Karl Gorath (12 December 1912,

Bad Zwischenahn Bad Zwischenahn (Low German: ''Twüschenahn'') is a town and a municipality in the low-lying Ammerland district, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is on Zwischenahner Meer, approximately 15 km northwest of Oldenburg and about 70 km south of t ...

− 18 March 2003,

Bremerhaven Bremerhaven (, , Low German: ''Bremerhoben'') is a city at the seaport of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen, a state of the Federal Republic of Germany. It forms a semi-enclave in the state of Lower Saxony and is located at the mouth of the Riv ...

) was a

gay ''Gay'' is a term that primarily refers to a homosexual person or the trait of being homosexual. The term originally meant 'carefree', 'cheerful', or 'bright and showy'. While scant usage referring to male homosexuality dates to the late 1 ...

man who was arrested in 1938 and imprisoned for

homosexuality Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to peop ...

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 ...

and

Auschwitz 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 ...

. He was freed in 1945. Gorath was training for a nursing career when, at 26, he was denounced as a homosexual by his "jealous lover" and arrested under

Paragraph 175 Paragraph 175 (known formally a§175 StGB also known as Section 175 in English) was a provision of the German Criminal Code from 15 May 1871 to 10 March 1994. It made homosexual acts between males a crime, and in early revisions the provision ...

of the criminal code, which defined homosexuality as an "unnatural act". Gorath was imprisoned at Neuengamme near

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

, Germany, and was forced to wear a

pink triangle A pink triangle has been a symbol for the LGBTQ+ community, initially intended as a badge of shame, but later reclaimed as a positive symbol of self-identity and love for queerness. In Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s, it began as one of the Na ...

, identifying him as gay and a

transvestite Transvestism is the practice of dressing in a manner traditionally associated with the opposite sex. In some cultures, transvestism is practiced for religious, traditional, or ceremonial reasons. The term is considered outdated in Western c ...

. Because of his medical training, Gorath was transferred to work at a prisoner hospital in a sub-camp of Neuengamme. When he refused to decrease the bread ration for patients who were

Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, who share a common history, culture, the Polish language and are identified with the country of Poland in Ce ...

, Gorath was transferred to Auschwitz. There he wore the red triangle of a

political prisoner A political prisoner is someone imprisoned for their political activity. The political offense is not always the official reason for the prisoner's detention. There is no internationally recognized legal definition of the concept, although n ...

, which he believed spared him the brutality inflicted on inmates identified as gay. In January 1945, Gorath was freed when the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

liberated Auschwitz. After the war, in 1947 he was sentenced again: “By the same Judge. Rabien his name was. He received me in the courtroom with the words: ‘You are here again!’” Gorath is one of six gay men who are the subject of a documentary on gays in

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

concentration camps. The film, by producers Jeffrey Friedman and

Rob Epstein Robert P. Epstein (born April 6, 1955), is an American director, producer, writer, and editor. He has won two Academy Awards for Best Documentary Feature, for the films ''The Times of Harvey Milk'' and '' Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt ...

and narrated by

Rupert Everett Rupert James Hector Everett (; born 29 May 1959) is an English actor, director and producer. Everett first came to public attention in 1981 when he was cast in Julian Mitchell's play and subsequent film '' Another Country'' (1984) as a gay pupil ...

, is called ''

''.

References

External links

Hidden from History: The Gay Holocaust
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gorath, Karl 1912 births 2003 deaths Auschwitz concentration camp survivors German prisoners and detainees Homosexual concentration camp survivors German gay men Neuengamme concentration camp survivors People convicted under Germany's Paragraph 175 People from Ammerland 20th-century German LGBT people

See also

References

External links