Jakob (Jack) Reimer (November 6, 1918 – August 3, 2005) was a Trawniki camp guard who later emigrated to the United States and became a salesman and restaurant manager.

Biography

Early life in USSR

Born to

Russian Mennonite The Russian Mennonites ( it. "Russia Mennonites", i.e., Mennonites of or from the Russian Empire are a group of Mennonites who are the descendants of Dutch and North German Anabaptists who settled in the Vistula delta in West Prussia for about ...

parents in Friedensdorf,

Molotschna Molotschna Colony or Molochna Colony was a Russian Mennonite settlement in what is now Zaporizhzhia Oblast in Ukraine. Today, the central village, known as Molochansk, has a population less than 10,000. The settlement is named after the Molochna R ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

(now , Ukraine), Reimer studied to be a librarian.

Second World War

In 1940, Reimer was drafted into the

Soviet Army The Soviet Ground Forces () was the land warfare service branch of the Soviet Armed Forces from 1946 to 1992. It was preceded by the Red Army. After the Soviet Union ceased to exist in December 1991, the Ground Forces remained under th ...

. When Germany invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, Reimer entered combat and was captured by German forces on July 6. Two months later, due to his Germanic heritage and language skills, he was recruited to the

Trawniki concentration camp The Trawniki was a Nazi concentration camps, concentration camp set up by Nazi Germany in the village of Trawniki about southeast of Lublin during the occupation of Poland in World War II. Throughout its existence the camp served a dual function ...

for training as a camp guard. While serving as a camp guard, Reimer participated in the liquidation of Jewish

ghetto A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...

s in Poland, in addition to administrative and office duties. On one occasion, Reimer fired a shot while at a pit containing corpses and at least one live civilian, which would later prove pivotal in his US

denaturalization Denaturalization is the loss of citizenship against the will of the person concerned. Denaturalization is often applied to ethnic minorities and political dissidents. Denaturalization can be a penalty for actions considered criminal by the state ...

trial. In 1944, he received a

War Merit Cross The War Merit Cross () was a state decoration of Nazi Germany during World War II. By the end of the conflict it was issued in four degrees and had an equivalent civil award. A " de-Nazified" version of the War Merit Cross was reissued in 1957 ...

for his service, and was promoted to SS Senior Platoon Guard (''SS-Oberzugwachmann'') in 1945. In 1944, Reimer gained German citizenship after

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his suicide in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the lea ...

made all ethnic German military and police personnel eligible for German citizenship.

United States

In 1952, Reimer applied for a visa to the United States and was naturalized as a United States citizen on April 28, 1959. During his time in the United States, he worked as a Wise potato chip salesman and a restaurant manager, and lived in

Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

. After he retired, he moved to Carmel, New York, and was living in

Fort Lee, New Jersey Fort Lee is a Borough (New Jersey), borough at the eastern border of Bergen County, New Jersey, Bergen County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, situated along the Hudson River atop The Palisades (Hudson River), The Palisades. As of the 2020 Uni ...

at the time of his death. Reimer was first investigated by American authorities in 1980 in connection with the

John Demjanjuk John Demjanjuk (), born Ivan Mykolaiovych Demjanjuk (), was a Trawniki and Nazi camp guard at Sobibor extermination camp, Majdanek, and Flossenbürg. Demjanjuk became the center of global media attention in the 1980s, when he was tried and ...

case, but minimal progress was made during this initial investigation. Not until the

fall of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of Nationalities, Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. :s: ...

and the end of

Communism Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...

in the

Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc (Combloc), the Socialist Bloc, the Workers Bloc, and the Soviet Bloc, was an unofficial coalition of communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that were a ...

did investigators make substantial progress, as formerly restricted archives were opened up to Western historians. In 1992 the Office of Special Investigations filed a denaturalization suit against Reimer, and following a bench trial in 1998, Reimer was denaturalized on September 5, 2002. He appealed his denaturalization, but the

United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (in case citations, 2d Cir.) is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals. Its territory covers the states of Connecticut, New York (state), New York, and Vermont, and it has ap ...

upheld it on January 27, 2004. In 2005, the government sought to deport Reimer, and he agreed to leave for Germany, but he died before his deportation could be completed.

In literature

Reimer, who was Trawniki recruit No. 865, figured predominantly in ''Citizen 865: The Hunt for Hitler's Hidden Soldiers in America'' (listed below).

References

Sources

* * * * Access by free subscription (January 2021). * * * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Reimer, Jakob 1918 births 2005 deaths American Mennonites American people of Ukrainian descent Anabaptist–Jewish relations Loss of United States citizenship and deportation by prior Nazi affiliation Trawniki concentration camp Nazi concentration camp personnel Holocaust perpetrators in Poland Soviet military personnel of World War II from Ukraine Soviet prisoners of war World War II prisoners of war held by Germany Russian Mennonites Soviet emigrants to the United States