The Participants at the Conference

From June 1941, Bühler was permanent deputy of Governor General Hans Frank, and in this position shared in the responsibility for all crimes committed against the Polish population and for the mass genocide of the Jews in Poland. At the Wannsee Conference he urged Heydrich to start the “Final Solution” in the Generalgouvernement where, he stated, no “transport problems” existed. Furthermore, Bühler stressed that he wanted “a speedy solution of the Jewish question in this territory.” In 1942, Bühler participated in the preparations for  German settlements near Lublin and the abduction of Poles to Germany for forced labor.

Born in Waldsee (Württemberg), the son of a baker. Catholic family. High school. Study of law. Doctor of law degree in 1932. Joined the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in 1933. As chief district attorney he was office manager to Reich Ministry without portfolio, Hans Frank. In December 1939, Head of the Governor General’s office in Cracow, and in March 1940 his secretary of state. Witness for the defense of Hans Frank before the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, thereafter extradited to Poland. Sentenced to death in Cracow in July 1948 and executed.

 

Eichmann, as organizer of the deportations, played a leading role in the process of exterminating Europe’s Jews. Having been active since October 1934 in Section II / 112 (“Jewry”) of the Security Service’s Main Office in Berlin, he concerned himself with the existing possibilities for driving the Jews out of Germany. Following the annexation of Austria and the German occupation of Bohemia and Moravia, Eichmann, in 1938/39, was in charge of the “Centers for Jewish Emigration” in Vienna and Prague. In October 1939, he participated in the plans for a “Jewish reservation” in Nisko on the river San (Poland). From December 1939 on, he worked as a consultant in the Reich Main Security Office’s Section IV D 4 (“Emigration and Expulsion”). In March 1941, he became Director of Section IV B 4 (“Jewish Affairs and Expulsions”). He also drew up the summarized protocol of the Wannsee Conference. From October 1941 until 1944, the coordination of transports and the decision on how many Jews were to be deported each time proceeded from his office. From March 1944 on, as head of the “Special Command Eichmann” in Budapest, he was responsible for the forced transport of over 437,000 Jews to Auschwitz and other concentration and extermination camps.

Born in Solingen as son of a bookkeeper. High school, uncompleted training in engineering, then business apprenticeship. From 1925 until 1933 he worked as a salesman and travel agent in Vienna. Joined the Nazi Party (NSDAP) and the SS in April 1932 and moved to Germany in August 1933. From 1934 he was in the Security Service; since 1939 in the Reich Security Main Office. In early May 1945, he posed as an airforce private, was arrested but soon managed to escape. Worked under a false name as a forestry worker near Celle. In 1950, he fled via Austria to Italy and from there to Argentina where he lived in Buenos Aires. Kidnapped by members of the  Israeli Intelligence Service in May 1960. Sentenced to death in Jerusalem in December 1961 and executed on May 31, 1962.

 

At the Wannsee Conference, Freisler represented the ministry which since the passage of the Nuremberg Laws in 1935 was principally involved in the persecution of the Jews along juridical lines. Freisler was considered a “guarantor of National Socialist convictions.” In August 1942, Freisler was appointed President of the People’s Court (Volksgerichtshof). In this position he and other members of the Court sentenced thousands of political opponents to death.

Born in Celle, son of an engineer. (Reformed) Protestant parental home. High school in Aachen, diploma in 1912. Study of law at the university of Kiel. Entered military service in August 1914 as an officer cadet, subsequently lieutenant. Russian prisoner of war from October 1915 to 1920. Continuation of the study of law at Jena. Doctor of law degree in 1922, and from 1924 lawyer in Kassel and member in the city parliament for the Völkisch-Sozial Block. Joined the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in July 1925. Member of the Prussian Diet. As of June 1933, state secretary (Staatssekretär) in the Prussian Ministry of Justice, member of the Prussian Council of State, and in October 1933 state secretary in the newly combined Reich and Prussian Ministry of Justice. There he was primarily responsible for personnel questions, penal legislation, and execution of sentences. Perished in Berlin during an air raid on February 3, 1945.

 

From 1938, Heydrich was a key figure in the expulsion and extermination of the European Jews. Since the annexation of Austria, the Security Service had excelled in organizing forced emigration. Following the November Pogrom of 1938, Heydrich had 26,000 Jews in Germany arrested and imprisoned in concentration camps. When war broke out on September 1, 1939, Heydrich ordered the ghettoization of all Jews and the establishment of Councils of Elders in all Jewish communities in Poland. After the attack on the Soviet Union he initially ordered the “Special Units” (Einsatzgruppen) to execute Communist functionaries and Jews old enough to serve in the military. The “Special Units” soon got the order to begin their systematic mass murder of the entire Jewish population within the occupied  territory of the Soviet Union. After receiving on July 31, 1941, a memorandum, signed by Göring, which authorized him to carry out the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question,” Heydrich made plans for the extermination of 11 million European Jews.

Born in Halle on the Saale, the son of a composer and director of a Conservatoire. Attended a Catholic high school. Freecorps fighter in 1920. Joined the German Navy in 1922 and was dishonorably discharged as a first naval lieutenant in 1931 because of a broken marriage promise. Joined the Nazi Party and the SS in 1931. In July 1932, Himmler entrusted him with the organization and leadership of the Security Service (SD). Head of the Bavarian Political Police in April 1933, and Head of the Secret State Police Office in Berlin in 1934. In June 1936, he became Head of the Security Police, and in September 1939 of the Reich Security Main Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt – RSHA). On May 27, 1942, Czech resistance fighters in Prague made an assassination attempt on him which led to his death on June 4, 1942.

 

Hofmann occupied a leading position from 1940 until 1943 in the various Germanization policies involving the territories of Poland and the Soviet Union. He was responsible for “racial testing,” as a result of which various ethnic groups were driven from their land and replaced by Germans from different countries; for the abduction of Polish children to Germany; and for “SS-genealogical preservation” (SS-Sippenpflege). At the Wannsee Conference, Hofmann demanded emphatically that people of “mixed blood” (Mischlinge) be sterilized.

Born in Innsbruck, the son of a businessman. High school education. Volunteered for military service in August 1914, and in March 1917 was promoted to second lieutenant. In June 1917, he became a prisoner of war in Russia, escaped and returned to Germany where he was trained as a pilot. Demobilized in 1919. From 1920 to 1925 he worked in the wholesale wine business, thereafter as a self-employed wine salesman. Joined the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in 1923, the SS in April 1931, and from 1933 on was a full-time SS leader. In April 1943, he was appointed commander of the SS Main Sector Southwest and Senior SS and Police leader in Württemberg, Baden and the Alsace. He was also commander of the prisoners of war within Defense Sector V (Southeast). During the trial of the Main Office for Race and Settlement in March 1948 he was sentenced to 25 years imprisonment for crimes against humanity and and war crimes. Amnestied in 1954 and released from Landsberg penitentiary. Thereafter business clerk in Württemberg.

 

Klopfer’s role in the process of the “Final Solution” developed from the central position the party chancellery occupied within the governing system of National Socialism. He was one of the most influential and best informed bureaucrats of the Nazi regime. As he was both Head of Constitutional Law Section III of the Nazi Party chancellery and also Martin Bormann’s deputy, he was in charge of questions relating to “Race and National Character,” economic policies, cooperation with the Reich Security Main Office, and basic policies referring to the politics of occupation. In November 1942, he participated as state secretary in restricting the rights of Jews living in “mixed marriages.”

Born in Schreibersdorf (Silesia), son of a farmer. High school diploma in 1923. Study of law and economics in Jena and Breslau. In 1927, he obtained his doctor of law degree. In 1931, district court judge in Düsseldorf. Joined the Nazi Party and the stormtroopers (SA) in April 1933. At the end of 1933, he became a consultant in the Prussian Ministry of Agriculture, and in 1934 at the Secret State Police Office. In April 1935, he joined the staff of Rudolf Hess, the “Führer’s Deputy,” and in the same year also the SS. In 1938, as ministerial secretary (Ministerialrat), he worked on the expropriation of Jewish enterprises. Fled Berlin in April 1945 and was subsequently interned. After he was released from imprisonment in 1949, the Superior Trial Court in Nuremberg declared him to be “only minimally incriminated” (minderbelastet). In 1952, tax accountant. In 1956, lawyer in Ulm. An investigation process by the prosecuting attorney’s office in Ulm because of his participation in the Wannsee Conference was discontinued in 1962.

 

Next to the Chief of the Reich Chancellery, Lammers, Kritzinger was the number two man in this position. He therefore knew about all anti-Jewish measures, and within his capacity as a Reich Chancellery official dealt extensively with “Jewish problems.” Thus, in 1939/40, he assisted in drafting ordinances against “despoilers of the people” (Volksschädlinge), and also in the draft of the 11th Ordinance to the Reich Citizenship Law on the basis of which the German Jews were deprived of their property prior to their deportation. In 1942/43, as state secretary, he busied himself with the draft of ordinances designed to delimit the right of appeal for Jews in legal matters. When he was questioned in court after 1945, Kritzinger admitted to having been a participant at the Wannsee Conference and acknowledged its criminal nature.

Born as son of a clergyman in Grünfier (Netze District). High School diploma in 1908. Study of law. Fought in the frontlines 1914–1918, became a reserve lieutenant. In 1921 examination as an assistant judge (Assessor). Thereafter he worked as an assistant in the Reich Ministry of Justice. In 1925/26, senior councilor (Landgerichtsrat) in the Prussian Ministry of Commerce, and in 1926 return to the Reich Ministryof Justice. Joined the Nazi Party on January 1, 1938. Transferred to the Reich Chancellery in February 1938 where he served as the director of Section B with the rank of permanent secretary (Ministerialdirektor). At the beginning of 1942, undersecretary of state (Unterstaatssekretär), and at the end of the same year secretary of state (Staatssekretär). Fled from Berlin in 1945, and in May 1945 became secretary of state in the Dönitz Government in Flensburg. Subsequently interned in Bruchsal, released in April 1946 but rearrested in December. Was found unfit to stay in prison on account of ill health.

 

For quite a long time Lange belonged to those Secret State Police officials of the “intermediate level” who made the functioning of the terror apparatus possible. When under Heydrich’s command the “Special Units” (Einsatzgruppen) of the Security Police and Security Service were formed in order to murder the Jews in the Soviet Union, Lange was called into action as well. As chief of staff of his outfit, “Special Unit A,” which moved behind the German Army into the Baltic region, he also led for a while “Special Command 2” which by December 1941 had murdered roughly 60,000 Latvian Jews as well as Jews from other countries deported to Latvia. Lange himself commanded killing operations at the outskirts of Riga. At the Wannsee Conference he was the “experienced practitioner” of mass executions.

Born in Weisswasser, the son of a railway construction supervisor. Study of law. Member of the Secret State Police in Halle in 1933, and doctor of law at the University of Jena. In 1936, member of the Secret State Police Office in Berlin. Joined the Nazi Party (NSDAP) and the SS in 1937. With the Secret State Police in Vienna in 1938 and in Stuttgart in 1939. In 1940, he headed the Secret State Police in Weimar and Erfurt, and in September 1940 was deputy for the Head of the Secret State Police in Berlin. In December 1941, Commander of SecurityPolice and Security Service in Latvia, and as of January 1945 Commander of Security Police and Security Service in the Warta region (Warthegau). Committed suicide in Poznan in February 1945.