On
this date, August 21, 1962, one of the SS personnel involved in Operation
Reinhard, hanged himself before his trial could begin. I will post information
about Hermann Höfle from Wikipedia and other links.
Hermann Höfle
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Birth
name
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Hermann Julius Höfle
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Nickname(s)
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Hans
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Born
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19 June 1911
Salzburg, Austria |
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Died
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21 August 1962 (aged 51)
Vienna, Austria |
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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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1933—1945
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Rank
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Sturmbannführer, SS
(Major)
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Commands
held
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Operation Reinhard
Coordinator |
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Other work
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Auto mechanic
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Hermann Julius Höfle also Hans (or) Hermann Hoefle (19 June 1911 – 21 August 1962) was an Austrian-born SS-Sturmbannführer (Major). He was deputy to Odilo Globocnik in the Aktion Reinhard program, serving as his main deportation and extermination expert. As such he was heavily involved in crimes against humanity during the Holocaust.
Background
Born
in Salzburg,
Austria,
Höfle joined the NSDAP
on 1 August 1933, with party number 307,469. He joined the SS at
the same time. Before the war, he worked as an auto
mechanic.
Crimes
against humanity
After
the conquest of Poland, Höfle served in Nowy Sącz,
in Southern Poland. In November 1940 he served as an overseer of a Jewish labour
camp southeast of Lublin. Up to December 1941 Höfle was in Mogilev, Russia. He was
involved in deportations to the camps of Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka.
He lived and worked from the Aktion Reinhard headquarters
with the Julius Schreck Barracks, Ostland Strasse, in Lublin.
Höfle
was "Coordinator" of Operation Reinhard and deputy to Odilo Globocnik
(effectively making Höfle second-in-command within the program), serving as his
main deportation and extermination expert. Höfle had chief authority of
Operation Reinhard beside Globocnik. At the beginning of the operation, he held
the rank of Hauptsturmführer (Captain). SS members,
including those from Action T4 who were assigned to the operation,
reported to the headquarters in Lublin and were instructed to their duties by Höfle. For an
example of the limited paperwork, every member of Operation Reinhard signed the
following declaration of secrecy:
I have been thoroughly informed and instructed by SS Hauptsturmführer Höfle, as Commander of the main department of Einsatz Reinhard of the SS and Police Leader in the District of Lublin:1. that I may not under any circumstances pass on any form of information, verbally or in writing, on the progress, procedure or incidents in the evacuation of Jews to any person outside the circle of Einsatz Reinhard staff;
2. that the process of the evacuation of Jews is a subject that comes under "Secret Reich Document," in accordance with censorship regulation Vershl V. a;...
4. that there is an absolute prohibition on photography in the camps of Einsatz Reinhard;...
I am familiar with the above regulations and laws and am aware of the responsibilities imposed upon me by the task with which I have been entrusted. I promise to observe them to the best of my knowledge and conscience. I am aware that the obligation to maintain secrecy continues even after I have left the Service.
— From: Yitzhak Arad, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka.
As
head of the "Main Department" (German:
Hauptabteilung), Höfle was in charge of the organization and manpower
of Operation Reinhard. He coordinated the deportations of Jews from all areas
of the General Government and directed them to one of
the extermination camps.} The deportation orders were coordinated and channeled
through SS authorities from Höfle's office for the Lublin reservation, through the district SS and Police Leaders, down to the localities
where the expulsions were to take place.
Around
May 1942 in the General Government, a substitution policy
developed for a short time in which Polish workers who
were sent to the German Reich were gradually replaced with Jewish laborers. It
became standard procedure to stop deportation trains from the Reich and
Slovakia in Lublin in order to select able-bodied Jews for work in the General
Government, the others being sent on to their deaths in Belzec. In this
way, many Jews were temporarily spared death and instead relegated to forced
labor. Hermann Höfle was one of the chief supporters and implementers of this
policy.
Höfle
personally oversaw the deportation of the Warsaw
Ghetto, the so-called Großaktion Warschau. The operation was
preceded on 20 and 21 July 1942 by a spree of randomly killing actions along
the streets of the Ghetto and by the arrest and brutal imprisonment of many
others taken as hostages among counselors, department managers and those
connected in a way or another to the Judenrat. All
this was to intimidate and soften the Judenrat to the new upcoming measures.
The day after, in the morning of 22 July, Sturmbannführer Höfle, accompanied by an
entourage of SS and government officials, arrived at the Judenrat in
the Warsaw
Ghetto and announced to the chairman, Adam Czerniaków, that the Jews, regardless of sex
or age and with but a few exceptions, were to be evacuated to the East. The
exceptions were workers in German factories who had valid work permits,
Judenrat employees, the Jewish Order Service, hospital patients and employees,
and the families of the exempt. The deportees were allowed to carry with them
15 kg of baggage, food
for three days, money, gold, and other valuables. The order also called for 6,000
Jews to report to the Umschlagplatz every day by 4 p.m. to board the trains
for deportation.
Adam Czerniaków wrote in his diary on 22 July 1941
(he committed suicide the next day):
Sturmbannführer Höfle (who is in charge of the evacuation) asked me into his office and informed me that for the time being my wife was free, but if the deportation were impeded in any way, she would be the first one to be shot as a hostage.— From: Yitzhak Arad, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka
Höfle
also played a key role in the Harvest Festival massacre of Jewish inmates of
the various labour camps in the Lublin district in early November 1943.
Approximately 43,000 Jews were murdered during this operation which was the
single largest German massacre of Jews in the entire war.
Höfle
rejoined Globocnik in Trieste, after various missions in the Netherlands and Belgium.
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Photocopy of personal
documents of Hermann Höfle, from his personal file, Berlin Document Center
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Telegram
from Hermann Höfle listing the number of deaths in the extermination camps
during a 14-day period in 1942 and for the whole year 1942 (1,274,166). (L)
stands for Lublin/Majdanek, (B) for Bełżec, (S) for
Sobibor and (T) for Treblinka extermination camp.
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Höfle
Telegram
On
11 January 1943, Höfle sent a radiogram from Lublin to SS-Obersturmbannführer
Franz
Heim in Kraków, who was at the time the deputy commander of the Security Police and SD
in the General Government, and to SS-Obersturmbannführer
Adolf Eichmann in Berlin. The message documented the total deportations of
Jews to the four Operation Reinhard camps through 31 of December 1942. Today this
document is called the Höfle
Telegram.
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Hermann Julius Höfle,
an SS officer who served in the Lublin district during the Operation Reinhard
phase of the Holocaust, during his arrest in Vienna, Austria, 1961.
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After
the war
On
31 May 1945 Höfle was found hiding in Möslacher Alm near the Weissensee Lake in Carinthia (Southern Austria) by the British,
along with SS storm troopers Ernst Lerch and Georg Michalsen. After two years in the
British interrogation center Wolfsberg (Carinthia), he was released to the
Austrian judicial system. On 30 October 1947, under oath, he was released to
continue his earlier occupation as an auto mechanic in his birthplace,
Salzburg.
After
an extradition request on 9 July 1948 by the Polish government, he fled to
Italy, where he lived under a false name until 1951. Later he returned to
Austria, and then emigrated to the Federal Republic of Germany. There he was
employed briefly as an informant for U.S. Army
Counterintelligence.
Höfle
returned to Salzburg, where he lived as a free man until 2 January 1961, when
he was arrested by the Austrian authority and sent to prison in Vienna, where in
1962 he hanged
himself before his trial could begin.
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