Hans Eng (22 March 1907 – 18 May 1995) was a Norwegian physician and Nazi collaborator 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 ...

World War II

In 1940 he called for Norwegian soldiers in the Norwegian Campaign to lay down their weapons. He volunteered for front service in Germanic SS Norway, but was never at the front. He was the private physician for Vidkun Quisling and his family, chief physician for Nasjonal Samling's department of public health, police physician with the title of "police inspector", physician in the

Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation NRK, an abbreviation of the Norwegian ''Norsk Rikskringkasting AS'', generally expressed in English as the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, is the Norwegian government-owned radio and television public broadcasting company, and the largest ...

and physician at Bredtveit concentration camp. According to

Julius Paltiel Julius Paltiel (4 July 1924 – 7 March 2008) was one of the 26 Norwegian Jews who returned from Auschwitz. For their efforts in telling about the atrocities in the Nazi extermination camps, both Paltiel and his widow were awarded St. Olav's M ...

he was unwilling to treat the Jews incarcerated at Bredtveit. He was also present as a medical expert at several

executions 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 ...

, including that of

Gunnar Eilifsen Gunnar Eilifsen (12 September 1897 – 16 August 1943) was a Norwegian police officer. In 1943, during the Nazi occupation of Norway, he was executed for disobedience when he refused to arrest five girls who did not show up for forced labour. ...

in August 1943. However, he was feared mainly as a police informer. Eng infamously notified

Statspolitiet (; shortened STAPO) was from 1941 to 1945 a National Socialist armed police force that consisted of Norwegian officials after Nazi German pattern. It operated independently of the ordinary Norwegian police. The force was established on 1 June 19 ...

about

Oslogjengen Oslogjengen (lit. ''The Oslo Gang'', also called Kompani Linge's Oslo Detachment) was a sabotage group operating in Oslo from May 1944 to May 1945, during the last year of the occupation of Norway by Nazi Germany. The group had its basis in both the ...

's May 1944 sabotage of Arbeidstjenesten's offices. The office which Max Manus,

Edvard Tallaksen Johan Edvard Tallaksen MC & Bar (17 August 1918 – 29 November 1944) was a Norwegian resistance member during World War II, serving as an ensign in the Oslo Gang and Norwegian Independent Company 1. Early life Tallaksen grew up with an older ...

and Gregers Gram were supposed to assault, lay at the address ''Kirkeveien 90'', where Eng also had one of his apartments. In addition to the three saboteurs, Dick Zeiner-Henriksen held guard at the front door and four people from

Milorg Milorg (abbreviation of militær organisasjon – military organization) was the main Norwegian resistance movement during World War II. Resistance work included intelligence gathering, sabotage, supply-missions, raids, espionage, transport of ...

were placed in the area to assist with firepower in case enemies showed up. In the

court of appeal A court of appeals, also called a court of appeal, appellate court, appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear an appeal of a trial court or other lower tribunal. In much of t ...

case against Eng, he testified that he thought the four guards had showed up to assassinate him. He phoned

, who managed to capture three of the four guards: Lars Eriksen, Jon Hatland and Per Stranger-Thorsen. The fourth guard Hans-Peter Styren as well as Tallaksen, Gram, Manus and Zeiner-Henriksen managed to escape. Two other persons associated with these three captured guards were later killed. The court of appeal found that fear of assassination was a viable reason to notify Statspolitiet. It later surfaced that Eng was a part of the

Osvald Group The Osvald Group was a Norwegian organisation that was the most active World War II resistance group in Norway from 1941 to the summer of 1944. Numbering more than 200 members, it committed at least 110 acts of sabotage against Nazi occupying fo ...

's hit list at least as early as March 1942. Asbjørn Sunde and some associates set up an attempt to assassinate him on 20 August 1942, but Eng did not show up at the location he was expected. This prompted Sunde to lead the famous attack on Statspolitiet's office on 21 August.

Post-war life

In December 1948 his sentence was announced: seven years of forced labour, ten years without political rights and one year's absence from the medicinal profession. He actually served three and a half years in prison. He was then allowed to return to medicine, but then as district physician in remote

Kvænangen Municipality Kvænangen ( sme, Návuotna; fkv, Naavuono) is a municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Burfjord. The European route E6 highway goes through the municipality and over ...

, with minimal support or equipment. An image of Vidkun Quisling was hanging in his

Burfjord Burfjord ( fkv, Puruvuono; sme, Buvrovuotna) is a village that is the administrative centre of Kvænangen Municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. It is home to the municipal council of Kvænangen. The village has a population (2017) ...

office, and in a 1978 interview he stated that he still followed Nasjonal Samling's ideology. He remained in Kvænangen the rest of his life, retired in 1985 and died in 1995. In 2004 there was a heated debate on whether he should be remembered for his Nazi sympathies or his achievements as a physician.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Eng, Hans 1907 births 1995 deaths 20th-century Norwegian physicians Physicians in the Nazi Party Bredtvedt concentration camp personnel People convicted of treason for Nazi Germany against Norway People from Troms People from Kvænangen Members of Nasjonal Samling