Friedrich Jeckeln (2 February 1895 – 3 February 1946) was a German
SS commander
Commander (commonly abbreviated as Cmdr.) is a common naval officer rank. Commander is also used as a rank or title in other formal organizations, including several police forces. In several countries this naval rank is termed frigate captain.
...
during the
Nazi era
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 ...
. He served as a
Higher SS and Police Leader in the occupied
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
during
World War II
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 ...
. Jeckeln was the commander of one of the largest collection of ''
Einsatzgruppen
(, ; also ' task forces') were (SS) paramilitary death squads of Nazi Germany that were responsible for mass murder, primarily by shooting, during World War II (1939–1945) in German-occupied Europe. The had an integral role in the im ...
''
death squad
A death squad is an armed group whose primary activity is carrying out extrajudicial killings or forced disappearances as part of political repression, genocide, ethnic cleansing, or revolutionary terror. Except in rare cases in which they are ...
s and was personally responsible for ordering and organizing the deaths of over 100,000
Jew
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...
s,
Romani
Romani may refer to:
Ethnicities
* Romani people, an ethnic group of Northern Indian origin, living dispersed in Europe, the Americas and Asia
** Romani genocide, under Nazi rule
* Romani language, any of several Indo-Aryan languages of the Roma ...
, and others designated by the Nazis as "undesirables". After the end of World War II in Europe, Jeckeln was convicted of
war crimes by a Soviet military tribunal in
Riga
Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the Ba ...
and executed in 1946.
SS career
![FriedrichJeckeln](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/77/FriedrichJeckeln.jpg)
Jeckeln served in
World War I
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 ...
as an officer. After being discharged following Germany's defeat, Jeckeln worked as an engineer before joining the
Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
on 1 October 1929. In January 1931, he was accepted into 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). By the end of 1931 he was placed in charge of a regiment and then a brigade. In 1932, Jeckeln was elected as a member of the
Reichstag. In January 1933, when the Nazi Party came to national power, Jeckeln was put in charge of SS group South. In 1936, he was appointed
SS and Police Leader and later promoted to SS-''
Obergruppenführer
' (, "senior group leader") was a paramilitary rank in Nazi Germany that was first created in 1932 as a rank of the ''Sturmabteilung'' (SA) and adopted by the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) one year later. Until April 1942, it was the highest commissio ...
''.
Jeckeln was known for ruthlessness and brutality. Political opponents, especially members of the KPD, SPD and the unions, were pursued relentlessly until their death. Together with party member
Friedrich Alpers
Friedrich Alpers (25 March 1901 – 3 September 1944) was a German Nazi politician and SS-''Obergruppenführer''. He was also a Minister of the Free State of Brunswick, and ''Generalforstmeister'' (General forest supervisor). Alpers was respons ...
, Jeckeln was primarily responsible for the
Rieseberg Murders in the summer of 1933.
Holocaust perpetrator
![Einsatzgruppen murder Jews in Ivanhorod, Ukraine, 1942](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6c/Einsatzgruppen_murder_Jews_in_Ivanhorod%2C_Ukraine%2C_1942.jpg)
After 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 ...
began, Jeckeln was transferred to the
Waffen-SS
The (, "Armed SS") was the combat branch of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts, volunteers and conscripts from both occup ...
. As was the practice in the SS, Jeckeln took a lower rank from his ''
Allgemeine-SS
The ''Allgemeine SS'' (; "General SS") was a major branch of the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) paramilitary forces of Nazi Germany; it was managed by the SS Main Office (''SS-Hauptamt''). The ''Allgemeine SS'' was officially established in the autum ...
'' position and served as an officer in Regiment 2 of the
Totenkopf Division
The 3rd SS Panzer Division "Totenkopf" (german: 3. SS-Panzerdivision "Totenkopf") was an elite division of the Waffen-SS of Nazi Germany during World War II, formed from the Standarten of the SS-TV. Its name, ''Totenkopf'', is German for "de ...
.
In 1941, he was transferred by ''
Reichsführer-SS
(, ) was a special title and rank that existed between the years of 1925 and 1945 for the commander of the (SS). ''Reichsführer-SS'' was a title from 1925 to 1933, and from 1934 to 1945 it was the highest rank of the SS. The longest-servi ...
''
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was of the (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party of Germany. Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and a main architect of th ...
to serve as
Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF) of Southern, then later in 1941, of Northern Russia.
In this role Jeckeln assumed control of all SS-''
Einsatzgruppen
(, ; also ' task forces') were (SS) paramilitary death squads of Nazi Germany that were responsible for mass murder, primarily by shooting, during World War II (1939–1945) in German-occupied Europe. The had an integral role in the im ...
'' mass killings and
security operations in his district.
Jeckeln developed a method of killing large numbers of people, over the course of the mass killings he had organised in the Ukraine, which included (amongst others)
Babi Yar
Babi Yar (russian: Ба́бий Яр) or Babyn Yar ( uk, Бабин Яр) is a ravine in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv and a site of massacres carried out by Nazi Germany's forces during its campaign against the Soviet Union in World War II. The fi ...
and the
Kamianets-Podilskyi Massacre
The Kamianets-Podilskyi massacre was a World War II mass shooting of Jews carried out in the opening stages of Operation Barbarossa, by the German Police Battalion 320 along with Friedrich Jeckeln's ''Einsatzgruppen'', the Hungarian soldiers, and ...
. First applied in the
Rumbula massacre
The Rumbula massacre is a collective term for incidents on November 30 and December 8, 1941, in which about 25,000 Jews were murdered in or on the way to Rumbula forest near Riga, Latvia, during the Holocaust. Except for the Babi Yar massacre in U ...
on 30 November and 8 December 1941, the method (which became known as the "Jeckeln System") involved dividing staff into separate groups, each of which specialised in a separate part of the process:
# The
Security Service (SD) men rousted the people out of their houses in the
Riga Ghetto.
# The people to be murdered (typically Jews) were organised into columns of 500-1,000 people; and driven to the killing grounds about 10 kilometres to the south.
# The
Order Police
The ''Ordnungspolizei'' (), abbreviated ''Orpo'', meaning "Order Police", were the uniformed police force in Nazi Germany from 1936 to 1945. The Orpo organisation was absorbed into the Nazi monopoly on power after regional police jurisdiction w ...
(Orpo) led the columns to the killing grounds.
# 3 pits where the killing would be done simultaneously had been dug in advance.
# The victims were stripped of their clothing and valuables.
# The victims were run through a double cordon of guards on the way to the killing pits.
# The killers forced the victims to lie face down on the trench floor, or more often, on the bodies of the people who had just been shot.
# In order to save on the cost of bullets, each person was shot once in the back of the head with a Russian submachine gun. The shooters either walked among the dead in the trench, killing them from a range of 2 metres, or stood at the lip of the excavation and shot the prone victims below them. Anyone not killed outright was simply buried alive when the pit was covered up.
This system was referred to as "sardine packing" (''Sardinenpackung''). It was reported that some of the experienced ''Einsatzgruppen'' killers were horrified by its cruelty. At Rumbula, Jeckeln watched on both days of the massacre as 25,000 people were killed. Jeckeln proved to be an effective killer who cared nothing about murdering huge numbers of men, women, children and the elderly.
[Ezergailis 1996, pp. 239–270.] One of only 3 survivors of the Rumbala massacre,
Frida Michelson
Frida Michelson ( lv, Frīda Mihelsone, née Fride; 1906–1982) was a Latvian Jew and Holocaust survivor. She is known for her memoirs “I survived Rumbula” which records the Holocaust in Latvia, her life in the Riga Ghetto and how she manag ...
, escaped by pretending to be dead as the victims heaped shoes (later salvaged by Jeckeln's men) upon her:
By the end of August 1941, while commanding the ''Kommandostab'' SS First Brigade in Western Ukraine, Jeckeln had personally supervised the murder of more than 44,000 people, the largest total of Jews murdered that month.
On 27 January 1942, Jeckeln was awarded the
War Merit Cross
The War Merit Cross (german: Kriegsverdienstkreuz) was a state decoration of Nazi Germany during World War II. By the end of the conflict it was issued in four degrees and had an equivalent civil award. A " de-Nazified" version of the War Merit ...
with Swords for killing 25,000 at Rumbula "on orders from the highest level." In February 1945, now a ''General der Waffen-SS und Polizei'', Jeckeln was appointed to command the ''SS-Freiwilligen-Gebirgs-Korps'' and also served as Commander of Replacement Troops and
Higher SS and Police Leader in Southwest Germany.
Trial and execution
Jeckeln was taken prisoner by
Soviet troops near
Halbe on 28 April 1945. Along with other German personnel, he was tried before a Soviet military tribunal in the ''
Riga Trial
The Riga Trial was a war crimes trial held in front of a Soviet military tribunal between 26 January and 3 February 1946 in Riga, Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic, Soviet Union against six high ranking Wehrmacht officers, Höheren SS- und Polizei ...
'' in
Latvia
Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...
from 26 January 1946 to 3 February 1946. During the investigation, he was calm, clearly answering questions from investigators, in the dock he looked dull and impartial.
Jeckeln in his last words was restrained, he fully admitted his guilt and agreed to bear full responsibility for the activities of subordinate police, SS and SD in
Ostland
The Reichskommissariat Ostland (RKO) was established by Nazi Germany in 1941 during World War II. It became the civilian occupation regime in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and the western part of Byelorussian SSR. German planning documents ini ...
. Concluding his speech, he said:
I have to take full responsibility for what happened in the borders of Ostland, within SS, SD and the Gestapo. This greatly increases my guilt. My fate is in the hands of the High Court, and so I ask only to pay attention to mitigating circumstances. I will accept a sentence in full repentance which I will consider as worthy punishment.
Jeckeln and the other defendants were found guilty, sentenced to death and hanged in Riga on 3 February 1946 in front of some 4,000 spectators. Contrary to popular misconception, the execution did not happen in the territory of the former Riga Ghetto, but in Victory Square (Uzvaras laukums).
Awards
*
Clasp to the Iron Cross
The Clasp to the Iron Cross (Spange zum Eisernen Kreuz) was a white metal medal clasp displayed on the uniforms of German Wehrmacht personnel who had been awarded the Iron Cross in World War I, and who again qualified for the decoration in World W ...
(1939) 2nd Class (October 1941) & 1st Class (12 May 1942)
[Thomas 1997, p. 327.]
*
War Merit Cross
The War Merit Cross (german: Kriegsverdienstkreuz) was a state decoration of Nazi Germany during World War II. By the end of the conflict it was issued in four degrees and had an equivalent civil award. A " de-Nazified" version of the War Merit ...
with Swords on 27 January 1942
*
German Cross
The War Order of the German Cross (german: Der Kriegsorden Deutsches Kreuz), normally abbreviated to the German Cross or ''Deutsches Kreuz'', was instituted by Adolf Hitler on 28 September 1941. It was awarded in two divisions: in gold for repe ...
in Gold on 19 December 1943 as SS-''Obergruppenführer'' and General of the ''Polizei'' in Kampfgruppe Jeckeln
[Patzwall & Scherzer 2001, p. 209.]
*
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves
The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (german: Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes), or simply the Knight's Cross (), and its variants, were the highest awards in the military and paramilitary forces of Nazi Germany during World War II.
The Knight' ...
** Knight's Cross on 27 August 1944 as SS-''Obergruppenführer'' and General of the Waffen-SS, ''Höherer SS- and Polizei'' and leader of the ''Höhere SS- und Polizeiführer'' Northern Russia, leader of Kampfgruppe Jeckeln (lett. Polizei) in the 18. Armee.
[Scherzer 2007, p. 419.]
** Oak Leaves on 8 March 1945 and SS-''Obergruppenführer'' and General of the Waffen-SS and commanding general of the V. SS-Gebirgskorps
References
Citations
Bibliography
* Ezergailis, Andrew (1996). ''The Holocaust in Latvia 1941–1944 – The Missing Center'', Historical Institute of Latvia (in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum) Riga. .
* Fleming, Gerald (1984) ''Hitler and the Final Solution'', University of California Berkeley. .
*
*
*
*
External links
*
Official website: Jewish Community in LatviaJoint project of Latvia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Latvian Jewish Community, and the Democracy Commission of the US Embassy; available in English, Latvian and Russian languages.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Jeckeln, Friedrich
1895 births
1946 deaths
Babi Yar
Einsatzgruppen personnel
Executed mass murderers
German Army personnel of World War I
German people convicted of war crimes
Gestapo personnel
Holocaust perpetrators in Estonia
Holocaust perpetrators in Latvia
Holocaust perpetrators in Lithuania
Holocaust perpetrators in Ukraine
Members of the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic
Members of the Reichstag of Nazi Germany
Nazi Party politicians
Nazis executed by the Soviet Union by hanging
People executed for war crimes
People from Ortenaukreis
People from the Grand Duchy of Baden
Recipients of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves
Recipients of the War Merit Cross
Reichskommissariat Ukraine
Riga Ghetto
SS and Police Leaders
SS-Obergruppenführer
20th-century Freikorps personnel
Waffen-SS personnel
Military personnel from Baden-Württemberg