Hirzenhain. Forced labour, a mass shooting and remembrance

Mass shooting
 

During the first half of March 1945, the order came from Wiesbaden to disband the AEL, since the entire SS personnel from the city, the main quarter of which was subject to frequent bombing raids, was to be moved to Hirzenhain.[19] The buildings occupied by the AEL were to be used to house the SS men. Prisoners who had been found guilty of low-level crimes were to be released, while the others were to be taken to Nonnenrod estate near Fulda. At this point in time, the AEL in Hirzenhain contained around 300 female prisoners. About 30 women had already been there for some time, since an application had been made to send them to protective custody – in other words, to a concentration camp. These women remained imprisoned in Hirzenhain until a decision was made by the RSHA in Berlin regarding their “protective custody”. Following the order to disband the camp, most of the female prisoners were in fact released. Around 50 women remained in the camp. Some of them were waiting either to be deported to a concentration camp, while others were accused of politically motivated crimes, theft or sabotage. A unit of around 12 SS officers led by Emil Fritsch had already arrived in the AEL in mid-March. The unit consisted of mainly young people from the occupied eastern regions of the Reich, who were classified as ethnic Germans and who often spoke almost no German at all. 

The liquidation of the camp was slowed down by the arrival of around 50 women who were unexpectedly brought to Hirzenhain from the Gestapo prison in Klapperfeldstrasse in Frankfurt, which had been closed down. The names of these women are given in a rationing book. They wore civilian clothes and brought small bundles of possessions with them. There were German citizens among them. Their train was guarded by police officials with dogs. Since the train route from Hirzenhain had been damaged, the women were taken to the AEL in the town during the early morning of 24 March. At the station, five women managed to escape by mingling among the forced labourers, who were marching towards the armaments factory in a column. The remaining 49 women, whose number is noted in the case files, were forced to remain standing in the muster ground in the rain and sun for two days. They were only allowed to go indoors at night, where they were housed in a temporary laundry building in the local water tower. The women were completely exhausted, and one of them died. The original plan had been for them to leave Hirzenhain the following day, and to be transferred on foot to the labour office in Büdingen, which was responsible for assigning them to civilian workplaces following their release from prison. At this point in time, the head of the Security Police and the “Rhine Westmark” Security Service in Wiesbaden, Hans Trummler, ordered the entire camp to be cleared immediately. He also gave the order for his private wooden lodge to be built near the AEL. The SS personnel, around 50 in total, arrived in Hirzenhain on 24 March, at the same time as the train carrying the women. Even amongst his own staff, Trummler was regarded as being “brutal”. Shortly after his arrival, he publicly beat several Poles who were holding white flags in their hands and waiting for the American liberators to arrive.

On Saturday and Sunday, 24 and 25 March, the SS and AEL functionaries held long discussions about the unexpected arrival of the women in the camp. Following these meetings, Trummler ordered the women to be shot. The precise circumstances under which this decision was reached still remain unknown today. It appeared that there were too many female prisoners remaining in the camp to be evacuated to another prison, and since they were allegedly guilty of severe crimes, there was no question that they could be released. Many of them were ill and were in no condition to leave. From the spring of 1944 onwards, it was common practice to dissolve prisons and camps in the face of the ever-encroaching front in the occupied eastern regions. On 20 July 1944, on behalf of the Government General, the commander of the Security Police and the Security Service issued an order for those prisoners to be killed who could not be removed, largely due to the rapidly approaching Soviet front. Prisoners accused of minor crimes were released, while those who were ill and unable to march were murdered. In Hirzenhain, the SS operated according to a similar logic, sending some prisoners to Nonnenrod near Fulda, while the rest, who were either in poor health or who posed a political threat, were shot en masse. 

In the early morning of 26 March, just three days before the Americans arrived, and shortly before Easter, the SS in Hirzenhain murdered 87 people – 76 women and eleven men – mainly by shooting them in the neck. The victims were rudely awakened in the night and taken to a ditch that had been dug at the edge of the forest. Some of them were wearing their grey prisoner’s uniform, while others were in civilian clothes. Some of the women were completely naked. In addition to the 49 women who had arrived on the train from Frankfurt, young women were also “selected” who had already been incarcerated for a long time in the AEL prison. They included two Russian doctors and an engineer. When the bodies were later exhumed, some witnesses recognised them.

The execution was carried out by Trummler’s subordinates and the SS commander Emil Fritsch, who had arrived ten days previously. Prior to the execution, two young AEL prisoners were forced to dig a large ditch, under supervision by the SS, into which they themselves were later pushed. Several other prisoners from the construction brigade, one of whom is likely to have been French, were also killed. Two residents of Hirzenhain witnessed the ditch being dug. They also heard the shots. According to the report on the incident, which was compiled after the war ended, the forced labourers from the civilian camp were locked in their camp for three days, and were able to imagine what was happening outside (Fig. 13 . ). On the same day of the massacre, the camp inventory and the remaining women prisoners were taken away in the direction of Fulda, together with the guards. At their destination in Nonnenrod, they, too, were to be killed. However, the officer responsible for carrying out the order refused to do so, and the prisoners were finally either released or sent on to the concentration camp in Buchenwald. The SS left Hirzenhain on 28 March 1945.

It is not known exactly how many of the victims came from Poland. However, on the basis of the Frankfurt list, it is possible to reconstruct the life stories of some of the women with Polish-sounding names. Two of the women on the transport list were named as Anna Fułka and Walentyna Gruza. It’s worth taking a closer look at their life stories. Anna Fułka (possibly Anna Fułek), born on 29 April 1929 in Warsaw, was incarcerated in Hanau from February 1944 to 1 March 1945 and was taken from there to the Gestapo prison in Frankfurt.[20] Walentyna Gruza, born on 24 July 1924 in Czechowice, was employed at the Kalle & Co. chemicals plant in Wiesbaden from September 1944 and lived in the “Landgrabenlager” camp[21] in Wiesbaden/Biebrich. On 21 February 1945, she was imprisoned in Frankfurt.[22] The two Polish women arrived in Frankfurt prison just a few weeks before they were taken to Hirzenhain. After arriving in Hirzenhain, they disappeared without trace. It is therefore highly likely that they were shot.