Josef Mengele (16 March 1911 – 7 February 1979), the Angel of Death, was a SS officer and physician at the Auschwitz concentration camp.
The doctor performed deadly experiments on prisoners, selected victims for the gas chambers, and administered Zyklon B
In this video, we explore the sadistic brutality of his experiments during the Nazi regime and document his life on the run after the war.
IMAGES USED: Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Description
English: Block 10 - Medical experimentation block in Auschwitz I
Date 14 March 2008
Source Own work
Author VbCrLf
LINK: [ Ссылка ]
SCRIPT:
Josef Mengele, aptly referred to as The Angel of Death, was the very personification of evil and easily one of the worst Nazi criminals from World War Two.
Described as a sadistic and extreme anti-samite, Mengele as an SS officer and physician at Auschwitz administered horrific human experiments on prisoners and would be documented for his dictatorial role in selecting victims for the gas chambers. As Chief-Physician for the camp he would personally oversee the use of Zkylon B used in the Birkenau gas chambers.
With his scientific endeavours predicated on proving the Nazi ideology of the genetic superiority of the Aryan race, the experiments expectedly crossed every line of human decency, his work at the Birkenau sub-camps being not only supported but greatly admired by the Third Reichs leadership.
Unlike the other SS doctors at the camp who found the selection process stressful Mengele often partook in the task without assignment, seeking out test subjects while bearing a gleeful smile.
The concentration camp as a perfect setting to continue his anthropological studies into hereditary, born from his doctrate obtained from the University of Munich in 1935, and work at the Institution of Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene in Frankfurt in 1939, Mengele would re-start his research on twins, running extensive experiments on children whom he introduced himself as Uncle Mengele, often bearing sweets and a friendly demeanour.
During the camps operation twins would undergo weekly examinations under his observation.
His horrific un-scientific experiments absent of morality and scientific standards would include the amputation of limbs, intentional infection of victims with diseases such as typhus, and forced blood transfusions.
One doctor even recalled one occasion in which The Angel of Death personally killed 14 twins in one night, injecting their hearts with chloroform.
If one twin died during these dreadful acts Mengele would often kill the other, comparing both their bodies in his post-mortem studies.
Of equal disgust were his eye experiments, forcibly attempting to change patients eye colours through chemical injection.
Almost of his victims died from these brutal acts, with any survivors thereafter promptly shipped off to the gas chambers after they had fulfilled their use.
How then did Mengele, easily considered one of the most sadistic and evil men of the 20th century, evade capture and punishment for his crimes against humanity that befell other officials of the Nazi hierarchy at the 1945 Nuremberg Trials?
Unfortunately, Mengele would be successful in avoiding retribution through a disguised identity as a Wehrmacht officer after fleeing Gross-Rosen concentration camp on the 18th of February before Soviet liberation, a camp in which he had transferred to a week prior to the Red Army’s arrival at Auschwitz.
Avoiding capture in Czechoslovakia by the Russian army he would instead be taken as a POW by the Americans in June. However, graced by the luck of the devil, Mengele’s fortune would continue due to the allies’ administrative issues in properly documenting prisoners of wars and identifying those on the wanted lists.
Released in July the doctor would gain access to false papers under the name of Fritz Ullman, subsequently altered to Fritz Hollmann.
Like many senior SS war criminals, he used the ratlines in Genoa, Italy in 1949. After obtaining a passport for international travel by the Red Cross under the name Helmut Gregor he reached South America.
Jumping around the continent, the doctor of death would first reside in Argentina, with frequent business trips to Paraguay as a sales rep for a farm supplies company.
Infuriatingly, de-classified documents released in 1992 by the Argentine government even indicated he may have continued his medical experiments on forced abortions.
It would take until June 6th 1985 for his remains to finally be exhumed, following a West German intelligence raid on a property of a life-long friend of Mengele in May.
Following the discovery of his grave, Mengele’s bones now reside at the São Paulo Institute for Forensic Medicine, the doctor’s skull finding use as an aid by the medical school.
An abhorrent, wicked and morally corrupt man, may we hope his Angel is burning in hell.
