Hellmuth Reinhard (born Hermann Gustav Hellmuth Patzschke; 24 July 1911 – 2002) was a German ''SS-Sturmbannführer'' who is best known for being head of the Gestapo in Nazi-occupied Norway from 1942 to 1945 during World War II. After the war, Reinhard evaded capture for nearly two decades before being arrested in 1964. He died in 2002.

Background

Reinhard was born Hermann Gustav Hellmuth Patzschke on 24 July 1911 in Weißenfels in the Prussian

Province of Saxony The Province of Saxony (german: link=no, Provinz Sachsen), also known as Prussian Saxony () was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia and later the Free State of Prussia from 1816 until 1944. Its capital was Magdeburg. It was formed by the merge ...

in the

German Empire The German Empire (),Herbert Tuttle wrote in September 1881 that the term "Reich" does not literally connote an empire as has been commonly assumed by English-speaking people. The term literally denotes an empire – particularly a hereditary ...

. He studied law in Vienna, Leipzig, and Berlin, graduating in 1938. Patzschke changed his last name to the more Germanic Reinhard in 1939. In 1940, he married Gunhild Röschmann and had three daughters.

Nazi official

SS career

A member of the Hitler Youth (''Hitlerjugend'') from a young age, Reinhard became a member of the SS (serial number 121174) in March 1933 and a member of the NSDAP (serial number 2.382.157) in May of the same year. The SS was at that time an organisation which recruited younger men distancing themselves from the "hoodlum character of the SA and the party and who looked upon the SS as an elite order, spiritually and politically."Herbert, Ulrich: Best: Biographische Studien über Radikalismus, Weltanschauung und Vernunft, 1903–1989, Bonn, Dietz, 1989, p. 119, translated from the German Reinhard served in the '' Sicherheitsdienst'' from 1935 in Leipzig and Berlin. In September 1938, he was given the title ''Regierungsassesor'' and became the head of the Historical Commission for the '' Reichsführer-SS'' in Vienna and Prague. He was transferred to the ''

Sicherheitspolizei The ''Sicherheitspolizei'' ( en, Security Police), often abbreviated as SiPo, was a term used in Germany for security police. In the Nazi era, it referred to the state political and criminal investigation security agencies. It was made up by the ...

'' (SiPo) in September 1939, where he was tasked with investigating the assassination of Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss. During this time, Reinhard wished to join the '' Waffen-SS'' but was permanently excluded as a candidate after breaking his leg in the Netherlands. On 8 August 1940, he became leader of the '' Zentralstelle für jüdische Auswanderung'' in Amsterdam until 3 November 1941, when he became deputy commander for the Gestapo in

Kiev Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

Role in Norway

On 28 January 1942, Reinhard was sent to Norway. By 1943, he had been given the rank of ''SS-Sturmbannführer'' and made head of SiPo's Abteilung IV (the Gestapo), stationed at

Victoria Terrasse Victoria Terrasse is an historic building complex located in central Oslo, Norway. The complex now houses the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. History Victoria Terrasse was built between 1884 and 1890 as an apartment complex. It was desi ...

in Oslo. He was placed there on personal orders from Heinrich Himmler. Under the command of Heinrich Fehlis, he led the fight against the Norwegian resistance and oversaw the torture of prisoners. He was even feared by his own men, who after the war claimed that he had threatened to send them to

northern Norway Northern Norway ( nb, Nord-Norge, , nn, Nord-Noreg; se, Davvi-Norga) is a geographical Regions of Norway, region of Norway, consisting of the two northernmost counties Nordland and Troms og Finnmark, in total about 35% of the Norwegian mainlan ...

or to concentration camps if they disobeyed orders. In the summer of 1944, following an order from Hitler, the fate of SiPo priosners was no longer decided in court, but rather by an assessment made by Reinhard. Later that year, a group of Norwegians were secretly executed at

Trandum leir Trandum leir is a former army camp Ullensaker, Norway. The camp was shut down when the civilian airport at Gardermoen was built since most of the buildings were located directly underneath the flightpath for planes landing there. The woods near T ...

as a result of what was called "''kontordom''" (office judgement) by Norwegian prisoners. During his time in Norway, Reinhard was also involved in the deportation of Jews and a series of murders carried out as part of

Operation Blumenpflücken Operation Blumenpflücken ( en, Operation Flower Picking) was a counter- resistance operation in occupied Norway, planned and carried out by the Gestapo/Sicherheitspolizei in 1944 and early 1945. It was planned by Ernst Weiner, and was a part of t ...

. Near the end of the war, Reinhard started inviting young male prisoners to dinner in his home, where he would hold conversations on philosophy, literature, and politics. In some occasions, this enabled the invitees to have other prisoners freed. It is unknown what Reinhard's purpose was in hosting these meals; he would drink heavily towards the end and sometimes mentioned death sentences for which he had a bad conscience.

After Norway

On 1 February 1945, Reinhard was transferred from Norway to the

Sudetenland The Sudetenland ( , ; Czech and sk, Sudety) is the historical German name for the northern, southern, and western areas of former Czechoslovakia which were inhabited primarily by Sudeten Germans. These German speakers had predominated in the ...

. Here he became leader of the Gestapo in Reichenberg, a role he would hold until the Nazi capitulation.

Post-war years

Following the

end of World War II in Europe The final battle of the European Theatre of World War II continued after the definitive overall surrender of Nazi Germany to the Allies, signed by Field marshal Wilhelm Keitel on 8 May 1945 in Karlshorst, Berlin. After German dictator Adolf H ...

, Reinhard started using the alias Hermann Patzschke when he was arrested by the British. Escaping identification, he was released and worked as a traffic manager in

Böblingen Böblingen (; Swabian German, Swabian: ''Beblenga'') is a town in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, seat of Böblingen (district), Böblingen District. Sindelfingen and Böblingen are Geographic contiguity, contiguous. History Böblingen was found ...

near

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...

. At some point he was briefly imprisoned and interrogated by the Americans, before becoming a clerk in a US Army regiment in Mannheim. From the autumn of 1948, Reinhard held various jobs in the publishing industry, eventually settling in Schleswig-Holstein. With new his identity, Reinhard was able to remarry his wife in December 1951, who had been posing as the widow of Hellmuth Reinhard. It was not until 1964 that West German police identified Hermann Patzschke as Hellmuth Reinhard and arrested him for war crimes. On 30 June 1967 he was sentenced to five years in prison. Reinhard was released in 1970 and died in 2002.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Reinhard, Hellmuth 1911 births 2002 deaths People from Burgenlandkreis People from the Province of Saxony Nazi Party members SS-Sturmbannführer Holocaust perpetrators in Norway Reich Security Main Office personnel Gestapo personnel German people convicted of murder People convicted of murder by Germany Recipients of the War Merit Cross Hitler Youth members