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Victims of the Gay Holocaust
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Re-discovering the names, faces, and stories of Nazis' Homosexual Victims
When we gay people wear or use the "pink triangle", it is to us just a symbol, an emblem of gay liberation, that rarely and vaguely recalls to us that it was the way Nazis "marked" the homosexuals. Very seldom we think that this "mark" meant, for the bearers in a Concentration Camp, that they were the most despised inmates, often even more than the Jews, who anyway were the "lowest" class in Nazi Lagers.
Jews were barbarously, and systematically eliminated as a people, because of racial hatred and of an official policy of Nazis. Homosexuals were not officially doomed to be exterminated, but they were just abandoned in the hands of the most sadistic attitudes of Camps' guards and officials, who mistreated, oppressed and killed them just for "fun". It was a personal hatred deriving from contempt and scorn, the same hatred that "justifies" the bashing and the killing of so many gay people even in our days, in our countries.
The pink triangle, transformed thus by homosexuals from a mark of Nazi persecution into an emblem of gay liberation, gained great currency but lost its link to the personal dramatic experience of the gay holocaust. Today, after more than half a century, the symbol can be associated once again with some men's names, with their voices, their story. This is the reason why we decided to open this section of out Memorial.
The number of homosexuals who died in Nazi concentration camps is unknown and likely to remain so. Although statistics are available on the number of men brought to trial on charges of "lewd and unnatural behaviour," many more were sent to camps without the benefit of a trial. Moreover, many homosexuals were summarily executed by firing squads; this was particularly the case with gays in the military -- which encompassed nearly every able-bodied man during the final years of the war. Finally, many concentration camps systematically destroyed all their records when it became apparent that German defeat was imminent.
Please, read the following sections (click on the pink triangle) |
5.1.1 - The beginning of persecution
5.1.2 - Homosexuals targeted
5.1.3 - Tracking down suspected homosexuals |
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5.2 - Arrested, deported, killed |
5.3 - Homosexuals in the German Army in War time |
5.4.1 - Homosexuals in Concentration camps normally died within months
5.4.2 - A difficult (and painful) "coming out" |
5.5 - Forgotten Holocaust (article by Rochambeau) |
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A partial list of "pink triangle" victims
(click on the names to read their file)
NOTE: several of the mug-shots are © of Jörg Hutter |
Friedrich Althoff |
Germany - waiter |
Deported |
January 25, 1938 |
Destiny unknown |
Friedrich Baumann |
Germany - worker |
Deported |
June 20, 1941 |
Killed |
Gad Beck |
Germany - writer |
Arrested |
March 1945 |
Liberated |
Albrecht Becker |
Germany - art director |
Arrested |
1935 |
Freed 1938 |
Anton Baerzchik |
Germany - worker |
Deported |
May 23, 1941 |
Destiny unknown |
Oskar Birke |
Germany - farmer |
Deported |
August 29, 1941 |
Killed |
Kurt Brüssow |
Poland - actor |
Deported |
May 28, 1941 |
Destiny unknown |
Kurt Bruhn |
Germany - waiter |
Deported |
January 25, 1942 |
Killed |
Walter Degen |
Germany - ironsmith |
Deported |
January 25, 1942 |
Killed |
Heinz Dörmer |
Germany - youth leader |
Deported |
April, 1935 |
Freed 1963 |
Emil Drews |
Germany - farmer |
Deported |
August 22, 1941 |
Killed |
Heinz F. |
Germany - farmer |
Deported |
1935 |
Freed 1944 |
Alfred Fischer |
Germany - shoemaker |
Deported |
October 31, 1941 |
Killed |
Max Gergla |
Germany - shopkeeper |
Deported |
November 28, 1941 |
Killed |
Karl Gorath |
Germany - deacon |
Deported |
November 28, 1938 |
Liberated |
Friedrich-Paul von Groszheim |
Germany - merchant |
Arrested |
January, 1937 |
Liberated |
Richard Grune |
Germany - artist |
Arrested |
December, 1934 |
Liberated |
Heinz Heger |
Austria - student |
Arrested |
1939 |
Liberated |
Otto Herzfeld |
Poland - workman |
Deported |
October 3, 1941 |
Killed |
Erwin Jahnke |
Germany - electrician |
Deported |
December 19, 1941 |
Destiny unknown |
Walter John |
Germany - workman |
Deported |
August 29, 1941 |
Killed |
Willi Käcker |
Germany - shopkeeper |
Deported |
August 29, 1941 |
Killed |
Josef Klose |
Germany - tailor |
Deported |
July 25, 1941 |
Killed |
Josef Kohout |
Austria - work unknown |
Deported |
1939 |
Liberated |
Friedrich Kühne |
Germany - clerk |
Deported |
May 23, 1941 |
Destiny unknown |
Karl Lange |
Germany - shop apprentice |
Deported |
1935 |
Liberated |
Franz Langecker |
Germany - clerk |
Deported |
August 22, 1941 |
Destiny unknown |
Paul Lehrfeld |
Germany - worker |
Deported |
August 22, 1941 |
Killed |
Manfred Lewin |
Germany - student |
Deported |
November, 1942 |
Killed |
Johann Mauler |
Latvia - Workman |
Deported |
September 11, 1941 |
Killed |
Rudolf von Mayer |
Germany - bailiff |
Deported |
May 30, 1941 |
Killed |
Waldemar Mews |
Germany - baker |
Deported |
October 10, 1941 |
Killed |
Paul O'Montis |
Germany - Singer |
Deported |
June, 1940 |
Killed |
Robert T. Odeman |
Germany - musician |
Deported |
1942 |
Escaped |
Robert Oelbermann |
Germany - work unknown |
Deported |
1936 |
Killed |
Harry Pauly |
Germany - actor |
Deported |
1943 |
Survived |
Walter Peters |
Germany - physician |
Deported |
October 10, 1941 |
Killed |
August Pfeiffer |
Germany - servant |
Deported |
November 1, 1941 |
Killed |
Günther Pieka |
Slovakia? - Miller |
Deported |
May 23, 1941 |
Destiny unknown |
Willi Pohl |
Germany - textile worker |
Deported |
June 6, 1941 |
Killed |
Hugo Präbitzer |
Germany - electrician |
Deported |
September 12, 1941 |
Killed |
Fritz Ruske |
Germany - nurse |
Deported |
November 27, 1941 |
Destiny unknown |
Henny Schermann |
Germany - shop assistant |
Deported |
1940 |
Killed |
Richard Schiller |
Germany - office assistant |
Deported |
October 25, 1941 |
Killed |
Erwin Schimitzek |
Germany - trade clerk |
Deported |
August 28, 1941 |
Killed |
Heinz Schumacher |
Germany - shopkeeper |
Deported |
December 5, 1941 |
Killed |
Pierre Seel |
France - student |
Deported |
1940 |
Liberated |
Emil Sliwiok |
Germany - workman |
Deported |
1941 |
Killed |
Paul Gerhard Vogel |
? - ? |
Deported |
? |
Liberated |
Name unknown |
Prisoner #3877 |
Arrested |
1936 - 1939 |
Destiny unknown |
Name unknown |
Germany - Interior designer |
Arrested |
? |
Destiny unknown |
Name unknown |
Germany - Work unknown |
Deported |
December 6, 1941 |
Killed |
Name unknown |
Germany - Bartender |
Deported |
August 27, 1936 |
Destiny unknown |
Name unknown |
Germany - ? |
Arrested |
October, 1937 |
Destiny unknown |
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