Christian Wirth
Christian Wirth | |
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Bełżec , December 1941 — end of August 1942 | |
Awards |
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Part of Auschwitz , May 1944 |
Christian Wirth (German:
Wirth worked within the
Early life
Christian Wirth was born on 24 November 1885 in Oberbalzheim, Württemberg, part of the German Empire. The son of a master cooper, after attending elementary and continuation school, Wirth learned the sawyer's craft. From 1905 to 1910, he was a member of the Württemberg Grenadier Regiment 123. By 1910 Wirth had worked as a policeman in Heilbronn, but he soon moved to Stuttgart, where he was a detective of the police.
During the
Family
Wirth married Maria Bantel and fathered two children.[4]
Early Nazi career
Wirth was one of the original members of the Nazi Party, joining for the first time in 1923, before
He again joined the
After the Nazi party rose to power in Germany, Wirth served in the Württemberg police force. He had joined the uniformed police (Orpo) in 1910 before the onset of World War I.[6] Wirth rose to become the captain of detectives (German: Kriminalkommissar) of the Kriminalpolizei (Kripo) in Stuttgart.[citation needed]
Aktion T4
This section needs additional citations for verification. (March 2017) |
At the end of 1939, Wirth, along with other Kripo police officers, was detached from the police for service with the Action T4 "euthanasia" program. These police officers served as nonmedical supervisors at the killing centers of the euthanasia program, and Wirth was chief among them. At the age of fifty-five, Wirth was among the oldest personnel involved in T-4. Wirth first set up office procedures at the "euthanasia" center at
In December 1939 or January 1940, Wirth was present when twenty to thirty German mental patients were subjected to the first known gassing experiment using carbon monoxide. This is where the idea to disguise the gas chambers as showers was introduced. Wirth continued to participate as a troubleshooter in the T-4 killing centers. For instance, when at Brandenburg a group of suspecting mental patients refused to enter the (disguised) gas chamber, Wirth coaxed them into the room by telling them that they had to enter it in order to receive clothing.[8] But Wirth's most intimate connection with T-4 was at the Hartheim killing centre, where he was chief of the office staff and director of personnel. At Hartheim, Wirth oversaw paperwork as head of the registry office, directed the killing process as the individual responsible for security, and commanded the junior staff as director of personnel. Wirth was coarse and brutal, feared by his subordinates and known to use any means necessary to ensure a smooth killing operation. When four female patients at Hartheim were suspected of having contracted typhus, Wirth shot them to prevent the spread of disease to the staff.[6]
Wirth's responsibility for murdering Jews began in September 1940, when handicapped Jews were first gassed at Brandenburg. In mid-1940, Wirth was appointed as an inspector of a dozen killing facilities in the Third Reich. He frequented the Hartheim killing centre, where
Wirth was a gross and florid man. My heart sank when I met him. He stayed at Hartheim for several days that time and often came back. Whenever he was there he addressed us daily at lunch. And here it was again this awful verbal crudity: when he spoke about the necessity of
T-4 had described it to me. He laughed. He spoke of 'doing away with useless mouths', and that 'sentimental slobber' about such people made him 'puke'.[9][10]: 183–186
In mid-1941, Wirth was involved in the "euthanasia" program in western areas of Poland; his activity during this time is obscure. In August 1941 Wirth was transferred out of T-4.
Operation Reinhard
After the
Before coming to Belzec, Wirth became acquainted with the gas vans in operation in
gas vans inspired his solution. He decided to combine in Belzec the permanent gas chamber with the internal combustion car engine as gas supplier. Wirth objected to the bottles of carbon monoxidegas that had been used in euthanasia institutions. The bottles, which were produced in private factories and which would be supplied to Belzec in large quantities, could arouse suspicion. In addition, the factories were located at great distances from Belzec and the steady supply of the bottles might cause a logistical problem. Wirth preferred to set up a self-contained extermination system, based on an ordinary car engine and easily available gasoline and not dependent on supply by outside factors...
Wirth carried out experiments to determine the most efficient method of handling the transports of Jews from the time of their arrival at the camp until their murder and burial. He developed some basic concepts for the process of extermination and for camp structure. The basic structure of the camp and the various actions the victims were made to do as soon as they left the train were intended to ensure that they would not grasp the fact that they had been brought for extermination. The aim was to give the victims the impression that they had arrived at a labor camp or a transit camp from where they would be sent to a labor camp. The deportees were to believe this until they were closed into the gas chambers camouflaged as baths.The second principle of the extermination process was that everything should be carried out with the utmost speed. The victims should be rushed, made to run, so that they had no time to look round, to reflect, or to understand what was going on. This also supported the basic principle of deceiving the victims. They should be shocked, and their reactions paralyzed in order to prevent escape or resistance. The speed of the extermination process served yet an additional purpose: it increased the killing capacity of the camp. More transports could be brought and annihilated in one day.
According to Wirth's annihilation scheme, the Jews themselves should carry out all physical work involved in the extermination process of a transport...[10]: 24–27
Fellow
Polizeihauptmann [police captain] Christian Wirth conducted the Aktionen in Bernburg. Subordinate to him were the burners, disinfectors and drivers. He also supervised the transportation of the mentally ill and of the corpses. One day in the winter of 1941 Wirth arranged a transport [of euthanasia personnel] to Poland. I was picked together with about eight or ten other men and transferred to Belzec... I don't remember the names of the others. Upon our arrival in Belzec, we met Friedel Schwarz [sic] and the other SS men, whose names I cannot remember. They supervised the construction of barracks that would serve as a gas chamber. Wirth told us that in Belzec "all the Jews will be struck down." For this purpose barracks were built as gas chambers. I installed shower heads in the gas chambers. The nozzles were not connected to any water pipes; they would serve as camouflage for the gas chamber. For the Jews who were gassed it would seem as if they were being taken to baths and for disinfection.[10]: 24
On 1 August 1942, Globocnik appointed him to the post of Inspector of Aktion Reinhard camps, which would grant Wirth overall command of the
Wirth was noted for his unusually brutal rule. He established the regime of terror and death which was carried out in all Operation Reinhard camps more than any other camp commander. During his time at Bełżec, Wirth experimented with different methods to most efficiently deal with prisoners. He developed much of the systematic policy for interaction with the prisoners. For instance, Wirth decided that newly arrived prisoners to be murdered should be beaten with whips incessantly to drive them into the gas chambers, thus creating a sense of panic and terror in which the prisoners felt forced to comply. Such policies were soon implemented at the other death camps.[11][12]
SS-Unterscharführer (Corporal) Franz Suchomel testified about Wirth:
From my activity in the camps of Treblinka and Sobibor, I remember that Wirth in brutality, meanness, and ruthlessness could not be surpassed. We therefore called him 'Christian the Terrible' or 'The Wild Christian'. The Ukrainian guardsmen called him 'Stuka'. The brutality of Wirth was so great that I personally see it as a perversity. I remember particularly that on each occasion, Wirth lashed Ukrainian guardsmen with the whip he always kept...[10]: 183–186
If only someone had had the courage to kill Christian Wirth – then
Aktion Reinhard would have collapsed. Berlin would not have found another man with such energy for evil and nastiness.[13]
During the construction of
To tell the truth, one did become used to it... they were cargo. I think it started the day I first saw the Totenlager [extermination area] in Treblinka. I remember Wirth standing there, next to the pits full of black-blue corpses. It had nothing to do with humanity – it could not have. It was a mass – a mass of rotting flesh. Wirth said 'What shall we do with this garbage?' I think unconsciously that started me thinking of them as cargo.[10]: 183–186
In May 1943, after
When Operation Reinhard was terminated after three million Polish Jews and thousands of Roma were murdered, Wirth was sent to
Allegedly to remove potential future witnesses, their superiors assigned former death camp staff to the most dangerous job they could find: anti-partisan combat. While in prison in 1971, Stangl stated in an interview, "We were an embarrassment to our [superiors]. They wanted to find ways and means to 'incinerate' us."
Death
Wirth was shot and killed by Yugoslav partisans near Kozina, Istria, on 26 May 1944.[15]
Sources
- Bresheeth, Hood and Jansz, The Holocaust for Beginners, Icon Books, 1994, ISBN 1-874166-16-1
- ISBN 0-14-013463-8
- ISBN 0-00-637194-9
- ISBN 978-0-241-29700-1
- ISBN 0-7139-9456-8
References
- ^ ISBN 0-02-897502-2
- ^ Nationalsozialistische Besatzungs- und Annexionspolitik in Norditalien (in German)
- ISBN 9780241979952.
- ^ "Christian Wirth: Timeline (1885-1944)". H.E.A.R.T. - Holocaust Education and Research Team. holocaustresearchproject.org. Retrieved 28 January 2018.
- ^ ISBN 3-10-039309-0
- ^ ISBN 0-8078-2208-6
- ISBN 1-56852-133-2.
- ISBN 0-8078-2208-6
- ISBN 9780712674478.
- ^ ISBN 9780253342935.
- ^ Franz Stangl interview
- ^ Shoah (documentary film) (1985).
- ^ Tregenza, Michael. Christian Wirth: Inspekteur der Sonderkommandos, Aktion Reinhard. Vol. XV, Lublin 1993, p. 7.
- ^ Sereny, Gitta. Into That Darkness: An Examination of Conscience. Vintage, 1983.
- ^ "Christian Wirth, "Dealer in Death"". Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team. 2007.