SS-Gefolge was the designation for the group of female civilian employees of the Schutzstaffel in Nazi Germany. SS-Gefolge members were only allowed to serve the Schutzstaffel in a very limited capacity as the organisation was not formally a part of the SS. Members of the Gefolge worked in the Nazi concentration camps as guards and nurses. [1]
During the early stages of the war the Gefolge was primarily staffed by volunteers, but as the war progressed on more women were either conscripted or recruited from wartime factories with the false promise of high pay and easier working conditions. [2]
Virtually all of the Gefolge recruits were trained at Ravensbrück, trainees would have spent anywhere from one week to six months receiving instruction on disciplinary techniques, subterfuge detection, and escape prevention. Recruits were instructed to show no sympathy for their prisoners and any Gefolge member suspected of helping a prisoner was severely punished. [3]
By mid-January 1945, around 3,500 women were said to have been on guard duty in the concentration camps, along with around 37,000 men. In general, based on the sparse literature on this subject, it is assumed that around 10% of the concentration camp guards were women. In addition to 8,000 SS men, about 200 female guards were on duty in the Auschwitz concentration camp between May 1940 and January 1945. SS Gefolge Women were the main Guards at female specific concentration camps of Ravensbrück, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Mauthausen, and Bergen-Belsen. [2] Male SS members were not permitted to enter the female camps. [4]
Irmgard Ilse Ida Grese was a Nazi concentration camp guard at Ravensbrück and Auschwitz, and served as warden of the women's section of Bergen-Belsen. She was a volunteer member of the SS.
Aufseherin was the position title for a female guard in Nazi concentration camps. Of the 50,000 guards who served in the concentration camps, approximately 5,000 were women. In 1942, the first female guards arrived at Auschwitz and Majdanek from Ravensbrück. The year after, the Nazis began conscripting women because of a shortage of male guards. In the context of these camps, the German position title of Aufseherin translates to (female) "overseer" or "attendant". Later female guards were dispersed to Bolzano (1944–1945), Kaiserwald-Riga (1943–44), Mauthausen, Stutthof (1942–1945), Vaivara (1943–1944), Vught (1943–1944), and at Nazi concentration camps, subcamps, work camps, detention camps and other posts.
Elisabeth Volkenrath was a German supervisor at several Nazi concentration camps during World War II.
Juana Bormann was a German prison guard at several Nazi concentration camps from 1938, and was executed as a war criminal at Hamelin, Lower Saxony, Germany, after a court trial in 1945.
Fritz Ernst Fischer was a Nazi German medical doctor who performed medical atrocities on inmates of the Ravensbrück concentration camp. He was tried and convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the 1947 Doctors' Trial; he was sentenced to life imprisonment, but his sentence was commuted to 15 years and he was released in 1954.
Dorothea Binz was a Nazi German officer and supervisor at Ravensbrück concentration camp during the Holocaust. She was executed for war crimes.
Gerda "Jane" Bernigau was an SS Oberaufseherin in Nazi concentration camps before and during World War II.
Greta Bösel was a trained nurse. Born in Wuppertal-Elberfeld, Germany, she became a camp guard at Ravensbrück in August 1944.
Herta Ehlert was a female guard at many Nazi concentration camps during the Holocaust.
Johanna Langefeld was a German female guard and supervisor at three Nazi concentration camps: Lichtenburg, Ravensbrück, and Auschwitz.
The Hamburg Ravensbrück trials were seven trials for war crimes against camp officials from the Ravensbrück concentration camp that the British authorities held in their occupation zone in Germany in Hamburg after the end of World War II. These trials were heard before a military tribunal; the three to five judges at these trials were British officers, assisted by a lawyer. The defendants included concentration camp personnel of all levels: SS officers, camp doctors, male guards, female guards (Aufseherinnen), and a few former prisoner-functionaries who had tortured or mistreated other inmates. In total, 38 defendants were tried in these seven trials; 21 of the defendants were women. One of the defendants died during the trial. Twenty of the defendants received death sentences. One defendant was reprieved while two others committed suicide before they could be executed. The remaining 17 death sentences relating to these trials were carried out on the gallows at Hamelin Prison by British hangman Albert Pierrepoint.
Margarete Maria Rabe was a guard at two concentration camps from November 1944 until April 1945.
The Uckermark concentration camp was a small German concentration camp for young women near the Ravensbrück concentration camp in Fürstenberg/Havel, Germany and then an "emergency" extermination camp.
Otto Max Koegel was a Nazi officer who served as a commander at Lichtenburg, Ravensbrück, Majdanek and Flossenbürg concentration camps.
Enno Lolling was a Nazi doctor. As a member of the SS, he served as a Lagerarzt at Dachau concentration camp. He later headed up the medical division for all the SS concentration camps. Lolling committed suicide in Flensburg as the war was ending.
Hildegard Mende was a female guard in two concentration camps during World War II. She was employed in Ravensbrück and then in the small fortress of Theresienstadt concentration camp and ghetto in Czechoslovakia. About 88,000 Jews were deported from Theresienstadt; over 33,000 are known to have been murdered or died in the camp itself. She gained the nickname "The Beast" for her alleged sadism.
Luise Brunner was a German concentration camp guard in Auschwitz II and the chief oberaufseherin of Ravensbrück concentration camp from December 1944 to April 1945.
Gertrud Elli Heise was a female guard and later, SS overseer at several concentration camps during the Second World War. Heise was born in Berlin, Germany. She was tried for war crimes in 1946.
Günther Tamaschke was a German SS-Standartenführer and commandant of the Lichtenburg and Ravensbrück concentration camps.
Hamelin Prison, also known as the Stockhof, was a prison and penitentiary in Hamelin. The penal institution, which had a predecessor since 1698, existed from 1827 to 1980. It was located between the old town and the river Weser. The listed prison buildings are now used as a hotel.
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