Fritz Sauckel | |
|---|---|
 Sauckel at the Nuremberg trials | |
| GeneralPlenipotentiary for Labour Deployment | |
| In office 21 March 1942 – 8 May 1945 | |
| Appointed by | Adolf Hitler |
| Preceded by | Position created |
| Succeeded by | Position abolished |
| Gauleiter ofGau Thuringia | |
| In office 30 September 1927 – 8 May 1945 | |
| Appointed by | Adolf Hitler |
| Preceded by | Artur Dinter |
| Succeeded by | Position abolished |
| Reichsstatthalter ofThuringia | |
| In office 5 May 1933 – 8 May 1945 | |
| Prime Minister | Willy Marschler |
| Preceded by | Position created |
| Succeeded by | Position abolished |
| Minister-President of Thuringia | |
| In office 26 August 1932 – 8 May 1933 | |
| Preceded by | Erwin Baum |
| Succeeded by | Willy Marschler |
| Additional positions | |
| 1935—1937 | ActingReichsstatthalter of theFree State of Anhalt |
| 1935–1937 | ActingReichsstatthalter of theFree State of Brunswick |
| 1933—1945 | Member of theGreater German Reichstag |
| 1929—1934 | Member of theLandtag of Thuringia |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1894-10-27)27 October 1894 Haßfurt, Kingdom of Bavaria, German Empire |
| Died | 16 October 1946(1946-10-16) (aged 51) Nuremberg Prison, Bavaria, Allied-occupied Germany |
| Political party | Nazi Party |
| Spouse | Elisabeth Wetzel |
| Children | 10 |
| Occupation | Merchantsailor |
| Signature |  |
| Criminal information | |
| Criminal status | Executed by hanging |
| Convictions | War crimes Crimes against humanity |
| Trial | Nuremberg trials |
| Criminal penalty | Death |
Ernst Friedrich Christoph Sauckel (27 October 1894 – 16 October 1946) was a GermanNazi politician andconvicted war criminal. As GeneralPlenipotentiary for Labour Deployment (Arbeitseinsatz) from March 1942 until the end of theSecond World War, he oversaw the mobilization offorced labour for the benefit of the German war effort.
Born inHaßfurt in Bavaria, Sauckel worked as a seaman from a young age. During theFirst World War, he was interned in France as anenemy alien. He joined theNazi Party in 1923 and established himself as a leading party organiser inThuringia. He was appointedGauleiter of Thuringia in 1927 and, following Hitler's appointment as chancellor,Reichsstatthalter in 1933; he would retain both positions until the end of the Nazi regime.
During the Second World War, Sauckel was responsible for regional defense until 1942, when he was appointed General Plenipotentiary for Labour Deployment, working directly underHermann Göring'sFour Year Plan office. In this capacity, he deported some five million workers from occupied territories for forced labour in German industries, often by brutal coercion. In addition, he authorized the use ofprisoners of war in response to ever-increasing demands.
At the end of the war, Sauckel was arrested by American troops inSalzburg. He was among the24 major war criminals accused in theNuremberg trials before the International Military Tribunal. He was found guilty ofwar crimes andcrimes against humanity, sentenced to death, and executed by hanging in October 1946.
Born inHaßfurt (Kingdom of Bavaria), as the only child of a postman and a seamstress, Sauckel attended the localvolksschule and the gymnasium inSchweinfurt, leaving in 1909 without graduating when his mother fell ill. He joined themerchant marine ofNorway andSweden when he was 15, first on a Norwegian three-mastedschooner, and later on Swedish and German vessels. Starting off as acabin boy, he went on to sail throughout the world, rising to the rank ofVollmatrose (able seaman). At the outbreak ofWorld War I in 1914, he was on a German vesselen route toAustralia when the vessel was captured by French naval forces. He was subsequentlyinterned as anenemy alien in France from August 1914 until 20 October 1919. While interned, he studied mathematics, languages and economics.[1]
When released, he returned to Germany and found factory work for the next few years in Schweinfurt as an apprenticelocksmith andtoolmaker in theErsten Automatischen Gußstahlkugel-Fabrik & Cie [de]ball-bearing works. In 1919 he joined theDeutschvölkischer Schutz- und Trutzbund, the largest and most influentialanti-Semitic organization inWeimar Germany. He served as its local manager forLower Franconia until 1921. Moving toThuringia, he studiedengineering at a technical school inIlmenau[2] from 1922 to 1923, but was expelled for his political activities.[3]
Sauckel joined theNazi Party (NSDAP) in January 1923 (member 1,395) and cofounded anOrtsgruppe (Local Group) in Ilmenau, serving as itsOrtsgruppenführer. He also enrolled in theSA, the party’s paramilitary organization. He planned a "March on Berlin" with about 80 followers in conjunction withAdolf Hitler’sBeer Hall Putsch inMunich on 9 November 1923. However, he and 22 followers were arrested and briefly detained inCoburg before the march could get under way. Despite the forced dissolution of the party in the wake of the failedputsch, Sauckel remained politically active, establishing a right wing organization calledBund Teja, giving speeches, founding an SAfront organization in Thuringia namedDeutscher Wanderverein and serving as theBezirksleiter (District Leader) forThuringian Forest. He also became in 1924 the publisher of a small newspaper in Ilmenau, which in 1925 would merge with another paper and develop into the official organ of the Party in Thuringia,Der Nationalsozialist. Published inWeimar, he would serve as its editor from 1927 until 1945. Sauckel thus established his credentials as anAlter Kämpfer (old fighter) with whom Hitler always retained strong bonds of loyalty. In 1924 he married Elisabeth Wetzel, with whom he had ten children.[4]
After the ban on the party was lifted, Sauckel became the business manager forGau Thuringia underGauleiterArtur Dinter in March 1925 and formally rejoined the party on 6 April. On 6 February 1927, he was also named DeputyGauleiter and GauOrganisationsleiter, in charge of personnel issues. Sauckel succeeded Dinter asGauleiter of Thuringia on 30 September 1927 and would retain this position until the end of the Nazi regime.[5]
On8 December 1929, Sauckel was elected to theLandtag of Thuringia as one of six Nazi deputies that would hold the balance of power there between the leftist (24) and center-right (23) parties.[6] On 23 January 1930, acoalition government took office in Thuringia which for the first time in Germany included Nazi ministers,Wilhelm Frick andWilly Marschler. Sauckel, though not included as a State cabinet minister, became the leader of the Nazi faction in theLandtag. Following the31 July 1932 election, the Nazis captured 42.5% of the votes and 26 seats, and Sauckel became the new LeadingMinister of State (equivalent toMinister-President) as well as theinterior minister from which portfolio he controlled all the State police and security apparatus.[7]
Following Hitler's appointment asChancellor of Germany on 30 January 1933, Sauckel was appointed to the new position ofReichsstatthalter (Reich Governor) of Thuringia on 5 May 1933, a post he would retain until May 1945. The new post was created to provide more centralized control over the State governments. On 8 May he left the Thuringian cabinet and was succeeded byWilly Marschler.[8] On 9 November 1933, Sauckel was promoted to SA-Gruppenführer and, on 12 November, he was elected to theReichstag from electoral constituency 12 (Thuringia), retaining this seat until the fall of the Nazi regime in May 1945.[9]
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On 9 September 1934, Sauckel joined theSS as an SS-Gruppenführer at the invitation ofHeinrich Himmler and was assigned to SS-Oberabschnitt Mitte (Senior Section Central) based in Weimar until 1 April 1936 when he was transferred to the staff of theReichsführer-SS.[10] Upon the death ofWilhelm Friedrich Loeper Sauckel was appointed to succeed him as the actingReichsstatthalter of bothAnhalt andBrunswick from 30 November 1935 to 20 April 1937.[11] On 23 January 1937 Sauckel was made the head of the Main Office for theFour Year Plan in Thuringia. He was also given an honorary rank ofSA-Obergruppenführer on 9 November 1937.[8]
At the start ofWorld War II on 1 September 1939, Sauckel was namedReich Defense Commissioner (Reichsverteidigungskommissar) forWehrkreis (Military District) IX headquartered inKassel. This district comprised Gau Thuringia along withGau Electoral Hesse, the eastern half ofGau Hesse-Nassau and smaller parts of four neighboring Gaue. In this position, he was entrusted with supervising civil defense measures over a large area, including air raid defenses and evacuations, as well as control over the war economy, rationing and suppression of the black market. On 16 November 1942, the jurisdiction of the Reich Defense Commissioners was changed from theWehrkreis to the Gau level, and he remained Commissioner for only his Gau of Thuringia.[12] A member of the SS since 1934, he was promoted to honorarySS-Obergruppenführer on 30 January 1942.[10] He was a holder of theGolden Party Badge.
On 21 March 1942, Sauckel was appointed to the position for which he would be forever linked in history, General Plenipotentiary for Labour Deployment (Generalbevollmächtigter für den Arbeitseinsatz) on the recommendation ofMartin Bormann.[9]
Sauckel worked directly underReichsmarschallHermann Göring within the Four Year Plan Office, obtaining and allocating labour for German industry and agriculture. On 27 March 1942, Göring issued a decree naming Sauckel the Leader of the Department of Labor Allocation within the Four Year Plan. In response to increased demands for labour from German war industries, Hitler issued a decree on 30 September 1942 granting Sauckel extraordinary powers over both civil and military authorities in theoccupied territories. His agents were authorized “to issue directives to the competent military and civilian authorities” to ensure an adequate supply of labourers.[13] Sauckel therefore met the ever-increasing requirement for manpower with people from the occupied territories. Voluntary numbers were insufficient andforced civilian labour was introduced within a few months. Of an estimated five million foreign workers brought to Germany, only around 200,000 came voluntarily, according to a March 1944 statement by Sauckel introduced as evidence at theNuremberg trials.[14]
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The majority of the acquired workers originated from the Eastern territories, especially inPoland and theSoviet Union where the methods used to gain workers were very harsh. TheArmy was used topressgang local people and most were taken by force to the Reich. In addition to forced civilian labourers, Sauckel authorized the use ofprisoners of war. Conditions of work were extremely poor and discipline severe, especially forconcentration camp prisoners. All the latter were unpaid and provided with starvation rations, barely keeping those workers alive. Suchslave labour was widely used in many German industries, including coal mining, steel making, and armaments manufacture. The use of forced and slave labour continually increased throughout the war, especially afterAlbert Speer, theReichsminister of Armaments and War Production, in April 1942 brought about the formation of theCentral Planning Board, which determined the labor requirements of industry, agriculture and all other components of the German war economy, and requisitioned that labor through Sauckel’s office.[15] It has been estimated that over 12 million such laborers eventually were brought forcibly to Germany to work, often by brutal coercion.[16]
On 1 July 1944, following the division of the Prussian Province of Saxony, Sauckel was namedOberpräsident of theRegierungsbezirk (Government District) Erfurt, which became part of Thuringia. On 25 September 1944, Sauckel was named leader of theVolkssturm forces in his Gau. On 27 October 1944 he was given a cash award of 250,000 ℛ︁ℳ︁ in honor of his 50th birthday and for his contributions to the Reich. On 10 April 1945, only a day after declaring Weimar a fortress city and exhorting hisVolkssturm forces to resist the approaching American Army, Sauckel fled the city by car. After the end of the war, he was arrested inSalzburg by members of the US ArmyCounterintelligence Corps on 12 May 1945. He was interned in the 7th Army Interrogation Center inAugsburg,Camp King inOberursel and, finally, inNuremberg.[17]
On 20 November 1945, Sauckel was put on trial before theInternational Military Tribunal as a major war criminal. He was indicted on all four charges of conspiracy to commit crimes against peace; planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression; war crimes and crimes against humanity. He defended theArbeitseinsatz as "nothing to do with exploitation. It is an economic process for supplying labour". He denied that it was slave labour or that it was common to deliberately work people to death (extermination by labour) or to mistreat them. Yet, documents put into evidence showed that he was complicit in exploiting the labourers:
All the men [prisoners of war and foreign civilian workers] must be fed, sheltered, and treated in such a way as to exploit them to the highest possible extent at the lowest conceivable degree of expenditure.It has always been natural for us Germans to refrain from cruelty and mean chicaneries towards the beaten enemy, even if he has proved himself the most bestial and most implacable adversary, and to treat him correctly and humanely, even when we expect useful work of him.
— Letter from Fritz Sauckel toAlfred Rosenberg, 20 April 1942,Report on Labor Mobilization Program[18]
Robert Servatius, Sauckel's counsel, portrayed Sauckel as a representative of the labour classes of Germany; an earnest and unpretentious party man assiduously committed to promoting the collective utility of the working class. This portrait was contrary to that of Speer, whom Servatius juxtaposed against Sauckel as a technical genius and entrepreneurial administrator. Sauckel surmised that Speer bore greater legal and moral responsibility by virtue of the fact that the former merely met the demands of the latter, in accordance with protocol. This strategy did not yield to his favour, however, as the ratio in the final judgement against the respective defendants outlined that Speer's tasks were numerous, with the forced labour program comprising only one facet of his ministerial responsibilities, while Sauckel was singularly responsible for his office as General Plenipotentiary.Sauckel was found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and was hanged at Nuremberg Prison on 16 October 1946, 11 days before his 52nd birthday after receiving Communion.[19][20] His last words were recorded as "Ich sterbe unschuldig, mein Urteil ist ungerecht. Gott beschütze Deutschland. Möge es leben und eines Tages wieder groß werden. Gott beschütze meine Familie."[21] ("I die an innocent man, my sentence is unjust. God protect Germany. May it live and one day become great again. God protect my family.") Albert Speer escaped the death sentence and served 20 years atSpandau prison, one of the most controversial verdicts of the Nuremberg trials. The discrepancy of an effective subordinate facing death with the superior facing a prison sentence has faced much attention and criticism in historical analysis, including byGitta Sereny, who later interviewed Speer concerning his responsibility for slave labour.[22]
Sauckel's body, as were those of the other nine executed men and the corpse of Hermann Göring, was cremated atOstfriedhof (Munich) and the ashes were scattered in the riverIsar.[23][24][25]
Fritz Sauckel has been portrayed by the following actors in film, television and theatre productions;
Nach der Entlassung arbeitete er als Hilsarbeiter in Schweinfurt, begann eine Lehre als Metallarbeiter und besuchte seit 1921 das Technikum in Ilmenau, das er jedoch ohne Abschluss 1924 wieder verließ.
| Weimar Republic (1920–1933) |  | |
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| Nazi Germany (1933–1945) | ||
| Soviet administration / DDR (1945–1952) |
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| Federal Republic of Germany (since 1990) | ||
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