, in latrines, wherever they could hide. I can't tell you how people feared him.—Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig
Poldek
Pfefferberg, another Schindlerjude (Schindler Jew), said: "When you
saw Goeth, you saw death." Yet Goeth spared the life of Jewish prisoner
Natalia Hubler (later known as Natalia Karp) and that of her sister, after
hearing her play a nocturne by Chopin on the piano the day after she arrived at
the Płaszów camp.
Goeth
believed if one member of a work team escaped or committed some infraction, the
entire team must be punished. On one occasion he ordered every second member of
a work detail should be shot because one of the party had escaped. On another occasion
he personally shot every fifth member of a crew because one had not returned to
the camp. The main execution site at Płaszów was Hujowa Górka ("Prick
Hill"), a large hill that was used for mass killings and executions.
Pemper testified that 8,000 to 12,000 people were murdered at Płaszów.
Dismissal
and capture
On
13 September 1944 Goeth was relieved of his position and charged by the SS with
theft of Jewish property (which belonged to the state, according to Nazi
legislation), failure to provide adequate food to the prisoners under his
charge, violation of concentration camp regulations regarding the treatment and
punishment of prisoners, and allowing unauthorised access to camp personnel
records by prisoners and non-commissioned officers. Administration of the camp
at Płaszów was turned over to SS-Obersturmführer Arnold Büscher. Goeth
was scheduled for an appearance before SS judge Georg Konrad Morgen,
but due to the progress of World War II and Germany's looming defeat, the
charges against him were dropped in early 1945. SS doctors diagnosed Goeth as
suffering from mental illness and he was committed to a mental institution,
where he was arrested by the United States military in May 1945.
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Hujowa Górka ("Prick Hill"), the
execution place in Kraków-Płaszów
concentration camp (2007)
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Identification Amon
Göths as Prisoner of War
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Execution
After
the war, Goeth was extradited to Poland, where he was tried by the Supreme
National Tribunal of Poland in Kraków between 27 August and 5
September 1946. Goeth was found guilty of membership in the Nazi Party (which
had been declared a criminal organisation) and personally ordering the
imprisonment, torture, and extermination of individuals and groups of people.
He was also convicted of homicide, the first such conviction at a war crimes
trial, for "personally killing, maiming and torturing a substantial,
albeit unidentified number of people". He was sentenced to death and was
hanged on 13 September 1946 at the Montelupich Prison in Kraków, not far from
the site of the Płaszów camp. The body was cremated and the ashes thrown in the
Vistula River.
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Amon Göth mistress
Ruth Irene Kalder with his attack dog at the villa in Płaszów, 1943. Photo by
R. Tisch, who sold all his Płaszów camp photographs to a former KL prisoner in
the 1960s. The collection was donated by him to Yad Vashem soon thereafter and
published by HEART.
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Family
In
addition to his two marriages, Goeth had a two-year relationship with Ruth
Irene Kalder, a beautician and aspiring actress originally from Breslau (or Gleiwitz;
sources vary). Kalder first met Goeth in 1942 or early 1943, when she worked as
a secretary at Oskar Schindler's
enamelware factory in Kraków. She soon moved in with Goeth and the two had an
affair. She took Goeth's name shortly after his death. Goeth's last child was a
daughter, Monika Hertwig, whom he had by Kalder. Monika was born on 23 October
1945, ten months before his execution.
In
popular culture
Goeth's
actions at Płaszów Labour Camp became internationally known through his
depiction by British actor Ralph Fiennes in the 1993 film Schindler's
List. In a subsequent interview, Fiennes recalled:
People believe that they’ve got to do a job, they’ve got to take on an ideology, that they’ve got a life to lead; they’ve got to survive, a job to do, it’s every day inch by inch, little compromises, little ways of telling yourself this is how you should lead your life and suddenly then these things can happen. I mean, I could make a judgement myself privately, this is a terrible, evil, horrific man. But the job was to portray the man, the human being. There’s a sort of banality, that everydayness, that I think was important. And it was in the screenplay. In fact, one of the first scenes with Oskar Schindler, with Liam Neeson, was a scene where I’m saying, 'You don’t understand how hard it is, I have to order so many—so many metres of barbed wire and so many fencing posts and I have to get so many people from A to B.' And, you know, he’s sort of letting off steam about the difficulties of the job.
Fiennes
won a BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role and was nominated for
an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. His portrayal ranked 15th on American Film Institute's list of the top 50 film
villains of all time. He ranks as the highest non-fiction villain. When
Płaszów survivor Mila Pfefferberg was introduced to Fiennes on the set of the
film, she began to shake uncontrollably, as Fiennes, attired in full SS dress
uniform, reminded her of the real Amon Goeth.
In
2002, Goeth's daughter Monika Hertwig published her memoirs under the title Ich
muß doch meinen Vater lieben, oder? ("But I have to love my father,
don't I?"). Hertwig described the subsequent life of her mother, Ruth Kalder
Goeth, who unconditionally glorified her fiancé until confronted with his role
in the Holocaust. Ruth committed suicide in 1983, shortly after giving an
interview in Jon Blair's documentary Schindler. Hertwig's experiences in
dealing with her father's crimes are detailed in Inheritance, a 2006
documentary directed by James Moll. Appearing in the documentary is Helen
Jonas-Rosenzweig, one of Goeth's former housemaids. The documentary details the
meeting of the two women at the Płaszów memorial site in Poland. Hertwig had
requested the meeting, but Jonas-Rosenzweig was hesitant because her memories
of Goeth and the concentration camp were so traumatic. She eventually agreed
after Hertwig wrote to her, "We have to do it for the murdered people."
Jonas felt touched by this sentiment and agreed to meet her.
In
a subsequent interview, Jonas-Rosenzweig recalled:
It's hard for me to be with her because she reminds me a lot of, you know ... she's tall, she has certain features. And I hated him so. But she is a victim. And I think it's important because she is willing to tell the story in Germany. She told me people don't want to know, they want to go on with their lives. And I think it's very important because there's a lot of children of perpetrators, and I think she's a brave person to go on talking about it, because it's difficult. And I feel for Monika. I am a mother, I have children. And she is affected by the fact that her father was a perpetrator. But my children are also affected by it. And that's why we both came here. The world has to know, to prevent something like this from happening again."
Hertwig
also appeared in a documentary called Hitler's Children (2011),
directed and produced by Chanoch Zeevi, an Israeli
documentary film maker. In the documentary, Hertwig and other close relatives
of infamous Nazi leaders describe their feelings, relationships, and memories
of their relatives.
Summary
of SS career
- SS number: 43673
- Nazi Party number: 510764
- Primary positions: Lagerkommandant, Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp
- Waffen-SS service: SS-Hauptsturmführer der Reserve
- SS-Mann: 1930
- SS-Scharführer: c.1935
- SS-Oberscharführer: 1941
- SS-Untersturmführer: 14 July 1941
- SS-Hauptsturmführer: 1 August 1943
- SS-Hauptsturmführer der Reserve der Waffen-SS: 20 April 1944
- Anschluss Medal
- German Sports Badge (Silver)
- SS Julleuchter
- Honour Chevron for the Old Guard
INTERNET SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html
Did 'executed' Nazi criminal in Schindler's List escape justice? Historians claim video of camp commander being hanged is NOT him
- Amon Goeth killed thousands of people as concentration camp commander
- For decades video of a Nazi execution was believed to show his death
- But new documentary says film shows execution of Dr Ludwig Fischer
- Goeth was chillingly played by Ralph Fiennes in the Spielberg masterpiece
- His death is a complete mystery and it is not known where he was buried
PUBLISHED:| UPDATED:
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Sadistic
Amon Goeth was believed to have been executed in a filmed hanging but now
historians say it was a different Nazi butcher (SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html)
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Revelations
about the execution of a notorious Nazi war criminal, immortalised in
Schindler's List, have raised questions about how the mass murderer died and
whether he was even hanged at all.
For
decades Amon Goeth, who was responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of
Jews and Poles during World War Two, was believed to have been filmed being
executed in 1946.
A
black and white video shows executioners twice botching a hanging before he was
eventually killed.
But
historians claim in a new National Geographic documentary called Bloody Tales
that the video was from 1947 and shows Dr Ludwig Fischer being hanged.
Worryingly,
there is almost no detail about the sadistic mass murderer's death in official
records and no one knows what happened to his body.
Historian
Dr Suzannah Lipscomb and presenter Joe Crowley do not believe he escaped Europe
like other high profile Nazis such as Adolf Eichmann and Joseph Mengele, and
say he was killed.
However
the revelations surrounding Goeth, who was known to carry out his own killings
rather than order them, mean his death is now a complete mystery with records
containing just two words: 'He died.'
Dr Lipscomb said: 'We
are pretty sure that he was executed. On some level there will be speculation
but if it was a court of law it would be concluded beyond reasonable doubt.
'He was a truly horrific
individual.'
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Goeth was arrested in
1945 after German forces fled Poland and was handed over to the Polish
authorities (SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html)
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The new documentary
says the infamous video shows the botched execution of Dr Ludwig Fischer in
1947 and not Amon Goeth, a year earlier, as has been believed for decades (SOURCE:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html)
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She said she hoped the
information would inspire other researchers to now try to find out more about
what happened to his body.
David
Caldwell-Evans, documentary director, said a combination of inaccurate records
and the internet has perpetuated the myth that Goeth was in the video of the
execution.
He
said: 'We know he was executed and there was one unconfirmed account that said
the executioners struggled because of Goeth's height.
'There
is no record of where he was buried, he could have been cremated and had his
ashes thrown in the river or his body could have been donated to a medical
school. We just don't know.
'With
Goeth, he acted alone so we thought there may be records and reports of his
death but there is nothing.
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The
only record left about the execution of Amon Goeth, who enjoyed killing people
himself rather than ordering their deaths, is a note saying 'he died' (SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html)
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'He actually killed
people himself, the war helped him exact his psychopathic tendencies.'
Goeth was chillingly
portrayed by British actor Ralph Fiennes in the Steven Spielberg's
Oscar-winning masterpiece Schindler's List.
The Polish State Film
Archive, the Yad Vashem Holocaust Archive in Israel, Goeth's biographer and
numerous online holocaust sites identified the man being hanged as Goeth.
Goeth, the
Kraksow-Plaszow concentration camp commander in Poland, was convicted of
killing tens of thousands of Jews in 1946.
He was known to shoot
babies for fun and got an extra kick when victims died slowly and painfully.
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Goeth
was chillingly played by Ralph Fiennes in the Oscar-winning classic Schindler's
List in 1993 (SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html)
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In
Schindler's List Ralph Fiennes' Goeth is seen being hanged, pictured, after
giving a Nazi salute but historians say very little is known about the actual
execution and what then happened to the body (SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html)
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As
well as killing Jews and Poles, Goeth also stole from them for his personal
gain.
At
his trial he was found guilty of ordering up to 8,000 inmates to be
exterminated, killing 2,000 more by closing the Krakow ghetto, and ordering the
murder of several thousands more by closing down the forced labour camp at
Szebnie.
Survivors
told of the horror of living under Goeth's command and testimonies said that he
took a personal interest in the murder of prisoners.
He
would often set dogs on prisoners, who would eat them alive, before Goeth
personally shot them but only when they stopped moving.
Prisoners
were counted lucky if they survived for more than four weeks.
In
1943 on Yom Kippur, Goeth and SS officers shot 50 Jews and prisoners were
regularly hanged in front of others.
Schindler
Jew Moshe Beijski's testimony at the trial of war criminal Adolf Eichmann is
quoted on the Auschwitz website: 'The case of Olmer, whose daughter lives in
Jerusalem, and I know her .. He was summoned by the Camp Commandant Amon Goeth.
'The
Camp Commandant had two dogs, Ralf and Rolf, and he set the dogs on him. The
dogs ate him up alive. Possibly a little breath still remained in him. He shot
him and he was killed.'
In
another testimony, an older man received a beating and was then made to thank
Goeth for it.
When
he turned to leave, he was shot in the back.
At
Plaszow, Goeth spent the mornings using a high-powered rifle to shoot children
playing in the camp.
Schindler
Jew Poldek Pfefferberg said: 'When you saw Goeth, you saw death.'
Goeth
was arrested by the Gestapo for theft in 1944 but charges were dropped as
Germany faced defeat by the Allied Forces.
He
was arrested again in 1945, this time by U.S. forces and put on trial in 1946
at the Supreme National Tribunal of Poland in Krakow.
Goeth
was found guilty on September 5, 1946 and executed on the 13.
Mr
Caldwell-Adams added: 'The prison record only says two words: "He
died". The Polish archives have been 80 per cent sure that it was him.
'We
knew the WFDIF had the original film and when we went to them they said the
film on the internet was theirs and they were 80 per cent sure it was Goeth.
'When
you think about the end of the war, Poland was a mess.
'They
weren't terribly concerned by the accuracy of the records so the video may have
just been dumped on a table and mislabeled.
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Documentary
film director David Caldwell-Evans said Goeth, portrayed here by Fiennes, has
been 'slightly forgotten' (SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2296911/Amon-Goeth-Did-executed-Nazi-murderer-Schindlers-List-escape-justice.html)
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'The clip was later used
in a documentary about Goeth and uploaded to YouTube and it has all perpetuated
the myth.
'People in Krakow are
aware of Goeth but he has slightly been forgotten.
'Schindler's List gave
us a hero and a villain, but without remembering the villain we can forget the
hero and what he fought against.'
In Steven Spielberg's
1993 masterpiece Schindler's List, Goeth was played by Ralph Fiennes - winning
a Bafta for Best Supporting Actor.
Fiennes' portrayal led
to Goeth being named as the 15th biggest villain in movie history by the
American Film Institute.
Oskar Schindler, played
by Liam Neeson, was named 15th top hero.
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