BIOGRAPHY - B

BACH-ZELEWSKI, ERICH (1899-1972) General of the Higher SS and Police Leader Corps, responsible for anti-partisan warfare on the eastern front. A professional soldier from a Junker military family, Bach-Zelewski, joined the NSDAP in 1930 and served in the Reichstag from 1932-1944 representing the Breslau district. In 1939, he was promoted to SS General and two years later became a General of the Waffen-SS assigned to the Central Army Group on the Russian front until the end of 1942. There he was responsible for numerous atrocities in which he took a personal part. On October 31, 1941, after 35,000 persons had been executed in Riga, he wrote: "There is not a Jew left in Estonia." He also actively participated in massacres of Jews at Minsk and Mogilev in White Russia. In July 1943, he was appointed by Himmler as anti-partisan chief on the entire eastern front, later claiming that he had tried to protect the Jews from the Einsatzgruppen. Bach-Zelewski was in command of the German units which suppressed the Warsaw uprising in the summer of 1944 and was subsequently awarded the Knight's Cross. The fact that he testified for the prosecution at Nuremberg, denouncing Himmler and his fellow police chiefs, saved him from extradition to Russia. In March 1951, he was sentenced by a Munich de-Nazification court to ten years' "special labor," which in reality was confinement in his own home in Franconia. He was never prosecuted for his role in the anti-Jewish massacres, even though he was the only major mass murderer who publicly denounced himself for his wartime actions. In 1961, he was arrested and tried for participating in the Röhm (Roehm) Blood Purge and sentenced to four and a half years. He was indicted again in 1962 for the 1933 murders of six German Communists and sentenced to life imprisonment by a jury in Nuremberg. Neither indictment mentioned his or the Waffen-SS' role during the war. He died on March 8, 1972, in a prison hospital at Munich-Harlaching.

BACKE, HERBERT (1896-1947) Joined the Nazi Party in 1931 and became head of the farmer's political organization in his district. Became Food Commissioner of the Four-Year Plan in 1936. In 1942, he was nominated as Richard Darre's successor and given the responsibility for organizing the foodstuffs sector of the war against Russia. Backe was appointed Reich Minister of Food and Agriculture and became a member of Hitler's last cabinet in April 1944. He committed suicide by hanging himself at Nuremberg prison.

BÄCK (BAECK), LEO (1873-1956) The central personality of German Jewry during the Nazi period, a great rabbinical scholar, teacher, and community leader. Born in Prussia, Baeck was called in 1912 to serve the most prominent Jewish congregation in Berlin, and except for several years spent as a chaplain during WWI, would hold that position for the next thirty years. From the autumn of 1933 until July 1939, Baeck served as President of the central representative body of Germany Jews and refused a number of attractive offers from abroad that would have enabled him to escape. Appointed chairman of the Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland in 1939, Baeck was in constant danger and frequently summoned by the Gestapo. Arrested several times, he was sent to Theresienstadt concentration camp in 1943, where he became head of the council of elders and continued to teach philosophy and theology. After his liberation in 1945, Baeck emigrated to Britain where he was elected President of the Council of Jews from Germany and Chairman of the World Union for Progressive Judaism. He died in London on November 2, 1956.

BAKUNIN, MIKHAIL A. (1814-1876) The eldest son of an aristocratic family, Bakunin spent his youth on the family estate, which educated him to peasant ways through his association with the serfs. He renounced a military career to pursue philosophic studies at the Universities of Moscow and Berlin. In 1843, in Switzerland, he befriended Weitling, whose imprisonment attracted the attention of the Russian authorities, and he was summoned to return. He refused and made his way to Paris where he learned greatly from Marx and Proudhon, although dislike of Marx prevented any closeness between them. Bakunin was arrested in 1849 and returned to Russia as a fugitive, where he spent eight years in solitary confinement. After four more years in Siberia and a marriage to a young woman strangely distant from his political concerns, he made his way to London where he worked for a time with Herzen. Making his way to Italy, Bakunin organized in 1864 a secret international brotherhood known later as the "International Alliance of Social Democracy." In 1868 he joined the First International, where his doctrines were strongly opposed by the Marxists. After the resulting split in 1872, the Bakuninists continued as a separate organization. He retired from the movement in 1874 after the abortive Bologna insurrection. He died and was buried in Rome.

BARKHORN, ERICH GERHARD (born 1919) Luftwaffe fighter pilot and "Ace," officially credited with 301 kills on the Russian front. Barkhorn survived the war and is said to have shot down more enemy planes than any other pilot in the war except his own countryman, Erich Hartmann.

BART, HERR Leader of the Nazi Blut-Orden (the Blood Order). British Brigadier J.H. Morgan said that in late 1936, he was invited to a rally by 40 members of the Blut-Orden at which their leader, Herr Bart, gave the oration. Bart was "torrentially" eloquent, according to Morgan, comparing Hitler to Jesus Christ and he and his handful of comrades to Jesus' disciples. Afterwards, Bart told Morgan in a conspiratorial tone, "There are thousands of such speakers in Germany. You see, we are taught how to do it." Morgan later did research into the so-called Führer-schule. The first three institutes were set up in 1933, and by 1939 the number had grown to 31, including three for girls and women. (Laffin)

BARTELS, ADOLF (1862-1945) German professor and literary historian who waged a relentless and uncompromising campaign to eliminate Jews and "pseudo-Jews" from German literature. To this end, Bartels founded a pseudo-science that evaluated literature based on the author's "race." Using family trees, photographs of the author and his ancestors, place of birth, work history, language, style, family and social milieu, Bartels attempted to "dejudaize" German literature. He died in Weimar on March 7, 1945.

BARTH, KARL (1886-1968) One of the foremost Protestant thinkers of the twentieth century and a vigorous opponent of National Socialism who strongly opposed the "German Christians" that supported Hitler. In 1935, Barth, born in Switzerland, was removed from his position at the University of Bonn for refusing to declare an oath of loyalty to to Hitler, and returned to the University of Basel where he published his most famous work, Kirchliche Dogmatik, one of the central works of modern Protestantism.

BARUCH, BERNARD MANNES (1870-1965) U.S. financier and advisor to Presidents born in Camden, S.C.; member of Supreme Economic Council after First World War and advisor to War Mobilization Director after 1943. U.S. representative (1946) to the UN Atomic Energy Commission.

BÄUMLER (BAEUMLER), ALFRED (1887-1968) Ardent German nationalist and "old Party member" who was one of the leading academic proponents of National Socialism. Appointed Professor of Political Education at Berlin University in 1933, emerging as the chief liaison between the universities and Alfred Rosenberg's office of ideological education. Baeumler's main contribution was the transformation of Nietzsche's thought into a myth at the service of the Nazi world-view, negating both Judeo-Christian morality and democratic values.

BEAVERBROOK, LORD (William Maxwell Aitken) (1879-1964) Canadian newspaper magnate and leading Conservative member of Churchill's Cabinet, who requested and held a secret meeting with Rudolf Hess in September 1941. Beaverbrook met with Hitler three times before the war and is said to have greatly admired him. Reputed to have been an avid antisemite.

BECK, LUDWIG (1880-1944) German general and Chief of Staff who became the acknowledged leader of the German resistance to Nazism. General Beck, who became Chief of Staff in 1935, was in charge of overall military planning and preparedness, but came into increasing conflict with Hitler. Beck tried to organize resistance to Hitler in the General Staff, but failed, and was forced to resign on August18, 1938. As one of the leading conspirators in the July 20, 1944, plot to assassinate Hitler, Beck knew he was doomed, and chose suicide instead. On his third attempt he succeeded in blowing his brains out, with the help of a German sergeant. Had the assassination succeeded, Beck would have been designated Head of State in place of Hitler.

BEEK, GOTTFRIED zur See Hausen, Ludwig Müller von.

BENES, EDUARD (1884-1948) Co-founder of Czechoslovakia with Thomas Masaryk in 1918. Succeeded Masaryk as president in 1935, but was forced to resign after the Munich crisis in October 1938. Benes headed the Czechoslovak government-in-exile in London during WWII. After the war he was forced to give Ruthenia, the easternmost province of his country to Russia. In 1948 he permitted Czechoslovak Communists to establish a dictatorship rather than risk civil war.

BERGER, GOTTLOB (1895-1975) SS general and one of Himmler's top experts on "racial selection" for the SS as well as problems of organization and security. It is said that Berger was the originator of the idea of the Waffen-SS as an international army which would forge together the scattered "racial" Germans of eastern and western Europe. He was promoted to SS-Obergruppenführer in 1940, and for the next five years served as Himmler's Chief of Staff for the Waffen-SS and head of the SS main leadership office. After the war, an American tribunal at Nuremberg sentenced him to twenty-five years imprisonment. His sentence was later commuted, and he was released in 1951.

BERKMAN, ALEXANDER (1870-1936) Berkman was born in Vilna, Russia, to a prosperous family. Attracted to radical ideas as a youth in St. Petersburg, he was expelled from school after submitting an atheistic essay to his instructors. Berkman came to the United States in 1887 and settled in New York City. He was a well-known anarchist leader in the United States and life-long friend of Emma Goldman. His dramatic attempt on the life of Henry Clay Frick is considered the event that broke the back of resistance to the striking workers' demands, although it led to his imprisonment, a penalty he served for over twenty years. Among his numerous agitational writings the best-known of his books are Prison Memoirs, and The Bolshevik Myth. He died as the result of a suicide attempt induced by illness and poverty.

BEST, WERNER (born 1903) Senior SS and Nazi Security Police Leader who later became Reich Commissioner of occupied Denmark. Best was originally sentenced to death after being extradited to Denmark, but his sentence was later commuted to five years and he was released in 1951. He later went to work as an attorney for the Stinnes Co. (See Hugo Stinnes)

BISMARCK, OTTO von (1815-1898) Prussian statesman who united the German people under the government of one empire and is credited with founding the Second Reich. After representing Prussia, first at the Russian, then at the French court, Bismarck was summoned to Berlin in 1862 by the Prussian king to put down the growth of parliamentary government as prime minister and secretary of foreign affairs. Bismarck quickly put his unification program into action, saying German unity would come not through parliament, but through power, blood and iron. Under Bismarck, Germany fought three wars to unify the German states: against Denmark in 1864; the Seven Weeks' War against Austria in 1866, which decided the supremecy of Prussia in Germany; and the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871. After Prussia's victory over France, the king of Prussia was coronated as Wilhelm I, emperor (Kaiser) of Germany. Bismarck was named Reichschancellor and became known as the "Iron Chancellor." He was dismissed in 1890 by Wilhelm II, who had succeeded his father as Kaiser in 1888.

BLAVATSKY, HELENA PETROWNA (nee von Hahn) (1831-1891) Well-known female esoteric. Founded the Theosophical Society in 1875. Her followers credited her with extraordinary gifts as a medium. Theosophy had a profound affect on the Thule Society and numerous other secret socities.

BLOBEL, PAUL (1894-1951) SS officer and head of Sonderkommando 4a of Einsatzgruppe C, which was assigned to the Ukraine. When German forces captured Kiev, his unit organized and carried out the killing of Kiev's Jews at Babi Yar on September 29-30, 1941. He was later put in charge of Operation 1005, whose goal was to obliterate all traces of the German mass murders. Arrested after the war, he was sentenced to death in 1948 by the Nuremberg Tribunal and hanged on June 8, 1951.

BLUM, LEON (9 April 1872 - 30 March 1950) The first Popular Front premier of France whose socialist policies and Jewish descent caused many in France and throughout Europe to mistrust his leadership. The Popular Front introduced many reforms, including the 40-hour week.

BONHÖFFER (BONHOEFFER), DIETRICH (1906-1945) Protestant pastor who became a leading member of the German Resistence and one of the few churchmen in Germany willing to pay the ultimate price for his Christian convictions. As a member of the Confessional Church he asserted that Christianity was incompatible with National Socialism and its racial doctrines. During a visit to Sweden in May 1942 Bonhöffer took with him peace proposals from the German conspirators led by General Hans Oster, Chief of Staff of the Abwehr, and General Ludwig Beck, but they were rejected by the British Foreign Office. After being arrested by the Gestapo in April 1943, he was sent to concentration camps at Buchenwald, and then Flossenberg, where he was executed together with Admiral Canaris and General Oster on April 9, 1945.

BONHÖFFER (BONHOEFFER), KLAUS (1901-1945) German lawyer and older brother of Dietrich Bonhöffer. Klaus, too, was a leader of the German resistence and was arrested soon after the failed attempt on Hitler's life in July 1944. He was executed by SS guards along with a group of antifascist prisoners, including Albrecht Haushofer, outside Lehrterstrasse prison in Moabit (G) on April 23, 1945, during the battle for Berlin.

BORMANN, MARTIN (1900-1945) Joined NSDAP in 1927. During the early 1920s Bormann was active in underground, right-wing political groups and was involved in several murders. Became director of party business office and was promoted to Reich Director in 1936. Sentenced to death in absentia at Nuremberg on Oct 1, 1946. Now believed to have died attempting to escape Berlin in May 1945.

BORSIG, ERNST (1869-1933) Industrialist. Early supporter of Hitler. Chairman of Union of German Employer Association, 1923-32. His family business was merged with Rheinmetall A.G. after his death. (Unknown Hitler)

BOUHLER, PHILIPP (1899-1945) Reich Business Manager of the NSDAP in 1925. Director of the "Office of the Fuehrer" in 1934. Bouhler headed Aktion T-4 which supervised the killing of millions of Germans in mental institutions and later millions of Jews, Gypsies and Slavs in mobile operations and the concentration camps. Committed suicide May 19, 1945.

BRACK, VIKTOR (1904-1948) Section chief in the Fuhrer Chancellery responsible for running the "euthanasia" program. Brack an engineer was closely associated with Phillip Bouhler. Six hospital killing centers within Germany, equipped with gas chambers and crematoria, were built up by Brack, and constituted a system that eliminated thousands of people each month during the early years of the war. Sentenced to death at the end of the Doctor's Trials in 1947 and hanged at Landsberg prison on 2 June 1948.

BRANDT, DR. KARL (1904-1947) Surgeon and administrator who enetered the Nazi Party in 1932. He served as Hitler's escourt doctor from 1934 to October 1944. General Commissioner of Public Health and Sanitation from summer 1942. Sentenced to death by Germans in March 1945 for having sent his family to an area where they could be captured by the advancing Americans. His life was saved by Albert Speer's intervention. Hanged by Americans in 1947.

BRAUCHITSCH, WALTHER von (1881-1948). German general and field marshal-general from 1940. Commander-in-Chief of the German army (OKH) from February 4, 1938 until dismissed and forced to retire on December 19, 1941, by Hitler, who assumed the post himself. Brauchitsch died on October 18, 1948, in the British Military Hospital at Hamburg.

BRAUN, EVA (1912-1945) Photo assistant to Heinrich Hoffmann. Hitler's mistress from 1932-1945. Married Hitler on April 29, 1945 and committed suicide with him the following day.

BRUCKMANN, HUGO (1863-1941) Bruckmann, a publisher, and his wife were two of Hitler's earliest financial sponsors. Hugo served as a member of Reichstag, 1933-41.

BRÜCKNER (BRUECKNER), WILHELM (1884-1954) Hitler's chief aide until 1940. Fell into disgrace and joined the armed forces in 1941. Held rank of colonel at end of the war.

BUCH, WALTER (1883-1949) Chairman of the Supreme Party Court of the NSDAP and father-in-law of Martin Bormann. Sentenced to five years in a labor camp after the war. Believed to have committed suicide in 1949 by slashing his wrists and drowning himself in Ammer Lake.

Copyright © 1999 R.H. Perez
All Rights Reserved.

HOMEPAGE