Karl-Friedrich Hocker Signed Document - Auschwitz

Karl-Friedrich Hocker Signed Document - Auschwitz
Rare signed document from Auschwitz signed bySS-Untersturmfuhrer und Adjutant Karl-Friedrich Hocker , he is famous forthe Hocker Album with the only known contemporary photos of Josef Mengele.The document reads :Service Auschwitz on 1.6.44K.L. AuschwitzRelates to the allocation of 5 Borgward trucks.To the Head of Office B V at the SS Economic and Administrative Main OfficeBerlin-Lichterfelde-WestUnder the oaks 126-135The office asks again for the immediate shutdown of the promised 5 KLWs tocover the urgent transport needs.HockerSS-Untersturmfuhrer and AdjutantKarl-Friedrich Höcker (11 December 1911 – 30 January 2000) was a Nazi warcriminal, German commander in the SS and the adjutant to Richard Baer, whowas a commandant of Auschwitz I concentration camp from May 1944 to December1944. In 2006, a photo album created by Höcker (the Höcker Album), with some116 pictures from his time at Auschwitz, was given to the United StatesHolocaust Memorial Museum, sparking new interest in his activities as aconcentration camp administrator.The youngest of six children, Höcker was born in the village of Engershausen(now part of Preußisch Oldendorf), Germany. His father was a constructionworker, who was later killed in action during World War I.Following an apprenticeship as bank teller he worked at a bank in Lübbeckebefore being made redundant. After having been unemployed for two and a halfyears, he joined the SS in October 1933 and the Nazi Party in May 1937.On 16 November 1939 he joined the 9th SS Infantry Regiment based at Danzigand, in 1940, became the adjutant to the commanding SS officer of theNeuengamme concentration camp, Martin Gottfried Weiss. In 1942 Weiss wasalso the commanding officer of the Arbeitsdorf concentration camp withHöcker serving as his adjutant. Before being transferred in May 1943 to theMajdanek concentration camp, again as adjutant to Weiss, Höcker followed acourse at the SS military academy (Junkerschule) in Braunschweig. During thesame period he also received some military training.In 1943, he became the adjutant to the commandant at Majdanek during theOperation Reinhardt mass deportations and murders. Afterward, he becameadjutant to Richard Baer, in 1944, who was previously deputy to WVHA chiefOswald Pohl in Berlin. In May 1944 Höcker was transferred to Auschwitz, where he remained until the advance of the Soviet Red Army forced campevacuation in January 1945. Thereafter, he was transferred to theDora-Mittelbau concentration camp along with Baer. The two men administeredthe camp until the Allies arrived. Höcker used false papers to flee the campand avoid being identified by the British when they captured him.He married before the war and had a son and daughter during the war, withwhom he was reunited after his release from 18 months in a British POW campin 1946. Early in the 1960s he was apprehended by West German authorities inhis hometown, where he was a bank official. It is not known why the bankrehired and promoted him after a long absence.At his trial in Frankfurt, part of the noted Frankfurt Auschwitz Trials, Höcker denied having participated in the selection of victims at Birkenau orhaving ever personally executed a prisoner. He further denied any knowledgeof the fate of the approximately 400,000 Hungarian Jews who were murdered atAuschwitz during his term of service at the camp. Höcker was shown to haveknowledge of the genocidal activities at the camp, but could not be provedto have played a direct part in them. In post-war trials, Höcker denied hisinvolvement in the selection process. While accounts from survivors andother SS officers all but placed him there, prosecutors could locate noconclusive evidence to prove the claim.In August 1965 Höcker was sentenced to seven years imprisonment for aidingand abetting in over 1,000 murders at Auschwitz. He was released in 1970 andwas able to return to his bank post as a chief cashier, where he workeduntil his retirement.On 3 May 1989 a district court in the Germany city of Bielefeld sentencedHöcker to four years imprisonment for his involvement in gassing to deathprisoners, primarily Polish Jews, in the concentration camp Majdanek inPoland. Camp records showed that between May 1943 and May 1944 Höcker hadacquired at least 3,610 kilograms of Zyklon B poisonous gas for use inMajdanek from the Hamburg firm of Tesch & StabenowIn 2006, a photo album created by Höcker came to the attention of the UnitedStates Holocaust Memorial Museum; the album contains rare images of the lifeof German functionaries at Auschwitz while the camp remained in operation, including some of the few photos of Josef Mengele at Auschwitz.Höcker died in 2000, still claiming that he had nothing to do with the deathcamp at Birkenau. During his final statement at the Frankfurt Trial in 1965,he had claimed, “I only learned about the events in Birkenau…in the courseof time I was there… and I had nothing to do with that. I had no ability toinfluence these events in any way…neither did I want them, nor carry themout. I didn’t hurt anybody… and neither did any one die at Auschwitz becauseof me.” Höcker testified that he never set foot on the ramp during theselection process, despite one survivor recalling an officer with thesurname Höcker being present on the ramp.A documentary airing on The National Geographic Channel, "Scrapbook fromNazi Hell", examined the claims made by former prisoners at Auschwitz thatthere was a German officer with the surname Höcker present on the rampduring the selection process. Photographic analysts used data gained frommeasurements of Höcker in the several photographs in his album. Measurementsfrom photogrammetric analysis, along with the height listed in his SSservice records, were compared to a figure found in two of the photos fromthe "Auschwitz Album" (made by SS photographers) whose face cannot be seen.The SS-Oberscharführer, whose face cannot be seen because his back is facingthe camera, is shown on the ramp where the new arrivals disembarked from thetrains and went through the "selection" process (the sorting of prisonershealthy enough to be useful as forced labor, in contrast with the sick, theelderly, women with small children, and children, who were sent immediatelyto the gas chambers). It is significant to note that during his trial andfor the rest of his life, Karl Höcker vehemently denied that he had anythingto do with killing, and was never present or participated in the selectionprocess. The results of the measurements gleaned from the "Höcker Album"showed that there was almost an exact match to the SS-Oberscharführer shownon the ramp during selection, though barring definitive eyewitnesstestimony, it is nearly impossible to prove beyond a reasonable doubt thatthe man in the photo is indeed Höcker. The LAPD Sr Forensic Image Analystwho consulted on the measurements taken from the photos believes that thereis enough evidence to say that the man is most likely Höcker. There is, however, one significant discrepancy between Höcker and the Nazi on theramp. Karl Höcker, in May 1944 upon his appointment as Adjutant to the CampCommandant, held the rank of SS-Obersturmfürher (first lieutenant), yet theunknown SS-Oberscharführer (technical sergeant) uniform insignia does notmatch that rank. As a possible explanation for this, it was posited by thedocumentary that Höcker may have worn the uniform of lower ranking toconceal his true identity. Barring concrete evidence, all the above isconjecture.This Typed document from Auschwitz measures 145mm x 210mm