Irmfried eberl biography books
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Chaos ensued and he was soon relieved of his post by SS- Brigadef�hrer Globocnik and SS- Obersturmf�hrer Christian Wirth, sometime towards the end of August 1942. At first he wanted to study law but later decided on medicine, and began his medical studies in 1929. The following month, he was the head of the Office for Social Welfare in Dessau, near Magdeburg.
Towards the end of June 1942, he was appointed the first Commandant of the Treblinka death camp, but within a little over a month, after the camp became operational - it became obvious that he was not equal to the task. Eberl attended four years of elementary school and the Bregenz Gymnasium (Secondary School) where aged 17 he took his final exams on leaving school on 15 June 1928.
Schneider" to conceal the murders.[10] Between December 21, 1941, and the official halt of centralized T4 killings in August 1942, roughly 8,600-9,000 victims, mostly mental patients and those with physical disabilities, were killed at Bernburg under this system.[10][11]Operations continued post-T4 under Aktion 14f13, targeting concentration camp prisoners classified as unfit, resulting in an additional approximately 5,000 deaths by April 1943, though Eberl's direct involvement ended earlier upon his reassignment.[10][11] The center's remote location facilitated discretion, but inefficiencies in body disposal and occasional witness reports contributed to broader scrutiny of the euthanasia program, which was publicly paused in 1941 following clerical protests, though killings persisted covertly.[10] Eberl's efficiency-driven approach at Bernburg mirrored his prior role at Brandenburg, emphasizing rapid throughput to meet T4 quotas while minimizing external detection.[10]
Command at Treblinka
Appointment and Initial Setup
In July 1942, Irmfried Eberl, an SS-Obersturmführer with prior experience directing gassings during Aktion T4 at the Brandenburg and Bernburg euthanasia centers, was appointed by Odilo Globocnik, the SS and Police Leader in the Lublin District, as the first commandant of Treblinka II, the extermination camp established as part of Operation Reinhard.[3][1] His selection leveraged his medical background and familiarity with mass killing techniques using carbon monoxide gas, adapted from T4 operations to the systematic murder of Jews.[4]Eberl arrived at Treblinka toward the end of June 1942, shortly before the camp's operational launch, following a brief involvement at Sobibor.[4] The site, located near the village of Treblinka in occupied Poland, had been under construction since May under SS supervision, with initial groundwork including rail connections for deportee transports and the erection of gas chambers disguised as shower facilities.[12] Eberl oversaw the final setup, assembling a staff comprising approximately 20 SS officers transferred from T4, supplemented by Ukrainian auxiliaries and Jewish prisoner forced laborers tasked with Sonderkommando duties such as body disposal in mass graves.[3]The camp's initial operations commenced on July 23, 1942, coinciding with the arrival of the first major transport of around 6,000 Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto, marking the beginning of large-scale gassings that Eberl directed amid efforts to process up to 5,000 victims daily—far exceeding the euthanasia program's scale of about 100 per day.[13][4] Early correspondence, such as Eberl's letter to Warsaw Ghetto administrator Heinz Auerswald in 1942, coordinated logistical aspects like transport scheduling to maintain the facade of resettlement while facilitating extermination.[1] This phase emphasized rapid throughput, with victims deceived into undressing under the pretense of delousing before being herded into gas chambers, though initial inefficiencies soon emerged due to the unprecedented volume of arrivals.[3]Management and Operational Breakdown
Eberl, as the first commandant of Treblinka II from early July to late August 1942, oversaw a staff comprising approximately 25-35 German SS and police personnel, many transferred from the T4 euthanasia program, alongside 90-150 Ukrainian guards trained at Trawniki.[3][14] These Germans handled command and specialized tasks, while Ukrainians managed security and perimeter duties; Jewish Sonderkommando prisoners, numbering up to 1,000 at peak, were coerced into sorting valuables, operating gas chambers, and disposing of bodies under threat of death.[3][14] Eberl's management emphasized rapid throughput to meet deportation quotas from the Warsaw ghetto and other areas, but lacked coordination, resulting in procedural shortcuts and inadequate oversight of guard discipline.Operational procedures followed a deception-based routine to maintain order and conceal the camp's purpose as a transit station.He was arrested again in 1947 and held in the remand prison in Ulm, while an investigation was carried out into his activities in Aktion T4. At that time, his tenure as commandant of the Treblinka death camp was unknown. He subsequently served at the Main Health Office in Berlin. In January 1940, he was recruited by the Charitable Foundation for Institutional Care, the cover name of the organization that ran the Nazi euthanasia operation under the code designation �T4�.
He witnessed the first experimental gassings of disabled patients using bottled carbon monoxide at the Brandenburg an der Havel facility in mid-January 1940, an event that tested the technical feasibility of mass killing under the guise of "mercy deaths" for those deemed burdensome to the state.[4][8]Eberl's formal transition to operational Nazi medical roles culminated in his appointment as medical director of the Brandenburg euthanasia center on February 1, 1940.
Now unemployed and without a future in Austria, Dr. Eberl crossed the border into Germany, as a political refugee Number 13,943.
For a month in April 1936, he was employed at the renowned Institute of German Hygiene in Dresden. He was among the group of Nazi dignitaries and doctors who witnessed the first gassing experiment in mid-January 1940, at an abandoned prison in Brandenburg-an-der- Havel, 30 km west of Berlin.
He was the youngest of three brothers, the offspring of Josef Franz, an engineer and his wife Josefine. Dr Irmfried Eberl committed suicide, by hanging himself in his cell on 16 February 1948.
Sources
C.Webb & M. Chocholaty, The Treblinka Death Camp, Ibidem- Verlag, Stuttgart, 2014
IMT Nuremberg � NO -860 � Statement of Fritz Karl Albert Bleich
Document : Hessiches Hauptarchiv Wiesbaden, Germany
Photograph � Ghetto Fighters House, Israel
� Holocaust Historical Society 2018
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Irmfried Eberl
Early Life and Professional Formation
Upbringing and Medical Education
Irmfried Eberl was born on September 8, 1910, in Bregenz, Vorarlberg, Austria, as the son of a trade inspector.[7] Little is documented about his family background or childhood experiences, which occurred amid the economic and political turbulence following the dissolution of Austria-Hungary after World War I.[4]Eberl commenced medical studies in 1928 at the University of Innsbruck, subsequently attending the University of Graz, and earned his medical degree in 1935.[7] While a student at Innsbruck, he joined the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) in December 1931, indicating an early alignment with its ideology during his formative academic years.[1] His political affiliation later hindered employment prospects in Austria, prompting his relocation to Germany in 1936 to advance his professional training.[5]Initial Psychiatric Career
After completing his medical studies and obtaining his license to practice in February 1935 at age 24, Irmfried Eberl held initial positions in general medicine in Austria.[4] He served from 20 February to 27 May 1935 in the 2nd Medical Section of the Rudolf Foundation Hospital in Vienna.[4] From 28 May 1935 to 8 March 1936, he worked at the Sanatorium for Lung Diseases in Grimmenstein, Lower Austria.[4]Eberl's medical license was revoked in 1936 due to his involvement in illegal National Socialist activities in Austria, prompting him to flee to Germany as a political refugee.[4] In Germany, he briefly worked at the Institute of GermanHygiene in Dresden for one month in April 1936.[4] By May 1936, he assumed the role of head of the Office for SocialWelfare in Dessau, where he also held employment at Dessau Hospital and responsibilities in public health administration.[4][6] He later transferred to the Main Health Office in Berlin, engaging in administrative health roles that intersected with welfare and institutional oversight.[4]These early positions focused on general medical practice, public hygiene, and social welfare rather than specialized psychiatry, reflecting Eberl's limited formal training in the field at this stage.[6] His administrative experience in health offices provided a foundation for subsequent leadership in institutional settings, though direct psychiatric practice prior to 1939 remains undocumented in available records.[4][6]Alignment with National Socialism
Party Membership and Ideological Commitment
Eberl joined the Austrian branch of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) in late 1931, during his medical studies at the University of Innsbruck.[1][5] This early affiliation occurred amid the party's growth in Austria, influenced by his two older brothers, who were enthusiastic NSDAP supporters.[6] Following the 1934 assassination of Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, the NSDAP was banned in Austria, forcing Eberl's political activities underground.[4]Unable to secure government employment in Austria due to his Nazi convictions, Eberl relocated to Germany in 1936, where he pursued psychiatric roles aligned with National Socialist priorities on racial hygiene and eugenics.[5] His prompt integration into Germany's Nazi medical apparatus, including subsequent SS membership as an Untersturmführer, reflected a deep ideological commitment to the regime's biologistic worldview, which viewed certain populations as burdens warranting elimination for societal purification.[1][8] This alignment extended beyond mere opportunism, as evidenced by his voluntary participation in euthanasia programs that operationalized Nazi racial doctrine.[6]Transition to Nazi Medical Roles
Following his early affiliation with the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) in December 1931 as a medical student at the University of Innsbruck, Eberl encountered professional barriers in Austria due to his illegal Nazi activities, including his role as a Nazi representative in the students' union and membership in SA units.Dr Eberl was drafted into the German Army and at the beginning of April 1945, he was taken prisoner by American troops and interned in Luxemburg before being transferred to a Prisoner of War (POW) camp in Dietersheim on the River Rhine, close to the French border with Germany. The dignitaries included Reichsleiter Philipp Bouhler, head of the F�hrer�s Chancellery, and Dr.
Karl Brandt, Hitler�s escorting physician and SS- Obersturmf�hrer Christian Wirth was also included in this group. After the war had ended, he settled in Blaubeuren, near Ulm, in the Alb-Donau district of W�rttemberg. After the assassination of Austrian Chancellor Dollfuss by the Nazis in 1934, the Nazi Party and all its organizations were banned in Austria, and Eberl�s illegal activities resulted in the withdrawal of his medical license in 1936.
Dr Eberl letter written from Sobibor death camp - April 1942
Upon on his return to Germany in the spring of 1942, Dr. Eberl was sent briefly to the Sobibor death camp in eastern Poland, which was then under construction. After working in the TB department in the camp, he was released in July 1945.
His medical license was revoked, prompting his emigration to Germany in 1936 as a political refugee, where he resumed work as a physician in assorted facilities. On 8 December 1931, he joined the Nazi Party (Membership Number 687,095) and became the Nazi representative of the students union.