SS-Ostuf. Theodor Kratzer

[Peter]

Please can anybody tell me if he was brought to trial after the war, he served at Auschwitz.

[giselher]

According to Jeremy Dixon's "Commanders of Auschwitz": "What happened to Kratzer at the end of the war is at this time unknown."

Best
Tilman

[Peter]

Hi Tilman
thanks, Yes I have Jeremy's book but I wondered if anything new had been found since the book came out

thanks

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Found in file WO 309/437 at the National Archives in Kew is a memo addressed to Gerald Draper [Tesch trial prosecutor; the man who secured the first confession from Höss; the War Crimes team's lawyer] at the J.A.G.'s HQ from a Lieutenant in the 43 Division Intelligence Section [his signature is unreadable on the memo] dated November 1, 1945, on the topic of Sachsenhausen, specifically Hans Diedrich: "an out and out social democrat and a wealthy German industrialist, was an inmate of Sachsenhausen from 1941 to 1944."

The memo states that the following information was given by Diedrich:

There exists a secret German organisation made up of ex-Concentration Camp prisoners who have sworn to revenge the death of many of their comrades who were killed in the various camps. It is clear that they have already discovered the whereabouts of quiet a few people whom we are also looking for and many of these are now hiding under false names in Schleswig-Holstein. [...]

One man who was executed recently by this organisation was Obersturmführer KRÄTZER (administration of Auschwitz).

[Peter]

thank you, I had been given a similar account by a WW2 veteran and this supports what I had been told.