The Safeguarding of Nazi Power and the Practice of Nazi Persecution, 1933–1937 Johannes Tuchel

Home , Esterwegen, Heinrich Himmler, Theodor Eicke, Walter Wagner (notary)

National Socialism’s accession to political power for 50 per cent, the SS for 30 and the paramil- and the associated establishment of a dictator- itary Stahlhelm [Steel Helmet] organization for ship in Germany would not have been possible by 20 per cent) represented a new stage in the legal and parliamentary means alone. From the legalization of violence. The campaigns of the time of the NSDAP’s (National Socialist German democratic parties and the Communists were Worker’s Party / Nazi party) founding, violence severely obstructed. and terror were fundamental elements in the constitution of Nazi power, and they became a On 27 February 1933, the Reichstag building mainstay of Nazi rule. The power secured do- went up in flames, an incident that gave the mestically later provided a basis for aggression Nazis a welcome occasion to launch the com- towards the outside. The establishment of the prehensive violent persecution of their polit- dictatorship and the development of the con- ical opponents. The next day, Reich President centration camps in the initial years of the Nazi Paul von Hindenburg enacted the “decree for regime will therefore be described briefly in the the protection of people and state” that in the following. 1 following years served the National Socialists as a pseudo-legal basis for persecution. It provided a comprehensive means of suppressing political I. After the “seizure of power” dissidents and would continue to serve that purpose until the end of the Nazi system. 2 The basic On 30 January 1933, Paul von Hindenburg rights of the Weimar Constitution had ceased appointed Adolf Hitler Reich chancellor and to have effect. If initially only Communists were Franz von Papen took office as vice-chancellor. taken into custody with the aid of this decree, Apart from a few regional exceptions, the major they were soon followed by trade unionists, So- “purge” hoped for by the SA and the party did cial Democrats, Socialists, non-affiliated intel- not yet come about in the initial days following lectuals and anyone who resisted “Gleichschal- this “seizure of power”. Violence now no longer tung” – enforced conformity to National Socialist had to serve the purposes of propaganda and in- ideology. Among these persons were also so- timidation, but to safeguard, as quickly as possi- called “asocials” and “professional criminals” ble, the newly attained power. At the same time, as well as the Jews, Sinti and Roma subjected to the outward show of open violence was not to persecution for racist-ideological reasons. be allowed to conflict with the Nazi leadership’s policy of exploiting the conservative camp. On 24 March 1933, soon after the Reichstag elections, the Nazis passed the Enabling Act, The sovereign assembly of the Weimar Republic which, along with the “Gleichschaltung” in every – the Reichstag – was dissolved, and new elec- area of life, took them a major step forward in tions scheduled for 5 March 1933. This election the process of establishing their power. The campaign, however, differed fundamentally from two-thirds majority needed for the Enabling Act all that had preceded it. On 4 February 1933, was obtained only because all 81 Communist Hermann Göring, the acting Prussian minister members of parliament as well as 26 Social of the interior, issued the oral directive to the Democratic MPs had been arrested or had police to take tougher action “against Marxists”, fled, and because those of the Zentrumspartei an order supplemented on 17 February 1933 by (Centre Party) and the Deutsche Staatspartei the decree “on the promotion of the national (German State Party) gave credence to Hitler’s movement”. Now the police were permitted – promises to interpret the new law restrictively. and expected – to shoot. The establishment of Only the 94 remaining Social Democratic MPs the auxiliary police in Prussia after 22 February voted against it after an impressive speech by 1933 (50,000 men, of which the SA accounted their chairman Otto Wels. It was not long be-

236 | 237 fore the “laws on the conformity of the Länder political activity was no longer possible and [states] with the Reich” destroyed the federal Gestapo informers increasingly undermined at- structure of the Weimar Republic. In the weeks tempts to rebuild illegal oppositional structures. that followed, National Socialist “Reich gover- nors” were appointed in the place of the elected minister presidents of all of the German Länder II. The early concentration camps and the Land parliaments were dissolved. Throughout Germany, the police thus came un- On 8 March 1933, the Reich minister of the der National Socialist control. interior Wilhelm Frick publicly declared: “When the new Reichstag convenes on 21 March, urgent The SA, SS and police collaborated closely. To and more useful work will prevent the Commu- carry out arrests, the police made use of lists nists from taking part in the session. They must that for the most part had already been drawn become re-accustomed to productive work, up in the Weimar period. The SA subdivisions and will be given the opportunity to do so in the combed their residential districts in search of concentration camps.” 4 political opponents, who were then often taken to SA homes or clubhouses. Torture was just Beginning in March 1933, nearly seventy con- as common in the Nuremberg “Burg” as it was centration camps were established, for exam- in the Dortmund “Steinwache” or the many SA ple the Dachau SS concentration camp near clubhouses of Berlin. Under the guise of legality, Munich and the Oranienburg SA concentration many a “personal account” dating back to the camp near Berlin. They were supplemented by Weimar period was settled. The pub owner who over thirty “preventive custody departments” had once thrown the SA out of his establishment in prisons. 5 Between March and April 1933, more might just as easily become a victim as a Com- than 45,000 persons were detained in these munist living downstairs from an SA officer who facilities for shorter or longer periods, and it can had already long coveted the Communist’s flat. be assumed that there were more than 80,000 The total number of makeshift detention rooms prisoners in the year 1933 as a whole. In the first that came into use from February 1933 onward, few months, primarily Communists, Socialists, and usually served to detain inmates for just a Social Democrats and trade unionists were put few weeks or months, has yet to be ascertained. in “preventive custody” and imprisoned in con- As many as two hundred of them are thought centration camps. to have existed in Berlin alone. 3 Yet violence and terror were to have a lasting effect, and it was As National Socialism gained political stability, therefore necessary to provide for the longer- however, many of these persons were released term accommodation of the prisoners. from the camps. In July 1933, for example, according to a survey by the Reich ministry of Many Communists, Social Democrats, Socialists the interior, there were approximately 26,800 and democratic intellectuals fled Germany and “preventive custody prisoners”, with Prussia went into exile as early as 1933. The situation of accounting for 14,906, Bavaria for 4,152, Saxony the oppositionists remaining in the country was for 4,500 and Württemberg for 971. 6 Nazi rule desperate. The parties were dissolved or prohib- had been consolidated to the point where it was ited, the trade union movement crushed. Legal possible to scale back the openly violent meas-

1 For the most recent introductions to this topic, see Nikolaus Wachsmann and Sybille Steinbacher, eds., Die Linke im Visier. Zur Errichtung der Konzentrations- lager 1933 (Göttingen, 2014); Wolfgang Benz and Barbara Distel, eds., Der Ort des Terrors. Geschichte der nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslager , vol. 1: Die Organisation des Terrors (Munich, 2005), vol. 2: Frühe Lager, Dachau, Emslandlager (Munich, 2005). 2 See Michael Hensle, “Die Verrechtlichung des Unrechts. Der legalistische Rahmen der nationalsozialistischen Verfolgung”, Benz and Distel 2005 (see note 1), vol. 1, pp. 76ff. 3 Irene Mayer-von Götz, Terror im Zentrum der Macht. Die frühen Konzentrationslager in Berlin 1933/34–1936 (Berlin, 2008), p. 56. 4 Cuno Horkenbach, Das deutsche Reich von 1918 bis heute. 1933 (Berlin, 1934), p. 106. 5 Klaus Drobisch and Günther Wieland, System der NS-Konzentrationslager 1933–1939 (Berlin, 1993), p. 12. See ibid., p. 73, “Liste der berüchtigten Folterstätten, Konzentrationslager und Justizstrafanstalten 1933” (list of the notorious places of torture, concentration camps and penal institutions in 1933).

6 Bundesarchiv, R 43 II/398, fol. 91f. See Drobisch and Wieland 1993 (see note 5), p. 134 with a precise analysis of the numbers.

E S SAYS ures. At the end of October 1933, there were Above all in the two large area Länder of Prussia still some 22,000 prisoners in custody in the and Bavaria, aspirations towards centralization concentration camps, of whom – above all with in the “enforcement of preventive custody” were a look abroad – 2,000 were released after the already evident at an early stage. 8 In Prussia “Reichstag elections” of 12 November 1933. The the inmates were to be accommodated central- ﬁrst phase in the consolidation of Nazi power ly in the moorlands of the Emsland region. At had thus been concluded and, objectively speak- the end of June 1933, the Prussian ministry of ing, the concentration camps were no longer the interior reckoned “with a constant inmate necessary for the maintenance of the Nazi dic- population of 10,000 for the coming years”, and tatorship. Along with the already existing penal in a letter to the Reich ministry of the interi- system, the “special courts” in operation since or explicitly formulated its concept for coping March 1933 and the “people’s court” estab- with these inmates. 9 Already in the summer of lished in April 1935 could easily have taken over 1933, the three detention locations Börgermoor, their function. This was not the case, however. Esterwegen and Sustrum were to receive a total Instead, the genuinely National Socialist concen- of 4,000 inmates. For the eastern administrative tration camp system emerged. The development districts, the plan was to retain the Sonnenburg in the two largest German Länder, Bavaria and and Lichtenburg camps along with the Branden- Prussia, can serve to illustrate this system’s burg camp. These camps were to accommodate evolution as a whole. inmates whose “preventive custody” would prospectively be shorter and whose transport to In 1933/34, the concentration camps were ven- Emsland was therefore not worth the effort. ues of direct terror against the political opponents of National Socialism and indirect repres- A decree concerning the “enforcement of pre- sion of the overall population, which was quite ventive custody” issued by Secretary of State well informed about the concentration camps Ludwig Grauert on 14 October 1933 marked the through the press. culmination of the Prussian interior ministry’s centralization efforts. According to the decree, These camps were the product of close collab- preventive custody inmates could now be oration between NSDAP party formations and imprisoned only in the Papenburg, Sonnenburg, government agencies. On the local, regional and Lichtenburg and Brandenburg state concentra- national levels alike, it would be incorrect to tion camps. “I will recognize no other facilities speak of “wild camps”, i.e. places of detention for the accommodation of political preventive outside of state control or without state par- custody inmates, and to the extent that such ticipation. Rather, “early concentration camps” facilities still exist, they will be dissolved short- would be a more appropriate term. On the whole, ly, in any case before the end of the year.” 10 Yet the development differed strongly from one it proved impossible to enforce this model: the region to the next. Criteria such as the construc- differences between the administration and the tion, guarding, and supervision of the camps, the guard units, which belonged primarily to the duration of the camps’ existence and the length SS, were too great. The endeavours to establish of detention help to gain an overview. Here the a Prussian concentration camp system were most important aspect is the supervision and brought to an abrupt halt in November 1933. 11 control of the “early concentration camps”, Until mid-1934, the development was character- which can be divided roughly into ﬁve types: ized by improvisation, chaos, and the lack of a preventive custody in prisons, Reich-govern- clear conception. The victims of these circum- ment-operated concentration camps, regional stances were the concentration camp inmates. camps under Reich government control, concen- In Bavaria, on the other hand, a model for the tration camps operated by regional authorities, further development of the concentration camps and concentration camps operated by party was successfully planned and implemented formations. 7 within the same period.

238 | 239 III. The development of the concentration camps function, Heinrich Himmler viewed the Dachau by the SS concentration camp as a long-term instrument for the repression of political opponents: as In Bavaria, the Dachau concentration camp near chief of the Bavarian political police he was in Munich was established on 21 March 1933. Its charge of the committal and release of pre- development was closely linked with the SS. ventive custody inmates; as commander of the The latter had been founded in 1925 as Hitler’s Bavarian auxiliary political police he supplied the personal bodyguard and was thus part of the SS guard troop with an SS commander. 13 NSDAP party organization. From 1929 onward it was under the authority of Heinrich Himmler, The difference between concentration camp the “Reich Leader of the SS”, who envisioned custody and custody in a prison soon became developing it into an elite formation within the quite evident: the judiciary had no means of in- NSDAP. Himmler consistently expanded the tervening in the concentration camps, initially in duties and inﬂuence of the SS. Over and above Bavaria, later throughout Germany. In the sum- its original function to provide protection to mer of 1933, the SS murdered several inmates assemblies and individuals, he turned it into an in Dachau. On 26 June 1933, SS-Oberführer NSDAP “party police force” and, as an especially Theodor Eicke became the new commandant of well-consolidated formation from the ideological the Dachau concentration camp. 14 He introduced point of view, an instrument of terror against a standardized system of violence in Dachau political opponents. The SS grew rapidly – from intended to ensure a maximum of systematic approximately 280 members in 1929 to more brutality towards the inmates. Eicke made the than 209,000 at the end of 1933. use of force in the camp more predictable and less conspicuous for Himmler. He separated the Heinrich Himmler had already been the acting camp administration (camp command) from the chief of the Munich police since 9 March 1933. camp guard troop, which was responsible only On 15 March, the acting minister of the interior for guard duty, and established camp depart- Adolf Wagner appointed Himmler as “political ments. This organizational model – which also advisor to the state ministry of the interior” served to close the concentration camp off to and put him in charge of coordinating all oper- all inﬂuence and inspection from the outside – ations of the political police. On 1 April, Wagner quickly proved successful. Through the three moreover enacted Himmler’s appointment as mainstays – the SS, the Bavarian political police, the “chief of the Bavarian political police” and and the Dachau camp command – the Dachau placed the “existing and still-to-be-established concentration camp was completely sealed off concentration camps” under his control. 12 from the interventions of all state institutions by mid-1934. The Bavarian political police withdrew from the authority of the Munich police administration. In Terror was systematized. The most important his new function, Himmler could order all other instrument of force against the inmates was police units to carry out executive measures. His the “camp order” already drawn up by Eicke in concept is easily described: legitimized by the Dachau in October 1933 and – with only minor state, he assumed state responsibilities which changes, contingent on local conditions – intro- he had the SS carry out on his behalf. In his triple duced in all still-existing concentration camps

7 For a detailed discussion of this subject, see Johannes Tuchel, Konzentrationslager. Organisationsgeschichte und Funktion der „Inspektion der Konzentrationslager“ 1934–1938 (Boppard, 1991), pp. 42ff. 8 A detailed discussion of this subject is found in ibid., pp. 60f. 9 Draft of a letter, end of June 1933, Bundesarchiv, Sammlung Schumacher 271. 10 Bundesarchiv, R 58/264 fol. 1ff. 11 See Tuchel 1991 (see note 7), pp. 80ff. 12 Bundesarchiv, Sammlung Schumacher 464. 13 For a detailed discussion of this subject, see Tuchel 1991 (see note 7), pp. 122ff. 14 For a detailed biography, see Tuchel 1991 (see note 7), pp. 128ff and Niels Weise, Eicke. Eine SS-Karriere zwischen Nervenklinik, KZ-System und Waffen-SS (Paderborn, 2013).

E S SAYS in the summer of 1934. With only slight modifi- Half a year later, Himmler emphasized above all cations, this camp order was to remain in effect the preventive police repression of the Commu- in all concentration camps until well after the nist “threat”: “At present there are still 1,396 beginning of the war. persons in preventive custody in Bavaria. 1,269 of them are Communists, 75 Social Democrats, In Bavaria, however, the concern was no longer and 52 other persons (oppositionists, agitators, merely with persecuting the political opponents etc.).” 16 Conspicuously, the other criteria that known from the Weimar era, but also with pre- had still been significant in April do not appear venting new attempts to form political opposi- here or were integrated into the “Communist” tion. By 1934, Heinrich Himmler had thus estab- category, for example the “work-shy” – num- lished a model for the “domestic security” of the bering just under 350– in custody in Dachau at Nazi state that evidently guaranteed a maximum that point in time. Himmler’s response to the of systematized terror. The SS had moreover representatives of other authorities of the Na- become a source for the recruitment of the po- tional Socialist state when they pushed for the litical police. In order to ensure the power of the restriction of “preventive custody” was clear: latter, however, a large proportion of the some- the concentration camps now held only Commu- what older police officers were permitted to nists who posed a threat to the state. This was remain in office even if they had not been Nazis an argument no National Socialist could oppose. before 1933, as long as Himmler deemed them And now, anyone who was committed to the qualified. At the same time, in this period the Bavarian concentration camp could be defined police had been severed from the normal interior as a Communist. Essentially, however, nothing administration, while the Dachau concentration changed in Himmler’s ambition to enforce his camp had become a manageable and effective racist-motivated society-changing policies with means of dealing with every stirring that did not the aid of the concentration camps. From 1935 conform with National Socialist policy. Action onward, this would be clearly evident in arrest could now be taken against non-compliant be- operations targeting a wide range of different haviour, political opposition, ideological resis- groups, for example so-called asocials or “pro- tance, but also social conspicuousness, poverty fessional criminals”. and every form of undesirable behaviour, by committing the offender to the concentration camp. IV. Esterwegen, Lichtenburg, Dachau, Sachsenburg, Moringen This “socio-racist” component was also evident in the grounds for committal to the Dachau At the end of June 1934, Hitler disempowered concentration camp in the spring of 1934. the SA leadership and murdered many of its When Reich Governor Franz von Epp once again top-ranking members, but also political oppo- demanded a decrease in preventive custody in nents and two generals of the Reichswehr (the Bavaria in March 1934, Himmler had a survey armed forces of the Weimar Republic). On 3 July taken of the grounds for committal cited by the 1934 the Reich cabinet declared this operation Bavarian political police for the 2,405 inmates in an act of “self-defence of the state”, and thus preventive custody as of 10 April 1934: 38.5 per legal, after the fact. The incident shows how cent had been arrested for “Communist activi- stable National Socialist rule had become by ties”, 24.5 per cent for being “German Commu- that point in time. When Reich President Paul von nist Party functionaries”, 19.5 per cent for “high Hindenburg died on 2 August 1934, Hitler imme- treason, Marxist activities, criticism harmful to diately combined the offices of Reich president the state, treason, German Social Democratic and Reich chancellor and, that very day, had the Party functionaries”, and already as much as officers and soldiers of the Reichswehr swear an 12.8 per cent as “Volksschädlinge” (persons oath of personal allegiance to himself. Hitler was harmful to the German people) or “work-shy”, or now “Führer and Reich chancellor”; the National on charges of “defamation”, “asocial behaviour” Socialist “Führer state” had asserted itself once or “habitual drunkenness”. 15 and for all. Racism, anti-Semitism and preparations for war dominated German politics in the years that followed.

240 | 241 Heinrich Himmler had already taken charge of which had at its disposal legal means of sup- the Prussian Geheime Staatspolizei (Gestapo; pressing all real or ideologically deﬁned oppo- secret state police) on 20 April 1934. He immedi- nents to National Socialism. 21 ately summoned Eicke to Prussia – the man who was to apply the model developed in Dachau to When the Society of Friends (Quakers) demand- other concentration camps all over Germany. ed the dissolution of the concentration camps in In May 1934, Himmler ordered Eicke to dissolve December 1934, Heinrich Himmler made it clear the small-scale SA concentration camps and that the “concentration camps have been built reorganize several others on the basis of the only out of absolute necessity in order to pro- Dachau model. By the end of the same month, tect not only the German people, but ultimately Eicke had already begun to take action accord- human society, from subversive and asocial ele- ingly, starting with the Lichtenburg concentra- ments. … In the present form, the concentration tion camp. 17 After participating in the murder of camps represent institutions in which political the chief of the SA, Ernst Röhm, on 1 July 1934 enemies of the state and saboteurs have to be in Munich, Eicke was appointed “inspector of detained in the interest of the people’s commu- the concentration camps” and “chief of the SS nity. With all due respect to the goodwill of the guard units” with effect from 4 July 1934. 18 In Quakers, the wellbeing of the entire nation must the summer months of 1934, Eicke then reor- not be put at risk by abolishing an institution ganized the Esterwegen concentration camp in that presently represents the most effective Emsland and the Sachsenburg concentration means of dealing with all enemies of the state, camp near Chemnitz and dissolved the Oranien- or by rendering it ineffective with any form of burg concentration camp. This was the actual relaxation.” 22 commencement of the National Socialist concentration camp system that would be further Finally, in the early summer of 1935, the Ester- developed by Himmler and Eicke in the years that wegen, Lichtenburg, Dachau and Sachsenburg followed. 19 camps and the Moringen women’s camp con- stituted the entire concentration camp land- A look at the inmate numbers shows that there scape in Germany. At this point in time, some was no longer any objective necessity for the 3,500 inmates were being held in them. Taking Nazi leadership to maintain the camp system, let these inmate numbers as a point of departure, alone develop it further. According to the ofﬁcial a concentration camp system was developed in statistics of the Reich ministry of the interior, the years that followed. The camps continued to on 1 August 1934 there were 2,267 preventive serve the purpose of stabilizing the dictatorship, custody inmates in Prussia, 2,156 in Bavaria, 544 but also as a means of sanctioning all forms of in Saxony, and 118 in Württemberg. 20 They could deviant political and social behaviour. easily have been turned over to the judiciary,

15 Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv München, MA 106299, letter from Himmler of 13 April 1934. 16 Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv München, MA 106299, letter from Himmler of 15 November 1934. Here Himmler cites the statistics of 1 November 1934. 17 See Johannes Tuchel, “Theodor Eicke im Konzentrationslager Lichtenburg. Die Etablierung der Inspektion der Konzentrationslager im Sommer 1934”, Stefan Hördler and Sigrid Jacobeit, eds., Lichtenburg. Ein deutsches Konzentrationslager (Berlin, 2009), pp. 59ff. 18 Bundesarchiv, Bestand Berlin Document Center, personnel ﬁle of Theodor Eicke, identiﬁcation document. 19 See Johannes Tuchel, “Planung und Realität des Systems der Konzentrationslager”, Ulrich Herbert, Karin Orth and Christoph Dieckmann, eds., Die nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslager (Göttingen, 1998), pp. 43ff. 20 Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv München, MA 106299/1, letter from the Reich minister of the interior of 5 October 1934. 21 Reichsgesetzblatt 1934 I, pp. 341ff. On the people’s court, see Walter Wagner, Der Volksgerichtshof im nationalsozialistischen Staat (Stuttgart, 1974 [new, enlarged edition, 2011]); Bernhard Jahntz and Volker Kähne, „Der Volksgerichtshof“. Darstellung der Ermittlungen der Staatsanwaltschaft bei dem Landgericht Berlin gegen ehemalige Richter und Staatsanwälte am Volksgerichtshof , 3rd edition, ed. by Senatsverwaltung für Justiz (Berlin, 1992); Klaus Marxen, Das Volk und sein Gerichtshof. Eine Studie zum nationalsozialistischen Volksgerichtshof (Frankfurt am Main, 1994); Holger Schlüter, Die Urteilspraxis des nationalsozialistischen Volksgerichtshofs (Berlin, 1995). 22 Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz, HA II, Rep. 90 P, Bl. 100f.

E S SAYS V. The National Socialist concentration camp also points to the growing significance of other system inmate groups. They would soon be followed by all manner of persons marginalized and ostra- The concentration camp system was a key cized by the National Socialist society. instrument in the thought and action of Heinrich Himmler, who expanded it, with Hitler’s consent, On 18 October 1935, Himmler had Hitler approve in the following years. 23 First Himmler succeeded his takeover of the German police in its entirety in fending off an attempt of the Reich minis- – that is, a major proportion of the persecution try of the interior to dissolve the camps. Then, apparatus. He had prepared carefully, making in June 1935, he obtained Hitler’s approval to a list of the topics he wanted to discuss: “1. retain the camps and expand the guard details, treatment of the Communists, 2. abortions, 3. which were to double as a special SS military asocial elements, 4. guard units, 5. Gestapa [sic] force. Himmler moreover got Hitler to commit to decree Frick.” 25 He thus began by confronting financing the guard units and the concentration Hitler with National Socialism’s chief ideological camps with the Reich budget. opponents, then with the sociopolitical problems that, against the background of the racist Nazi Now the persecution of political opponents was ideology, had not been solved within the frame- replaced once and for all by a prevention con- work of the so-called “people’s community” and cept. In July 1935, Himmler ordered “that the were now to be “overcome” by means of custody number of preventive custody inmates is to be in concentration camps. Starting immediate- increased the following month by a thousand ly, women who had had abortions were to be from the ranks of the former K. P. D. [German subjected not only to the statutory punishment Communist Party] functionaries.” 24 in effect at the time, but also to the threat of concentration camp imprisonment. All persons To this austere order of Himmler’s, Reinhard who deviated even slightly from the norm of the Heydrich added that not only those persons “people’s community” belonged to the group of were to be put in custody who were under sus- the “asocials”. The most minor offence sufficed picion of engaging in illegal activities, but also to be labelled “asocial” by the police and com- those whose “behaviour indicates that they are mitted to a concentration camp. By the end of still hostile to the state and who are suspected 1938, there were thus already 12,921 persons of agitating against the state in covert form”. in “preventive police detention” in the concen- At the same time, all “KPD functionaries” who tration camps; 8,892 of them were classified as were released from prison were to be placed so-called “asocials”. in preventive custody “inasmuch as they are dangerous opponents to the state”. Heydrich’s In November 1935, with Hitler’s help, Himmler addendum led to a far greater number of arrests then succeeded in severing the ties between the than had been demanded by Himmler on 12 July concentration camps and the judicial system 1935. The operation was moreover expanded to once and for all. Inmates were now prohibited involve all non-Prussian political police. At the from seeking representation by a lawyer, and the beginning of August 1935 it was implemented judiciary was no longer permitted to investigate in Saxony, on the 13th of the month in Bavaria. deaths taking place in the concentration camps. Some 800 inmates were newly committed to In the months that followed, these fundamental Dachau; in Sachsenburg the inmate population decisions by Hitler enabled Theodor Eicke to rose from 820 on 10 September 1935 to 1,537 on submit fundamental plans for the expansion of 20 October 1935. It was the first major preven- the concentration camps within the framework tion operation; many more were to follow. of the National Socialist preparations for war:

Yet not only political inmates were subjected - In the north, a concentration camp was to to the violence in the concentration camps. As be established near Hamburg. As the Hamburg early as 1933, so-called “disciplinary forced la- administration had no means of approving the bour inmates” and “professional criminals” were construction, Eicke had to allocate the guard committed to the camps. At 325, the high rate unit designated for this camp to other camps. of “homosexual” inmates in Lichtenburg in 1935

242 | 243 - In the northwest, the Esterwegen concen- From 1935 onward, the concentration camps tration camp was to be expanded in the spring were thus places of detention for political oppo- of 1936. These plans were abandoned in the nents, served the purposes of the racialistically summer of that year, however, because a large deﬁned “people’s community” and of prevention concentration camp was to be built near Berlin with regard to the opposition from the labour in the centre of Germany: the Sachsenhausen movement, and in late 1938 as a direct means camp. of increasing the pressure on German Jews to leave the country. Beginning in 1937/38, the SS - In central Germany, a further major concentra- moreover pursued economic plans to exploit the tion camp was to be established, as Sachsen- forced labour of inmates and to occupy a niche burg and Lichtenburg had already long been in the self-contained economy of the Third unsuitable for larger inmate numbers. It would Reich, above all with quarries and brickworks. be 1937 before this plan was realized with the The concentration camp system was thus a construction of Buchenwald. purposively deployed instrument for the safeguarding of National Socialist rule, and its signif- - In southern Germany, the Dachau concentra- icance as such can hardly be overestimated. tion camp was to be expanded to permit the accommodation of larger inmate numbers there as well. This project was carried out in 1937/38. Johannes Tuchel Director of the Arbeitsstelle Widerstandsgeschichte of the Freie Universität Berlin and the Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand Other changes in the development of the concentration camps – for example the use of Lichtenburg as a women’s concentration camp, the establishment of the large Ravensbrück women’s concentration camp launched in late 1938 / early 1939, and the construction of the Flossenbürg and Mauthausen camps – are not to be attributed to this fundamental planning of late 1935 / early 1936. The establishment of those camps already signiﬁed a new function of the concentration camps: the increased ex- ploitation of inmate forced labour.

Whereas in the early summer of 1935 there were altogether 3,500 inmates, the number had already risen to 4,761 by November 1936, and by early November 1938 – that is, before the “November pogroms” – to more than 24,000. Through the deportations following the pogroms it rose to over 60,000. The new Buchenwald and Sachsenhausen camps were thus full beyond capacity. Following thousands of releases and an “amnesty” on the occasion of Hitler’s ﬁftieth birthday, some 21,000 inmates were still in custody in the concentration camps shortly before the invasion of Poland in September 1939.

23 On Himmler’s image of the enemy, see: Johannes Tuchel, “Heinrich Himmler – Der Reichsführer SS”, Ronald Smelser and Enrico Syring, eds., Die SS. Elite unter dem Totenkopf (Paderborn, 2000), pp. 234ff. 24 On this subject see Johannes Tuchel and Reinold Schattenfroh, Zentrale des Terrors. Prinz-Albrecht-Straße 8. Das Hauptquartier der Gestapo (Berlin, 1987), p. 145. 25 Bundesarchiv, NS 19/1447, fol. 17. Here I adhere to my account in Tuchel 1991 (see note 7), pp. 312ff.

E S SAYS