Arnold Büscher (16 December 1899 – 2 August 1949) was a German SS officer. Holding the rank of SS-''

Obersturmführer __NOTOC__ (, ; short: ''Ostuf'') was a Nazi Germany paramilitary rank that was used in several Nazi organisations, such as the SA, SS, NSKK and the NSFK. The rank of ''Obersturmführer'' was first created in 1932 as the result of an expa ...

'', he served as a commandant of the

Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp , known for = , location = , coordinates = , built by = , operated by = Nazi Germany , commandant = Amon Göth (until September 1944)Arnold Büscher (September 1944 – January 1945) ...

, succeeding

Amon Göth Amon Leopold Göth (; alternative spelling ''Goeth''; 11 December 1908 – 13 September 1946) was an Austrian SS functionary and war criminal. He served as the commandant of the Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp in Płaszów in German ...

, from September 1944 until January 1945.

Life

Büscher was born on 16 December 1899 in

Bad Oeynhausen Bad Oeynhausen () is a spa town on the southern edge of the Wiehengebirge in the district of Minden-Lübbecke in the Ostwestfalen-Lippe, East-Westphalia-Lippe region of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. The closest larger towns are Bielefeld (39 ki ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. Büscher became a member of the

Schutzstaffel The ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS; also stylized as ''ᛋᛋ'' with Armanen runes; ; "Protection Squadron") was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe d ...

(SS) in 1931. After the outbreak of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, he worked at many

Nazi concentration camps From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps, (officially) or (more commonly). The Nazi concentration camps are distinguished from other types of Nazi camps such as forced-labor camps, as well as concen ...

, including Flossenbürg,

Buchenwald Buchenwald (; literally 'beech forest') was a Nazi concentration camp established on hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within Germany's 1937 borders. Many actual or su ...

Sachsenhausen 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 ...

and

Neuengamme Neuengamme was a network of Nazi concentration camps in Northern Germany that consisted of the main camp, Neuengamme, and more than 85 satellite camps. Established in 1938 near the village of Neuengamme in the Bergedorf district of Hamburg, th ...

. Büscher succeeded Amon Göth as the commandant of the Płaszów concentration camp after the latter was arrested on 13 September 1944. Büscher resisted

Oskar Schindler Oskar Schindler (; 28 April 1908 – 9 October 1974) was a German industrialist, humanitarian and a member of the Nazi Party who is credited with saving the lives of 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust by employing them in his enamelware and amm ...

's efforts to include 300 Jewish women on his list of ''

Schindlerjuden The ', literally translated from German as "Schindler Jews", were a group of roughly 1,200 Jews saved by Oskar Schindler during the Holocaust. They survived the years of the Nazi regime primarily through the intervention of Schindler, who afforde ...

'' for work at Schindler's new

factory A factory, manufacturing plant or a production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. T ...

in Brněnec, instead sending them with other Jews from Płaszów to

Auschwitz I Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It con ...

. Furthermore, Büscher, perhaps out of spite for Schindler, requested of Auschwitz I commandant Richard Baer that 300 different Jewish women be sent to Schindler's factory. However, Schindler was able to

bribe Bribery is the offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence the actions of an official, or other person, in charge of a public or legal duty. With regard to governmental operations, essentially, bribery is "Corr ...

Baer to send him the original 300 female ''Schindlerjuden''. On 23 January 1948, Büscher was

sentenced to death Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

for his crimes at Płaszów. Benz, Wolfgang
''Der Ort des Terrors. Geschichte der nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslager. (The Place of Terror. History of Nazi Concentration Camps.)''
C.H. Beck, Munich, 2005, 3-406-57237-1, p. 272. He was executed by

hanging Hanging is the suspension of a person by a noose or ligature around the neck.Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. Hanging as method of execution is unknown, as method of suicide from 1325. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' states that hanging i ...

on 2 August 1949.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Büscher, Arnold 1899 births 1949 deaths Buchenwald concentration camp personnel Executed mass murderers Executed Nazi concentration camp commandants Flossenbürg concentration camp personnel German mass murderers Holocaust perpetrators Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp personnel Nazis executed by Poland by hanging Neuengamme concentration camp personnel Oskar Schindler People from Bad Oeynhausen Sachsenhausen concentration camp personnel SS-Obersturmführer