Franz Romeikat (born October 7, 1904, date of death unknown) was an SS-'' Unterscharführer'' and staff member at

Auschwitz concentration camp Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. I ...

. He was prosecuted in the

Auschwitz Trial The Auschwitz trial began on November 24, 1947, in Kraków, when Poland's Supreme National Tribunal tried forty former staff of the Auschwitz concentration camps. The trials ended on December 22, 1947. The best-known defendants were Arthur Lie ...

. Romeikat was born in Iwenberg (then in

East Prussia East Prussia ; german: Ostpreißen, label= Low Prussian; pl, Prusy Wschodnie; lt, Rytų Prūsija was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1773 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 187 ...

). A watchmaker by trade, he became a member of the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

and the SS by March 6, 1933. In November 1940 he was drafted into the

Waffen-SS The (, "Armed SS") was the combat branch of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts, volunteers and conscripts from both occup ...

and in February 1941 he was assigned to Auschwitz. At first he worked in the clothing section, then from November 1942 to October 1944 he worked in Department IV (Administration), dealing with prisoners' property. He was cruel to prisoners, sometimes beating them, and participated in the plundering of property from those killed in the Birkenau gas chambers. Romeikat was tried by the Supreme National Tribunal at the Auschwitz Trial in

Kraków Kraków (), or Cracow, is the second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula, Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city dates back to the seventh century. Kraków was the official capital of Poland un ...

and sentenced to 15 years in prison for his crimes. Due to an amnesty, he was released in the fifties.

Bibliography

* Cyprian T., Sawicki J., ''Siedem wyroków Najwyższego Trybunału Narodowego'', Poznań 1962 {{DEFAULTSORT:Romeikat, Franz 1904 births Waffen-SS personnel People convicted in the Auschwitz trial Year of death missing SS non-commissioned officers German watchmakers (people) People from East Prussia German people convicted of crimes against humanity German people imprisoned abroad