Erwin Gohrbandt (September 20, 1890, in Schlawe,

Pomerania Pomerania ( pl, Pomorze; german: Pommern; Kashubian: ''Pòmòrskô''; sv, Pommern) is a historical region on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea in Central Europe, split between Poland and Germany. The western part of Pomerania belongs to ...

, (Polish - Sławno, north-western

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 ...

) – January 3, 1965, in

West Berlin West Berlin (german: Berlin (West) or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin during the years of the Cold War. Although West Berlin was de jure not part of West Germany, lacked any sovereignty, and was under mi ...

) was a German surgeon and war criminal who participated in human experimentation at Dachau Concentration Camp. Gohrbandt served as vice president of the Berlin regional association of the German Red Cross. He was also a member of the German Olympic Society. In 1950-51 he was chairman of the Berlin Surgical Society. Fotothek df pk 0000296 006 Dozent Prof

His younger brother Paul Gohrbandt (1896–1975) was also a doctor.

Life

After graduating from high school in Treptow an der Rega in 1910, Gohrbandt studied medicine from 1910 to 1914 at the Kaiser Wilhelm Academy for Military Medical Education in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

. In 1910 he became a member of the Pépinière Corps Franconia. At the beginning of the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

he was drafted into military service as a junior doctor. During his military service, he passed the state examination in January 1915 and received his medical license in 1917.

Before the war

He was then assigned to the Pathological Institute of the Charité. Between 1920 and 1928 he worked at the surgical university clinic of the Charité, from 1924 as senior physician and head of the pediatric surgery department. In 1924, he habilitated in surgery and began teaching. On June 6, 1928, he was appointed Associate Professor of Surgery at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin. In the same year, he moved to the city hospital Am Urban as chief physician of the II. Surgical Department. In 1931, Gohrbandt, with

Ludwig Levy-Lenz Ludwig Levy-Lenz (born 1 December 1892 in Posen (now Poznań), German Reich; died 30 October 1966 in Munich) was a German doctor of medicine and a sexual reformer, known for performing some of the first sex reassignment surgeries for patients of ...

, was one of the first surgeons to perform sex reassignment surgery with vaginoplasty on some transgender patients - a pioneering experimental achievement at the time. Known by name are the patients

Dora Richter Dora "Dorchen" Richter (16 April 1891 – presumed 1933) was the first known person to undergo complete male-to-female gender reassignment surgery. She was one of a number of transgender people in the care of sex-research pioneer Magnus Hirschfel ...

, a domestic worker at the Institute for Sexology under Magnus Hirschfeld, and the Danish artist Lili Elbe. During

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

, Gohrbandt was a research assistant for surgical questions in the Social Office of the Reich Youth Leader.

During the Second World War

From August 1939, Gohrbandt was a consultant surgeon to the army and (from 1940) as the inspector of medical services in the

Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...

. With effect from October 1, 1940, he became Head of the Surgical Department at the Municipal Robert Koch Hospital and at the same time became Clinic Director of the Third Appointed Surgical University Clinic. Gohrbandt participated in the conference on medical questions in distress and winter death on October 26 and 27, 1942. From 1944 he was a member of the scientific advisory board of the General Commissioner for the Sanitation and Health Service Karl Brandt. Ernst Klee: ''Das Personenlexikon zum Dritten Reich'', Frankfurt am Main 2007, S. 191f. He participated in the development of

human experiments ''Human Experiments'' (also known as ''Beyond the Gate'') is a 1979 American horror film directed and co-produced by Gregory Goodell. It stars Linda Haynes, Geoffrey Lewis, Ellen Travolta, Aldo Ray, Jackie Coogan and Lurene Tuttle. This film earn ...

conducted on prisoners of the

Dachau concentration camp , , commandant = List of commandants , known for = , location = Upper Bavaria, Southern Germany , built by = Germany , operated by = ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) , original use = Political prison , construction ...

, investigating the problems of mortality due to

hypothermia Hypothermia is defined as a body core temperature below in humans. Symptoms depend on the temperature. In mild hypothermia, there is shivering and mental confusion. In moderate hypothermia, shivering stops and confusion increases. In severe h ...

Post-war period

In the post-war period, he was Ferdinand Sauerbruch's deputy in the office of the city council for health care in all of Berlin. He was commissioned by the Soviet military administration in Germany and the Berlin magistrate to ensure sanitation and to monitor hygiene regulations. He drove the reconstruction of the war-damaged Moabit Hospital and headed its surgical department until December 31, 1958. At the same time, he resumed his lectures at the newly founded Free University of Berlin and published the Central Journal for Surgery in 1946. Effective December 31, 1958, he retired. He ran an outpatient clinic in Berlin-Tiergarten until his death in 1965.

Honours

*Iron Cross 2nd and 1st Class (First World War) *Knight's Cross of the War Merit Cross with Swords (February 1, 1945) *Grand Cross of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (1952) *Honorary professorship at the TH Berlin (1956) *Honorary member of the Berlin Surgical Society (1958)

Works

* 1928: ''Lehrbuch der Kinderchirurgie'', 1928 * 1936: ''Chirurgische Fragen der Kinderheilkunde in der Praxis'', 1936 As an editor * ''Zentralblatt für Chirurgie''

References

{{reflist *

Walther Killy Walther Killy (26 August 191728 December 1995) was a German literary scholar who specialised in poetry, especially that of Friedrich Hölderlin and Georg Trakl. He taught at the Free University of Berlin, the Georg-August-Universität Göttinge ...

, Rudolf Vierhaus (Hrsg.): ''Deutsche Biographische Enzyklopädie''. München 1995–1999 * Rolf Winau, Ekkehard Vaubel: ''Chirurgen in Berlin: 100 Porträts.'' Berlin 1983 * Karl Philipp Behrendt
''Die Kriegschirurgie von 1939 - 1945 aus der Sicht der Beratenden Chirurgen des deutschen Heeres im Zweiten Weltkrieg''.
(PDF; 2,3 MB) Dissertation, Freiburg im Breisgau, 2003 * ''Zum Wirken des Chirurgen Erwin Gohrbandt (1890–1965) für die Berliner Universität, den Magistrat der Stadt und die Berliner Chirurgische Gesellschaft''. In: ''Zeitschrift für ärztliche Fortbildung'', 84, 1990, S. 1005–1008 German surgeons German sexologists Physicians from Berlin 1890 births 1965 deaths