| SS-Totenkopfverbände (SS-TV) | |
 Right collar insignia (second version, 1934–1945) | |
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 SS-TV officers atGusen concentration camp (October 1941) | |
| Agency overview | |
|---|---|
| Formed | 1936; 89 years ago (1936) |
| Dissolved | May 8, 1945; 80 years ago (1945-05-08) |
| Type | Paramilitary organisation |
| Jurisdiction | |
| Headquarters | Oranienburg, nearBerlin 52°45′16″N13°14′13″E / 52.75444°N 13.23694°E /52.75444; 13.23694 |
| Employees | 22,033 (SS-TV 1939[1] and SS DivisionTotenkopfc. 1942) |
| Minister responsible |
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| Agency executives |
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| Parent agency | Schutzstaffel |
SS-Totenkopfverbände (SS-TV;lit. 'SS Death's Head Units'[2] or 'SS Death's Head Battalions'[3]) was a major branch of theNazi Party'sparamilitarySchutzstaffel (SS) organisation. It was responsible for administering theconcentration camps andextermination camps ofNazi Germany, among similar duties.[4] It was both the successor and expanded organisation to theSS-Wachverbände (guard units) formed in 1933. While theTotenkopf was the universal cap badge of the SS, the SS-TV also wore this insignia on the rightcollar tab to distinguish itself from other SS formations.
On 29 March 1936, concentration camp guards and administration units were officially designated as theSS-Totenkopfverbände (SS-TV). The SS-TV was an independent unit within the SS, with its own command structure. It ran the camps throughoutGermany and later inoccupied Europe. Camps in Germany includedDachau,Bergen-Belsen, andBuchenwald; camps elsewhere in Europe includedAuschwitz-Birkenau inGerman occupied Poland andMauthausen inAustria among the numerous other concentration camps, anddeath camps handled with the utmost of secrecy. The extermination camps' function was genocide; they includedTreblinka,Bełżec, andSobibór built specifically forAktion Reinhard, as well as the originalChełmno extermination camp, andMajdanek which was fitted with mass killing facilities, along with Auschwitz. They were responsible for facilitating what the Nazis calledthe Final Solution, known since the war asthe Holocaust;[5] perpetrated by the SS within the command structure of theReich Security Main Office, subordinate toHeinrich Himmler, and theSS Economic and Administrative Main Office or WVHA.[6]
At the outbreak ofWorld War II in Europe, theSS DivisionTotenkopf was formed from SS-TV personnel. It soon developed a reputation for brutality, participating inwar crimes such as theLe Paradis massacre in 1940 during theFall of France. On theEastern Front, the mass shootings of Polish and Soviet civilians inOperation Barbarossa were the work ofEinsatzgruppen mobile death squads and their subgroups calledEinsatzkommando. These units were organized byHeinrich Himmler andReinhard Heydrich.[7][8]
After taking national power in 1933, theNazi Party launched a new programme of mass incarceration of the so-called enemies of the state. Originally there were only wild camps in operation. Springing up in every town across Germany "like mushrooms after the rain" (Himmler's quote),[9] the early camps utilized lockable spaces usually without infrastructure for permanent detention (i.e. engine rooms, brewery floors, storage facilities, cellars).[10] Following the fall from power of the paramilitary Brownshirts of theSA during the NSDAP purge known as theNight of the Long Knives (30 June to 2 July 1934), the SS took control of the fledgling camp system.[11] The SS founded state-run concentration camps atDachau,Oranienburg, andEsterwegen, which held the total of 107,000 'undesirables' already by 1935.[12]
On 26 June 1933,Reichsführer-SSHeinrich Himmler appointed SS-OberführerTheodor Eicke theKommandant of theDachau concentration camp.[13] Eicke requested a permanent unit that would be subordinate only to him, and hence theSS-Wachverbände (guard units) were formed.[13] Eicke began his infamous tenure by issuing new orders about the killing of inmates trying to escape (Postenpflicht). He developed the firstLagerordnung, a Nazi disciplinary and penal code regulating the system of extreme disciplinary sanctions for detainees. His rules were adopted by all concentration camps of Nazi Germany as of 1 January 1934. Eicke was promoted to SS-Brigadeführer (equivalent to amajor-general in the army) on 30 January 1934. Following the Night of the Long Knives, Eicke – who played a role in the affair by shooting SA chiefErnst Röhm – was again promoted to the rank of SS-Gruppenführer and officially appointedInspector of Concentration Camps and Commander of theSS-Wachverbände. Thereafter, all remaining SA-run camps were taken over by the SS.[14][15][16] In his role as the Concentration Camps Inspector, Eicke began a large reorganisation of the camps in 1935. The smaller camps were dismantled. Dachau concentration camp remained, then personnel from Dachau went on to work atSachsenhausen andOranienburg, where Eicke established his central office.[2]
In 1935, Dachau became the training center for the concentration camps service.[2] Many of the early recruits came from the ranks of the SA andAllgemeine SS. Senior roles were filled by personnel from theOrdnungspolizei, the police who maintained order. On 29 March 1936, concentration camp guards and administration units were officially designated as theSS-Totenkopfverbände (SS-TV).[17] In the summer of 1937,Buchenwald became operational, followed byRavensbrück (nearLichtenburg) in May 1939. There were other new camps in Austria, such asMauthausen-Gusen concentration camp, which opened in 1938.[2] All SS camps' regulations, both for guards and prisoners, followed the Dachau camp model.[18]
In 1935, as the concentration camp system within Germany expanded, groups of camps were organized intoWachsturmbanne (battalions) under the office of the Inspector of Concentration Camps who answered directly to the SS headquarters office andHeinrich Himmler. When theSS-Totenkopfverbände were formally established in March 1936, the group was organized into sixWachtruppen situated at each of Germany's major concentration camps. In April 1936, Eicke was named commander of theSS-Totenkopfverbände and the number of men under his command increased from 2,876 to 3,222; the Concentration Camps Inspectorate (CCI) was also provided official funding through the Reich's budget office, and Eicke was allowed to recruit future troops from the Hitler Youth based on regional needs.[19] In 1937, theWachsturmbanne were in turn organized into three mainSS-Totenkopfstandarten (regiments).
By 1936, Eicke had begun to establish military formations of concentration camp personnel which eventually became theTotenkopf Division and other units of theWaffen-SS. In the early days of the military camp service formation, the group's exact chain of command was contested since Eicke asFührer der Totenkopfverbände exercised personal control of the group but also, as it was considered an armed SS formation, authority over the armed units was claimed by theSS-Verfügungstruppe (SS-VT), which had been first formed in 1934 as combat troops for the Nazi Party. But at this time, Himmler and Eicke envisioned the armed SS-VT as a force for internal "police and security operations". Later by 1938, it became clear that the SS-VT troops were to be used for front-line "purposes", as well.[20]
Eicke in his role as the commander of the SS-TV, continued to reorganize the camp system by dismantling smaller camps. By August 1937 only Dachau,Sachsenhausen,Buchenwald andRavensbrück remained in Germany. In 1938 Eicke oversaw the building of new camps in Austria following theAnschluss, such asMauthausen. Eicke's reorganization and the introduction of forced labor made the camps one of the SS's most powerful tools, but it earned him the enmity ofGestapo andSicherheitsdienst (SD) chief,Reinhard Heydrich, who wanted to take over control of the concentration camp system. Himmler wanted to keep a separation of power, so Eicke remained in command of the SS-TV and camp operations. This kept control of the camps out of the hands of the Gestapo or the SD.[21]
By April 1938, the SS-TV had four regiments of three storm battalions with three infantry companies, one machine gun company and medical, communication and transportation units.[22] On 17 August 1938 Hitler decreed, at Himmler's request, the SS-TV to be the official reserve for the SS-VT;[23] this would over the course of the war lead to a constant flux of men between theWaffen-SS and the concentration camps. Himmler's intention was simply to expand his private army by using the SS-TV (as well as the police, which he also controlled) as a manpower pool. Himmler sought and obtained a further decree, issued on 18 May 1939, which authorized the expansion of the SS-TV to 50,000 men, and directed the army to provide it with military equipment, something the army had resisted.[17]
"the object of war is . . . physically to destroy the enemy. That is why I have prepared, for the moment only in the East, my 'Death's Head' formations with orders to kill without pity or mercy all men, women, and children ofPolish descent orlanguage. Only in this way can we obtain theliving space we need."
During the Germaninvasion of Poland in September 1939, Eicke's SS-TV field forces numbered four infantry regiments and a cavalry regiment, plus two battalions placed inFree City of Danzig.[26] The SS-TV role in the attack on Poland was not military in spite of close proximity to combat. "Their military capabilities were employed instead in terrorizing the civilian population through acts that included hunting down straggling Polish soldiers, confiscating agricultural produce and livestock, and torturing and murdering large numbers of Polish political leaders, aristocrats, businessmen, priests, intellectuals, and Jews."[27] Eicke's three regiments, Oberbayern, Brandenburg and Thuringen, were reformed as the firstEinsatzgruppen; the Oberbayern and the Thuringen (EG II and EG z. B.V) followed theTenth Army inUpper Silesia; the Brandenburg (EG III) followed theEight Army acrossWarthegau.[28] The behavior of theseStandarten in Poland elicited some protests from officers of the army, including 8th Army commanderJohannes Blaskowitz who wrote a memorandum toWalther von Brauchitsch detailing the SS-TV atrocities,[29] unaware that they were planned years in advance by theCentral Unit II P-Poland underHeydrich who himself coordinated secret extermination actions includingOperation Tannenberg and theIntelligenzaktion both targeting more than 61,000 members ofPolish elites during the opening stages of World War II.[30]
At the beginning of war in Europe, the SS forces consisted of roughly 250,000 servicemen spread out across multiple branches,[4] with transferable ranks and service records from police regiments and the army.[4] Himmler's military formations at this time comprised several subgroups, including theSS-Verfügungstruppe, which would become the basis of theWaffen-SS.[31] Hitler approved further expansion of the armed SS formations.[32] By October 1939, a new SS military division theSS-Totenkopf was formed.[32] TheTotenkopf was initially formed from concentration camp guards of theStandarten (regiments) of the SS-TV and soldiers from theSS-Heimwehr "Danzig. Members of other SS militias were transferred into the division in early 1940; these units had been involved in multiple massacres of Polish civilians, political leaders and prisoners of war.[33]
From fall 1939 to spring 1940 a massive recruitment effort in Germany raised no fewer than twelve newTK-Standarten (four times the size of theSS-Verfügungstruppe) in anticipation of the coming attack on France. Both Eicke personally and hisTotenkopf Division performed poorly duringFall Gelb therefore Himmler resolved to curb his decisions which had spurred a conflict withHausser andDietrich; especially his designation ofTK-Standarten as reserves for hisTotenkopf Division alone, and the fact that theSS-Verfügungstruppe military supplies were stored at Eicke's concentration camps. On 15 August 1940 Himmler dissolved Eicke's Inspectorate ofSS-Totenkopfstandarten using as justification several well-publicized atrocities committed by the Division in France, and transferred theTotenkopf Division, the independentTK-Standarten, and their reserve and replacement system to the newly formedWaffen-SS high command.[34] In February 1941 theTotenkopf designation was removed from the names of all units other than theTotenkopf Division and the campTotenkopfwachsturmbanne, and their personnel exchanged the Death's-Head collar insignia for theWaffen-SS Sig-runes. The camp system expanded greatly after the invasion of theSoviet Union in 1941, when large numbers of Soviet soldiers were captured. Some were transferred to the camps, where their inhumane treatment became normal.
TheTotenkopf Division still had close ties to the camp service and its members continued to wear the Death's-Head as their unit insignia. They were known for brutal tactics, a result of the original doctrine of "no pity" which Eicke had instilled in his camp personnel as far back as 1934, together with the fact that the originalTotenkopfstandarte had "trained" themselves. The Division's ineffectiveness in France, as well as its war crimes, can in part be explained by its personnel who were more thugs than soldiers. When first formed a total of 6,500 men from the SS-TV were transferred into theTotenkopf Division.[35] Over the course of the savage fighting in the East, the Division was twice effectively destroyed and recreated. Very few of the men who were part of the 1939Standarten in Poland were still in the Division by 1945.
After the close of theBattle of France, theSS-Verfügungstruppe was officially renamed theWaffen-SS in a speech made by Hitler in July 1940.[36] Himmler also gained approval for the Waffen-SS to form its own high command, theKommandoamt der Waffen-SS within theSS-Führungshauptamt, which was created in August 1940. It received command of theSS-Verfügungstruppe (theLeibstandarte and theSS-Verfügungs-Division, renamedReich) and the armed SS-TV regiments (theTotenkopf-Division together with the independentTotenkopf-Standarten). TheWaffen-SS was greatly expanded and allowed to recruit volunteers from conquered territories from the ethnic German and Germanic populations.[37]
After Eicke was reassigned to combat duty, his Chief of Staff SS-GruppenführerRichard Glücks was appointed the newConcentration Camps Inspectorate (CCI) or IKL (Inspektion der Konzentrationslager) chief by Himmler.[2] By 1940, the CCI came under the control of theVerwaltung und Wirtschaftshauptamt Hauptamt (VuWHA; Administration and Business office) which was set up underOswald Pohl.[38] Then in 1942, the CCI becameAmt D (Office D) of the consolidated main office known as theSS-Wirtschafts-Verwaltungshauptamt (SS Economic and Administrative Department; WVHA) under Pohl.[38] Glücks continued to manage the camp administration until the end of the war. Therefore, the entire concentration camp system was placed under the authority of the WVHA with the Inspector of Concentration Camps a subordinate to the Chief of the WVHA.[39]
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By 1941, prior to the "Final Solution", the concentration camps run by SS-TV, both in Germany and across occupied territories, grew into a massive system of institutionalized forced labour for the SS. The concentration camp personnel began to arrive from the front-line SS formations upon medical discharge. Attack dogs were introduced to compensate for the personnel shortage.[40] Special death camps ofAktion Reinhard had also come into existence. Under the WVHA, the camps were separated into divisions offorced labor,concentration, andextermination camps,[5] all linked by record-high profit margins propped up by the theft of cash and assets from the Holocaust victims. Gigantic camps at Auschwitz and Majdanek were built with the expectation of Soviet prisoners of war entering the camp labour after 1941.[41][42]
During the war, almost half of the concentration camp officers served with theWaffen-SS combat divisions, including theLeibstandarte,Das Reich, Wiking, the Nord Division, andTotenkopf.[43] Some concentration camp officers served as division commanders in theWaffen-SS.[43] By October 1944 theWaffen-SS membership reached 800,000 and up to 910,000 men.[40]
Within the camps themselves, there existed a hierarchy of camp titles and positions which were unique only to the camp service. Each camp was commanded by aKommandant, sometimes referred to asLagerkommandant, who was assisted by a camp adjutant and command staff. The prison barracks within the camp were supervised by aRapportführer who was responsible for daily roll call and the camp daily schedule. The individual prisoner barracks were overseen by junior SS-NCOs calledBlockführer who, in turn had one to two squads of SS soldiers responsible for overseeing the prisoners. Within the extermination camps, theBlockführer was in charge of the prisonerSonderkommando and was also the person who would physically gas victims in the camp's gas chambers.
The JewishSonderkommando workers in turn, were terrorised by up to around 100 mostly collaboratorTrawniki men per camp, calledWachmannschaften (security guards or watchmen).[44]
The camp perimeter and watch towers were overseen by a separate formation called theWachbattalion (guard battalion). The guard battalion commander was responsible for providing watch bills to man guard towers and oversaw security patrols outside the camp. The battalion was organized on typical military lines with companies, platoons, and squads. The battalion commander was subordinate directly to the camp commander.
Concentration camps also had supply and medical personnel, attached to the headquarters office under the camp commander, as well as a security office with Gestapo andKripo personnel attached to the camp. Heydrich had been successful in getting control over the "political departments" of the camps.[21] These security personnel were under direct command ofSicherheitspolizei (SiPo) commanders until September 1939 and thereafter, theReich Security Main Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt, RSHA) commanders independent of the camps.[21][45]
In addition to the regular SS personnel assigned to a concentration camp, there also existed a prisoner system of trustees known asKapos who performed a wide variety of duties from administration to overseeing other groups of prisoners. TheSonderkommandos were special groups of Jewish prisoners who assisted in the extermination camps with the disposal of bodies and other tasks. The duty of actually gassing prisoners was, however, always carried out by the SS.
In 1942 Glücks was increasingly involved in the administration of theEndlösung, supplying personnel to assist inAktion Reinhardt (although thedeath camps ofBelzec,Treblinka andSobibor were administered bySS-und Polizei-führerOdilo Globocnik of theGeneral Government).[46] In July 1942, Glücks met Himmler to discuss medical experiments on concentration camp inmates. All extermination orders were issued from Glücks' office to SS-TV commands throughout Nazi Germany and occupied Europe. He specifically authorized the purchase ofZyklon B for use atAuschwitz.
Already in 1943 the SS-TV units began to receive orders to conceal as much of the evidence ofthe Holocaust as possible. Himmler was most concerned about covering up Nazi crimes ever since the Polish 22,000 victims of the SovietKatyn massacre were discovered well preserved underground near Smolensk.[47] The cremations began shortly thereafter and continued until the camps' official closure.[48] Camps were meticulously destroyed, sick prisoners were shot and others were marched ondeath marches away from the advancingAllies. The SS-TV were also instrumental in the execution of hundreds of political prisoners to prevent their liberation.
By April 1945 many SS-TV had left their posts. Due to their notoriety, some removed theirdeath head insignia to hide their identities. Camp duties were increasingly turned over to so-called "Auxiliary-SS", soldiers and civilians conscripted as camp guards so that theTotenkopf men could escape. However, many were arrested by the Allies and stood trial for war crimes atNuremberg between 1946 and 1949. "Immediately after their seizure by the Russians on May 9–10, 1945 – wrote Sydnor – the officers and men in theTotenkopf Division were transported to several detention camps inside the Soviet Union. Within six months of the end of the war, many prominent SSTK officers, includingBecker, disappeared, most likely the victims of secret executions."[49]
From the SS-TV inception, Eicke fostered an attitude of "inflexible harshness" exercised by the masters. This core belief continued to influence SS guards in all concentration camps even after Eicke had taken over command of the SSTotenkopf Division. Recruits were taught to hate their enemies through tough training regimes andNazi indoctrination.[50]
Within camps, guards subjugated the inmates in an atmosphere of controlled, disciplined cruelty. This environment of formalized brutality influenced some of the SS-TV's most infamous commandants includingRudolf Höß,Franz Ziereis,Karl Otto Koch,Max Kögel, andAmon Göth.[51]
In the last days of World War II, a special group called the "Auxiliary-SS" (SS-Mannschaft) was formed as a last-ditch effort to keep concentration camps running and allow regular SS personnel to escape. Auxiliary-SS members were not considered regular SS personnel, but were conscripted members from other branches of the German military, the Nazi Party, and theVolkssturm. Such personnel wore a distinctive twin swastika collar patch and served as camp guard and administrative personnel until the surrender of Germany.[50]
The SS, individually and collectively, benefited financially from the Holocaust. Slave labour at the camps was sold to private companies, or used to run lucrative SS-run industries,[52] while the cost of prisoner upkeep was minimal.[53] Himmler intended to make concentration camps into a profitable industry for the financial benefit of the SS. Wartime labour shortages meant that the concentration camps ended up as a significant labour source for all sectors of the German economy.[54] The property of murdered Jews was stolen and auctioned off to the German public.[55] Individual personnel at the camps often embezzled some of the stolen property for themselves, and some were charged for theft.[56]
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