A few months after the outbreak of the war Horst Schumann was invited by Victor Brack from T4 to join his euthanasia organisation. After a short time for reflection Schumann accepted, and in 1940 he was sent to Grafeneck in Württemberg as leader of the institution. In early summer 1940 he was transferred to another killing institution, becoming the leader of Sonnenstein (near Dresden).
Schumann had no psychiatric education whatsoever. He had only spent a short period of “supplementary training” with the medical leader of the T4 programme, Dr. Werner Heyde, in Würzburg.
Schumann also belonged to the doctors’ commission that travelled through the concentration camps and selected especially weak prisoners unfit for work. This was called "Aktion 14f13". The selected prisoners were sent to the killing institutions to be gassed.
In connection with this work Schumann came to Auschwitz for the first time on 28 July 1941. He selected 575 prisoners who were all held in the so called “Schonungsblock” (block for the very weak). After the selection they were all taken to Sonnenstein and gassed.
On 2 November 1942 Schumann returned to Auschwitz but this time he had a different function. Schumann, who was now an Oberleutnant in the Luftwaffe, did not belong to the Auschwitz garrison; with the strong support of Himmler he worked directly under Victor Brack. He now proposed undertaking sterilization experiments on men and women. The experiments were intended to find a method for the mass sterilization of oppressed people, so that their working capacity could be exploited whilst at the same time they could be prevented from having children. An experimental station was put up in Block 30 in the women’s camp in Birkenau (B Ia) and here Schumann experimented with X-rays as a mean of sterilization. He also carried out castrations in the Stammlager, first in Block 21, later in the experimental Block 10, where Clauberg also worked on sterilization methods.
To some extent Schumann personally picked out his subjects, mainly very young Jewish men and women. He then irradiated the testicles and ovaries. In order to find the right level of irradiation he had to use different timing periods and dosages. This led to severe burns for many victims and very serious harm to their inner organs. Not only were they forced to work immediately after the painful treatment, but many of them were irradiated several times. In order to know whether he had been successful with the men, Schumann needed samples of sperm. These were taken from the victims in an unbelievably humiliating and painful manner. One testicle was removed from some of the male subjects and one ovary was cut out from some of the females. Both kinds of samples were sent to the University of Breslau (today Wroclaw) for examination. The subjects very often had to stay in the sick prisoners’ block for a long time, some because the wounds would not heal, others because of inflammation of the wounds due to the fact that the instruments were not cleansed. After some time the victims were released into the camp and had to work normally. This fact alone led to numerous deaths, as many of the victims attracted attention because of their wounds and were therefore sent to the gas chamber. Doctors amongst the camp prisoners took part in the operational castrations, since Schumacher did not have any surgical knowledge at all.
In a report from the head of the Surgery Department in the Stammlager covering the period from 15 September until 15 December 1943, 106 castrations by surgery are mentioned. Here it should be remembered that such operations were also carried out in the sick prisoners’ barracks in Birkenau (B II f).
It is not known how many prisoners were mistreated by Schumann, but a number around 1,000 may be assumed. The prisoner who installed and worked the X-ray apparatus was sent to KZ Mauthausen in January 1945 and shot because he was a carrier of secrets.
After having informed Himmler of his rather negative results, Schumann left Auschwitz in spring 1944. Schumann considered the X-ray method to be to too complicated and therefore not worthwhile. Although it is not completely clear what he then did, he probably continued to select victims for the gas chambers. He was evidently seen at a party at Hartheim, the euthanasia killing institution near Linz (Austria). It is a fact however, that in spite of his recommendation to Himmler not to use the X-ray method, he continued with this type of experiment at KZ Ravensbrück. According to his own evidence, he served as a doctor in the Wehrmacht from January 1945.
In October 1945 he showed up in Gladbeck (West-Germany), where his wife was already living. The local authorities hired him as a sports doctor. In April 1946 he reported to the National Registration Office under his real name. In 1949 he opened his own general practice. Not until 1951 did the authorities show any interest in Schumann, who had lived under his real name throughout this period. He had applied for a hunting licence and because of that his personal data was recorded as a matter of routine. It transpired that he was wanted by the police. It is assumed that Schumann was warned by the authorities. When two policemen called to talk to him on 26 February 1951, he was gone.
According to his own statement, he served as a ship’s doctor for 3 years and because he did not have a German passport, he applied for one in Japan in 1954 and received it under his own name. One year later he materialized in Egypt and Sudan. Then he went to Ghana, where he was under the protection of the head of state, Kwame Nkrumah, and where he met old friends such as the chemist from the Führer’s Chancellery, Dr. Helmut Kallmeyer, who had been very closely connected to T4 and also had served in Lublin, the headquarters of Aktion Reinhard. After the fall of Nkrumah, Schumann was extradited to West Germany in 1966.
On 23 September 1970 the process against Schumann began in Frankfurt, but on 10 March 1971 he collapsed and was taken to hospital. His supposed heart attack was probably simulated. Schumann was examined at the university clinic, where doctors thought that he would not be able to follow the process in court. On 14 April 1971 the process was temporarily suspended and on 29 July 1972 Schumann was released from prison. The doctor who suffered so much from a weak heart that he could not appear in court lived in Frankfurt until May 1983.
