Hermann Wilhelm Hackmann (November 11, 1913 – August 20, 1994) was a German

war criminal A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hostage ...

, Nazi SS captain in two extermination camps during World War II. He was a roll call officer at KL

Buchenwald Buchenwald (; 'beech forest') was a German Nazi concentration camp established on Ettersberg hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within the Altreich (Old Reich) territori ...

, and lead guard in charge of the so-called protective custody at

Majdanek concentration camp Majdanek (or Lublin) was a Nazi concentration and extermination camp built and operated by the SS on the outskirts of the city of Lublin during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. It had three gas chambers, two wooden gallows, ...

in German-occupied

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

. Described as a brutal man with a cynical sense of humour, Hackmann was tried three times. The first time, he was prosecuted for murder and embezzlement and sentenced to death by SS Judge Georg Konrad Morgen in connection with the Koch trial. However, Hackmann's sentence was later commuted to a prison term. He spent at least five months as a regular prisoner in

Dachau concentration camp Dachau (, ; , ; ) was one of the first concentration camps built by Nazi Germany and the longest-running one, opening on 22 March 1933. The camp was initially intended to intern Hitler's political opponents, which consisted of communists, s ...

before being transferred to a penal battalion.David A. Hackett, ''The Buchenwald Report'', , .

Trials

Hackmann came from

Osnabrück Osnabrück (; ; archaic English: ''Osnaburg'') is a city in Lower Saxony in western Germany. It is situated on the river Hase in a valley penned between the Wiehen Hills and the northern tip of the Teutoburg Forest. With a population of 168 ...

. At the age of 24 he first assumed the post of SS officer at Buchenwald. After the war, Hackmann was prosecuted this time by the U.S. government at the Buchenwald Trial of 1947. He was one of twenty-two Nazis sentenced to death for his role in the

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are certain serious crimes committed as part of a large-scale attack against civilians. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity can be committed during both peace and war and against a state's own nationals as well as ...

committed at

, though the sentence was commuted to

life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence (law), sentence of imprisonment under which the convicted individual is to remain incarcerated for the rest of their natural life (or until pardoned or commuted to a fixed term). Crimes that result in life impr ...

in 1948. Details of his activities in Buchenwald that surfaced during the trial portray him as a man who was greatly feared by the prisoners and prone to violence and using different ways to torture prisoners. Inmates were frequently beaten, kicked and whipped by Hackmann with sticks and whips. He was also known to make prisoners kneel so he could kick them in the scrotum. There was a rule against spitting on the camp road and when Hackmann saw some spit on the ground he forced the nearest inmate to lick it up. One witness testified that he had two block leaders bend a birch tree where he made a Jewish man hold onto it. When the block leaders released the tree, the man was flung into the air into a stone quarry. In 1950, Hackmann's sentence was further reduced to 25 years. He was paroled in 1955. During the Third Majdanek trial between 1975 and 1981, he was sentenced to an additional ten years imprisonment for two counts of serving as joint accessory to murder of at least 141 prisoners at KL Lublin / Majdanek concentration camp.''Landgericht Düsseldorf spricht Urteile im Majdanek-Prozeß''
''Landtag Intern'' vom 26. Juni 2001 (Landtag Nordrhein-Westfalen).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hackmann, Hermann 1913 births 1994 deaths Buchenwald concentration camp personnel SS-Hauptsturmführer German people convicted of torture German prisoners sentenced to death People convicted in the Dachau trials People convicted in the Majdanek trials People convicted in the Buchenwald trials People convicted of murder by Germany Military personnel from Osnabrück Prisoners sentenced to death by the United States military People condemned by Nazi courts Waffen-SS personnel