Hitler's First Victims
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5 Thousands of others were taken: Dachau was the only official concentration camp in Bavaria at the time, though state prisons and local jails, as well as warehouses, sports halls, and other facilities, served for temporary detention. The very first concentration camp in Germany was opened on March 3, 1933, in a school in Thuringia. In Bremen, an abandoned river barge was pressed into service. Of the seventy concentration camps established in Germany in 1933, only three were equipped with barracks, barbed wire, and watchtowers, at Papenburg, Emsland, and Dachau. For more on the early concentration camps, see Geoffrey P. Megargee, ed., foreword by Elie Wiesel, Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933–1945, vol. 1, Early Camps, Youth Camps, and Concentration Camps and Subcamps under the SS-Business Administration Main Office (WVHA) (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2009); Jane Kaplan and Nikolaus Wachsmann, eds., Concentration Camps in Nazi Germany: The New Histories (London and New York: Routledge, 2010); and Johannes Tuchel, Konzentrationslager: Organisationsgeschichte und Funktion der “Inspektion der Konzentrationslager” 1934–1938 (Boppard am Rhein: Harold Boldt Verlag, 1991).
6 “those in protective custody”: Letter from Cardinal Faulhaber to Franz von Epp, April 3, 1933, in Ludwig Volk, ed., Akten Kardinal Michael von Faulhabers 1917–1945, vol. 1: 1917–1934 (Mainz: Matthias Grünewald Verlag, 1975), 693.
7 his “greatest ambition”: Ibid.
8 “Most Honorable Herr Cardinal”: Letter from Wagner to Faulhaber, April 12, 1933, in Bernhard Stasiewski, ed., Akten deutscher Bischöfe über die Lage der Kirche 1933–1945, vol. 1: 1933–1934 (Mainz: Matthias Grünewald Verlag, 1968), 124.
9 Paragraph 159: See Dr. Otto Schwarz, Strafprozessordnung mit Gerichtsverfassungsgesetz und den wichtigsten nebengesetzen des Reiches, Preussens und Bayerns, Dritte, verbesserte und vermehrte Auflage, Stand vom 15. Mai 1933 (Berlin: Verlag von Otto Liebmann, 1933), 146–47. Further references cited throughout the notes as Strafprozessordnung.
10 “As soon as the prosecutor”: Ibid., 147.
11 had earned perfect grades: Performance appraisal, “Meinungsäusserung über den Oberarzt Moritz Flamm. Garnisonlazarett München Station B III,” May 20, 1920, in Flamm’s military personnel file, BayHStA Abt. IV OP 739.
12 “Particularly noteworthy is”: Ibid.
13 “At the front [Flamm] became”: Ibid.
14 Flamm was accused: For Flamm’s complaint, see the letter in his military personnel file: “Betreff: Beschwerde des Oberarzt Moritz Flamm. An Reichsbefehlstelle Bayern; Absender: Generalarzt,” September 19, 1919.
15 After two years with Flamm: Letter from Josef Hartinger to August R. Lang, January 16, 1984.
16 After the war: On November 7, 1918, King Ludwig III of Bavaria was deposed and Bavaria declared its independence from the Reich as the People’s State of Bavaria (Volksstaat Bayern), which in turn led to the establishment of the Soviet Republic (Bayerische Räterepublik) in April 1919. The Battle of Dachau was fought on April 16, 1919, between the troops of the Bavarian Red Army and ad hoc military forces sent to depose the Bolshevik government. Two weeks later, right-wing Bavarian militia units, known as Freikorps, or Free Corps, supported by Reichswehr (regular army) units dispatched from Berlin, overthrew the Bolshevik government and returned Bavaria to the Berlin government as the Ordnungszelle Bayern, or the “orderly cell” of Bavaria.
17 “Since 1920”: “Arbeitsbeschaffungsmöglichkeit in den Deutschen Werken,” Dachauer Zeitung, January 25, 1933.
18 “The facility seemed uncanny”: Eugen Mondt, Künstler und Käuze: Aufzeichnungen aus dem Dachau der 20er Jahre (Munich: Süddeutscher Verlag, 1979).
19 “On the water tower”: “Neues Leben in dem Deutschen Werken?,” Dachauer Zeitung, March 21, 1933.
20 On Monday, March 20: Hans-Günter Richardi, Schule der Gewalt: Die Anfänge des Konzentrationslagers Dachau 1933–1934: Ein dokumentischer Bericht (Munich: C. H. Beck Verlag, 1995), 36–37.
21 “These are to be armed”: Letter from Josef Hartinger to August R. Lang, Munich, February 11, 1984, DaA 20.109.
22 “authorities and officials of the police”: Strafprozessordnung, 147–48.
23 He was told that the four: The scene as described by Erspenmüller is recounted in Wintersberger’s report of the incident, “Tötung flüchtiger Gefangener im Sammellager Dachau,” April 24, 1933, USHMM 1995 A. 104: 67–69.
24 the deputy camp commandant: Robert Erspenmüller’s name is occasionally miscited in testimonies as Erpsenmüller or Erbsenmüller. In the camp, he was sometimes referred to as “die Erbse,” meaning “the pea.”
25 “One of the stretcher-bearers”: Testimony of Josef Gabriel, “Zeugenvernehmungsprotokoll aufgenommen in der gerichtlichen Voruntersuchung gegen Birzle Wilhelm,” Weilheim, January 23, 1953, StAM Stanw 34465.
26 He asked to see a rabbi: Ibid.
27 The corpses had been unceremoniously: Testimony of Emil Schuler, Nuremberg, March 29, 1951, StAM Stanw 34464/3.
28 Their heads were shorn: “Tötung flüchtiger Gefangener im Sammellager Dachau,” April 24, 1933, USHMM 1995 A. 104: 67–69.
29 Arthur Kahn, the medical student: Ibid.
30 Dr. Rudolf Benario, a political scientist: Ibid.
31 Ernst Goldmann, more robust: Ibid.
32 “Your guards are very good shots”: Transcript of Hans Steinbrenner’s interrogation, Garmisch, August 19, 1948. DaA 22.031. At that time Steinbrenner had already undergone a number of interrogations and was being held in internment in Garmisch. Steinbrenner does not specify the exact context in which Flamm made this remark to Wäckerle, but I have taken the liberty of situating it during their first encounter.
33 “They started beating the Jews: For Gesell’s account, see Hans-Günter Richardi, Schule der Gewalt, 62.
34 “they were beaten horrifically”: For Scharnagel’s account, see Siegfried Imholz, “Der Mord an Ernst Goldmann in Dachau am 12. April 1933,” 6: http://www.der-landbote.de/Downloads/Der%20Mord%20an%20Ernst%20Jakob%20Goldmann.pdf.
35 Around three o’clock: Richardi, Schule der Gewalt, 89.
36 “On the critical day”: Testimony of Heinrich Ultsch, Nuremberg, March 6, 1950, StAM Stanw 34462/4.
37 “ ‘You come along too’ ”: Ibid.
38 He handed the four of them spades and picks: Ibid. In his postwar interrogation, Steinbrenner mistakenly said that he had selected five Jewish detainees and that he had selected them at random. There are also varying accounts as to the exact time and circumstances of the selection process, though there is general agreement that the incident took place in the late afternoon toward dusk of April 12. See the transcript of the Steinbrenner interrogation, Garmisch, August 19, 1948.
39 “Everybody stop!”: Richardi, Schule der Gewalt, 89.
40 According to Gessell: Ibid.
41 “a terrified young man pressed hard”: Letter from Josef Hartinger to August R. Lang, February 11, 1984.
42 “my assessment of the personalities”: Ibid.
2 LATE AFTERNOON NEWS
1 Leo and Maria Benario were preparing a package: Letter from Leo Benario to the administration of the Dachau Concentration Camp, April 13, 1933, personal archive of Michael Schneeberger, Kitzingen, Germany, reprinted on page 12 in Birken am Rednitzufer—eine Dokumentation über Dr. Rudolf Benario am 12. April 1933 im KZ Dachau ermordet, Schulprojekt der Hauptschule Soldnerstrasse, Stadt Fürth, 2003.
2 Since the town jail was too small: Siegfried Imholz, “Der Mord an Ernst Goldmann in Dachau am 12. April 1933,” 6: http://www.der-landbote.de/Downloads/Der%20Mord%20an%20Ernst%20Jakob%20Goldmann.pdf.
3 “Among the individual students”: Letter from the rector of the Friedrich Alexander University in Erlangen, “An das Staatsministerium für Unterricht und Kultur,” December 12, 1932, Archive of Erlangen University, reprinted in Birken am Rednitzufer, 7.
4 “Dr. Siegmund Bing, had frequented”: Marianne Mohr, “Dr. Siegmund Bing, Nürnberg,” Rijo Research, August 24
, 2013. http://www.rijo.homepage.t-online.de/pdf/DE_NU_JU_bing.pdf.
5 They packed Rudolf’s winter coat: For a listing of the package contents, see the letter from Leo Benario to the administration of the Dachau Concentration Camp, April 13, 1933, reprinted in Birken am Rednitzufer, 12.
6 By the seventeenth century, Fürth: For a description and brief history of Fürth’s Jewish institutions, see “Jüdische Geschichte in Fürth”: http://www.fuerth.de/home/tourismus/geschichte/juedische-geschichte-in-fuerth.aspx.
7 “Maria was the daughter”: Rolf Seubert, “Mein lumpiges Vierteljahr Haft …,” in Alfred Andersch “Revisited”: Werkbiographische Studien im Zeichen der Sebald-Debatte, ed. Jörg Döring and Markus Joch (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter Verlag, 2011), 81. For a history of the Bing family see Ignaz Bing, Aus meinem Leben (Hamburg: Wellhausen & Marquardt Medien, 2004).
8 “This branch seems destined”: Advocate of Peace 75, no. 7 (July 1913): 149.
9 “When someone claims”: Adolf Hitler: Reden, Schriften, Anordnungen: Februar 1925 bis Januar 1933, ed. Institut für Zeitgeschichte, 5 vols. in 12 parts (Munich: Institut für Zeitgeschichte, 1992–98), vol. III, 680.
10 “Student Benario”: “Aus der Asta,” Erlanger Nachrichten, January 18, 1930.
11 “I do not think there is anything”: Speech given at Erlangen University, November 13, 1930. Adolf Hitler: Reden, Schriften, Anordnungen: Februar 1925 bis Januar 1933, ed. Institut für Zeitgeschichte, 5 vols. in 12 parts (Munich: Institut für Zeitgeschichte, 1992–98), vol. IV, 105.
12 “the big cleanup of Bavaria begins!”: Imholz, “Der Mord an Ernst Goldmann in Dachau,” 6.
13 “The all-too-well-known communist and Jew Benario”: “Ruhige Nacht in Fürth: Beginn der Generalsäuberung,” Fürther Anzeiger, March 10, 1933.
14 “The retired editor and guest lecturer”: Seubert, “Mein lumpiges Vierteljahr Haft …,” 84.
15 “To restore a national and professional civil service”: For the full text of the law (in German), see “Gesetz zur Wiederherstellung des Berufsbeamtentums”: http://www.documentarchiv.de/ns/beamtenges.html.
16 “For the moment I am still safe”: See Klemperer’s diary, April 12, 1933. Victor Klemperer, I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi War Years, 1933–1941, trans. Martin Chalmers (New York: Modern Library, 1999), 14.
17 “to give my son Rudolf Benario from the contents”: Letter from Leo Benario to the administration of the Dachau Concentration Camp, April 13, 1933.
18 THREE COMMUNISTS SHOT: “3 Kommunisten bei einem Fluchtversuch aus dem Dachauer Konzentrationslager erschossen,” Fürther Anzeiger, April 13–14, 1933.
19 “several more detainees have been released”: “Aus der Schutzhaft entlassen,” Amper-Bote, April 14–15, 1933.
3 WINTERSBERGER
1 “I did not hesitate to give my opinion”: Letter from Josef Hartinger to the Bavarian state minister of justice, August R. Lang, February 11, 1984, DaA 20.109.
2 his deputy possessed “many years of experience”: Hartinger’s performance review, “Dienstliche Würdigung 1931,” in his personnel file, state prosecutor’s office, BayHStA MJu 26797.
3 Wintersberger ran Munich II: Letter from Josef Hartinger to August R. Lang, February 11, 1984.
4 “needed to have a complete overview”: Ibid.
5 “iron diligence”: Wintersberger’s performance review, “Dienstliche Beurteilung durch den Präsidenten des Landgerichts München I,” May 22, 1931, BayHStA MJu 26443.
6 In his study: Emil J. Gumbel, “Die Einnahme von München,” in Vier Jahre politischer Mord (Berlin-Fichtenau: Verlag der Neuen Gesellschaft, 1922).
7 “Of the thirty-five jurisdictions”: Ibid., 125.
8 “In another era”: Ibid., 147–48.
9 Hitler’s plans came to an abrupt halt: Ian Kershaw, Hitler, 1889–1936: Hubris (New York: W. W. Norton, 1998), 211.
10 “You may pronounce us guilty”: “Vor dem Volksgericht: Vierundzwanzigster Verhandlungstag,” in Hitler: Sämtliche Aufzeichnungen, 1905–1924, ed. Eberhard Jäckel and Axel Kuhn (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1980), 1216.
11 A few weeks after Hitler’s courtoom triumph: For the verdict against Assault Troop Adolf Hitler, see “Urteil vom Volksgericht für den Landgerichtsbezirk München I in der Strafsache Berchtold Josef und 39 Genossen wegen Beihilfe zum Hochverrat, u.a.,” April 28, 1924, StAM JVA 12436. The trial records were destroyed during the bombing of Munich in the Second World War, but a notarized copy of the final verdict survived.
12 “not relevant in terms of the guilt”: Ibid., StAM JVA 12436: 10.
13 “the little Hitler trial”: In 1933, one Assault Troop defendant, Hans Kallenbach, published a memoir of his time in prison, With Hitler in Landsberg Prison, and devoted an entire chapter to the Wintersberger prosecution. Hitler himself provided an introduction to the book. Hans Kallenbach, Mit Adolf Hitler auf Festung Landsberg (Munich: Verlag Parcus & Co., 1933).
14 While Hitler’s trial: Kallenbach, Mit Hitler auf Festung Landsberg, 19.
15 the number of shattered windowpanes: Ibid., 23–24.
16 He chronicled the Assault Troop’s subsequent march: Ibid., 29.
17 “all means of judicial rhetoric”: Ibid., 33.
18 “Decree for Public Order”: See “Dritte Verordnung des Reichspräsidenten zur Sicherung von Wirtschaft und Finanzen und zur Bekämpfung politischer Ausschreitungen,” October 6, 1931: http://www.documentarchiv.de/wr/1931/wirtschaft-finanzen-ausschreitungen_reichspraesident-vo03.html#t7.
19 a growing number of assaults on Jews: James Waterman Wise, Swastika: The Nazi Terror (New York: Harrison Smith and Robert Haas, 1933), 55.
20 “For us, the citizen of the Jewish faith”: Peter Longerich, Heinrich Himmler: Biographie (Munich: Siedler Verlag, 2008), 160.
21 “In Chemnitz the Jewish lawyer”: “Jüdische Rechtsanwalt emordet: S.A. zur Aufdeckung der Tat eingesetzt,” Völkischer Beobachter, April 13, 1933.
22 Two of them were “tall, slender, and blond”: Ibid.
23 “Das machen die nicht”: Letter from Josef Hartinger to August R. Lang, February 11, 1984.
4 WITNESS TO ATROCITY
1 One bullet had penetrated his skull: For Kahn’s medical record, see “Kranken Hauptbuch Nr. II/173 Krankeitsgeschichte Erwin Kahn,” StAM Stanw 34465: 81–87.
2 “The injured man stated”: Ibid.
3 It was here that Joseph Lister: LMU Klinikum der Universität München, official website: http://www.klinikum.uni-muenchen.de/Klinik-fuer-Allgemeine-Unfall-Hand-und-Plastische-Chirurgie/de/ueber-uns/historischerRueckblick/index.html.
4 Kahn was taken into protective custody: For details of Erwin Kahn’s arrest, see Rolf Seubert, “Mein lumpiges Vierteljahr Haft …,” in Alfred Andersch “Revisited”: Werkbiographische Studien im Zeichen der Sebald-Debatte, ed. Jörg Döring and Markus Joch (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter Verlag, 2011), 89–90.
5 “You probably came to Stadelheim”: Letter from Erwin Kahn to his wife, Eva, March 23, 1933, StAM Stanw 34465: 115.
6 “I have but a single wish, to finally be”: Letter from Erwin Kahn to his wife, Eva, March 30, 1933, ibid., 116.
7 “I don’t know why I was arrested”: Letter from Erwin Kahn to his parents, April 5, 1933, ibid., 117.
8 Erwin Kahn mistakenly responded: Testimony of Heinrich Ultsch, Nuremberg, March 6, 1950, StAM Stanw 34462/4.
9 someone screamed for him to stop: Testimony of Emil Schuler, Nuremberg, March 29, 1953, StAM Stanw 34464/3.
10 “Average-sized man”: Erwin Kahn’s medical record.
11 “Condition is basically unchanged”: Ibid.
12 “My husband went on to explain”: Testimony of Eva Euphrosina Ehlers (Eva Kahn), “Niederschrift aufgenommen in der Voruntersuchung gegen Burner, Hans, ua. wegen Mord,” February 4, 1953, StAM Stanw 34465.
13 “
Fever rising”: Erwin Kahn’s medical record.
14 His breathing grew labored: Ibid.
15 “Nevertheless, these twenty-eight”: Pfanzelt’s letter of April 17, 1933, to the Ordinariat München. See the chapter by Thomas Kempter about the practice of religion in the first days of the camp, “Die ersten Gottesdienste und die Erlaubnis zur Beichte,” in his thesis “Gott Feiern in Dachau: Die Feier der Eucharistie im KZ Dachau” (Diplomarbeit, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg/Breisgau, September 2005), 39.
16 In Nuremberg, Bernhard Kolb: Bernhard Kolb’s manuscript “Die Jüden in Nürnberg: Tausendjährige Geschichte einer Judengemeinde von ihren Anfängen bis zum Einmarsch der amerikanischen Truppen am 20. April 1945.” The manuscript was edited with an introduction by Gerhard Jochem in 2007 and published online with the title Bernhard Kolb: Die Jüden in Nürnberg 1839–1945. Kolb also mentions the deaths of Benario, Goldmann, and Erwin Kahn, as well as several other Jewish detainees who died in Dachau, though some of his observations are based on hearsay and not always accurate. For the full text, see: www.rijo.homepage.t-online.de/pdf/DE_NU_JU_kolb_text.pdf.
17 “the camp administration wanted to conceal”: Ibid., 21.
18 Kahn had been a political activist: Letter from Herbert Kahn to Gertraud Lehmann, December 15, 1993, in which he wrote that “my brother was a medical student in Würzburg and was at the time of his arrest during the Easter holiday in Nuremberg. He was also active in the anti-Nazi movement in Würzburg.” See Seubert, “Mein lumpiges Vierteljahr Haft …,” 88.
19 he was taken into protective custody: Ibid., 87.
20 The manifest identifies: Ibid.
21 “When the news came”: Author’s telephone interview with Lothar Kahn, February 19, 2014.
22 “According to newspaper reports”: The article was referenced in Arthur Kahn’s student record at the University of Würzburg, 1933; see Seubert, “Mein lumpiges Vierteljahr Haft …,” 87.