Female guards in Nazi concentration camps
SS-Gefolge
SS-Aufseherin (pl. SS-Aufseherinnen; German: [ˈaʊ̯fˌzeːəʁɪn] ; lit. 'female SS overseer') was the position title for a female guard in Nazi concentration and extermination camps. Female camp personnel were members of the SS-Gefolge auxiliary organization, which served the SS-Totenkopfverbände (SS-TV) in a limited capacity as these women were not formally recognized as members of the Schutzstaffel (SS).
Background
In April 1933, a workhouse in Moringen was made into a detention facility under Hanover administration. In November of that year, 141 women, the majority of whom were suspected or confirmed Communists, were imprisoned there. Prisoners usually stayed in Moringen for a few weeks before being released. The facility did not become one associated with reports of mistreatment, and group discussions were held daily to "re-educate". The facility closed in March 1938, and was replaced by the Lichtenburg concentration camp, which opened in Saxony in late 1937, and became known as the first SS-run women's concentration camp. It was commanded by SS-Hauptsturmführer Max Koegel and staffed by recruited and conscripted women who worked as guards.
Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler directed the construction of a larger second women's concentration camp in November 1938, after Lichtenburg's limited capacity had become an issue due to a rising number of arrests.
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This entry incorporates text from “Female guards in Nazi concentration camps” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.