Albert Sauer (17 August 1898, Misdroy – 3 May 1945, Falkensee) was a

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

German commandant of

Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp Mauthausen was a German Nazi concentration camp on a hill above the market town of Mauthausen, Upper Austria, Mauthausen (roughly east of Linz), Upper Austria. It was the main camp of a group with List of subcamps of Mauthausen, nearly 100 f ...

. He died of wounds in 1945, and was never tried for his role in

The Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

Nazi atrocities and death

Sauer, a

carpenter Carpentry is a skilled trade and a craft in which the primary work performed is the cutting, shaping and installation of building materials during the construction of buildings, ships, timber bridges, concrete formwork, etc. Carpenter ...

by trade, became a member of the

NSDAP The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor, the German Workers ...

(Nazi Party) and the SS in 1931. After a period of unemployment, he became a full-time SS employee. Wolfgang Benz, Barbara Distel (ed.). ''Der Ort des Terrors: Geschichte der nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslager, Flossenbürg, Mauthausen, Ravensbrück'', Vol. 4, Munich 2006
p. 295
/ref> A protégé of the Inspector of Concentration Camps Theodor Eicke, Sauer was assigned to the SS guard unit (''Wachtruppe'') of

Oranienburg concentration camp Oranienburg was an early Nazi concentration camp, one of the first concentration camp, detention facilities established by the Nazis in the Free State of Prussia, state of Prussia when they Hitler's rise to power#Seizure of control .281931 - 1933 ...

in April 1935. From 1 April 1936, he was commandant of Bad Sulza concentration camp. Between 1 August 1937 and mid-1938, Sauer was second '' Schutzhaftlagerführer'' in

Sachsenhausen concentration camp Sachsenhausen () or Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg was a German Nazi concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany, used from 1936 until April 1945, shortly before the defeat of Nazi Germany in May later that year. It mainly held political prisoners t ...

and thus belonged to '' "Wachtruppe Brandenburg"''. In the period between 1 August 1938 and 1 April 1939, he officially acted as commandant of the then-temporary

quarry A quarry is a type of open-pit mining, open-pit mine in which dimension stone, rock (geology), rock, construction aggregate, riprap, sand, gravel, or slate is excavated from the ground. The operation of quarries is regulated in some juri ...

''Wienergraben'', so named because of the Wienergraben Valley in which it was located, of Granitwerke Mauthausen, which relied on slave labor from the subcamps of Mauthausen-Gusen. Due to negligence, Sauer was removed from the camp service in April 1939. On 9 February 1939, he was replaced as camp commandant by SS-'' Sturmbannführer'' Franz Ziereis. In the period of 1941–1942, he had an official position in the RKFDV ('' Reichskommissar für die Festigung deutschen Volkstums''; Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood). From September 1942 to April 1943, Sauer was again ''Schutzhaftlagerführer'' in Sachsenhausen. In 1943, Sauer was involved in the destruction of the

Riga Ghetto Riga Ghetto was a small area in Maskavas Forštate, a neighbourhood of Riga, Latvia, where Nazis forced Latvian Jewish, Jews from Latvia, and later from the German "Reich" (Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and Moravia), to live during World War II. On ...

, which involved executing or deporting thousands of people (mostly Jews) to their deaths in concentration camps. Later, he was temporarily the commandant of Kaiserwald concentration camp which was vacated in July 1944, by execution and deportation of inmates. He died of wounds received at Falkensee on 3 May 1945.The 'Final Solution' in Riga: Exploitation and Annihilation, 1941-1944 by Andrej Angrick, Peter Klein, Ray Brandon, p. 479

Bibliography

* Eberhard Jäckel et al.: ''Enzyklopädie des Holocaust'', Vol. 2, Tel Aviv * Stefan Hördler: ''Die Schlussphase des Konzentrationslagers Ravensbrück'', in: Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft, Book 3, 2008, p. 229, Fn 34 * Wolfgang Benz, Barbara Distel (ed.): ''Der Ort des Terrors: Geschichte der nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslager, Flossenbürg, Mauthausen, Ravensbrück'', Vol. 4, Munich 2006,

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sauer, Albert 1898 births 1945 deaths German military personnel killed in World War II People from Kamień County Schutzhaftlagerführer Mauthausen concentration camp personnel Sachsenhausen concentration camp personnel Kaiserwald concentration camp personnel Holocaust perpetrators in Latvia Riga Ghetto SS-Sturmbannführer German carpenters Nazi concentration camp commandants