Ludolf Von Alvensleben (1844-1912)

Ludolf-Hermann Emmanuel Georg Kurt Werner von Alvensleben (17 March 1901 – 1 April 1970) was a ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) functionary of Nazi Germany. He held positions of SS and Police Leader in occupied Poland and the Soviet Union, and was indicted for war crimes including the killing of at least 4,247 Poles by units under his command.

Early life and career

Alvensleben was born in Halle in the Prussian Province of Saxony into the noble family von Alvensleben. His father was Prussian Major General Ludolf von Alvensleben (1844–1912). Ludolf's father had already retired from active service to administer the family's manor around Schochwitz Castle, which had been inherited from Alvensleben's grandfather, the Prussian general Hermann von Alvensleben (1809–1887).

Alvensleben enlisted in the Prussian cadet corps in 1911, and in 1918 joined the 10th (Magdeburg) Hussars Regiment, but did not fight in World War I. He was briefly a member in a paramilitary ''Freikorps'' unit in 1920. Between 1923 and July 1929, he was a member of the nationalist ''Der Stahlhelm'' organization. Upon the death of his father in December 1912, he inherited the family's manor at Schochwitz. He wed Melitta von Guaita on 3 May 1924; the marriage produced four children. He also later fathered a natural son raised as a ''Lebensborn'' child.

Nazi party and SS career

Alvensleben joined the NSDAP and SA in 1929. He soon became head of the local branch in Eisleben and chief district official in Mansfeld Land. From July 1931, he chaired the motorized corps of the SA in the '' Gau'' of Halle-Merseburg. Alvensleben left the SA in 1932; at that time he was heavily indebted and had a considerable criminal record on charges which included libel and road traffic offence.

After the ''Machtergreifung'', he and ''Gauleiter'' Rudolf Jordan on 12 February 1933, organized a violent attack of SA and SS paramilitaries on Communist officials in Eisleben, whereby three men were killed and many others injured, an event later known as Eisleben Bloody Sunday. In March 1933, Alvensleben became a member of the provincial diet and of the Prussian Landtag; from 12 November 1933, he also was a member of the Reichstag.

On 5 April 1934, he joined the SS and became commander of the 46th Regiment in Dresden in the rank of ''Obersturmbannführer''. On 22 August 1934, Alvensleben received a reprimand by ''Reichsführer-SS'' Heinrich Himmler for having insulted a woman in Leipzig in April. From 1 October 1935, he assumed the leadership of the 26th SS-Regiment in his hometown Halle. His advancement continued: he became commander of SS-District X in Stuttgart on 20 September 1936 and commander of SS-District XXXIII in Schwerin on 1 July 1937.

Alvensleben's career continued after the 1939 Invasion of Poland as commander of the ''Volksdeutscher Selbstschutz'' ('German Self-Defense') organization in what was to become the newly established Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia. He told his men on 16 October 1939:

The ''Selbstschutz'' paramilitary forces, formed by members of the German minority in Poland and led by SS officials, performed mass executions during the ''Intelligenzaktion Pommern'' in the " Fordon Valley of Death", the Massacres in Piaśnica,Grzegorz Popławski
"Piaśnica – pomorski "Katyń" " (Piaśnica – Pomeranian Katyn)
''Dziennik Baltycki'' (The Baltic Daily). Retrieved 7 June 2014. and other atrocities.Tadeusz Piotrowski,
Poland's holocaust: ethnic strife, collaboration with occupying forces and genocide in the Second Republic, 1918-1947
' McFarland, 1998. . In a letter to Himmler, Alvensleben complained about scrupulous Wehrmacht officers too weak to take drastic measures. In 1939 he confiscated the Jewish-owned manors of Rucewo and Rucewko in Reichsgau Wartheland.

In December 1939, Alvensleben was appointed member-of-staff at the command of Friedrich-Wilhelm Krüger, the SS and Police Leader in Kraków, General Government. On 23 May 1940, he was promoted to the rank of ''Hauptsturmführer'' in the Waffen-SS. From February 1941 he was in service of the Reich Security Main Office, assumed the SS and Police Leader command in Chernigov on 22 October 1941 and of Simferopol in Crimea on 19 November. In 1942, Alvensleben was SS inspector of the ''Durchgangsstrasse'' IV, a large forced labor project to build a road from Lemberg to Stalino (now Donetsk). From 6 October 1943, he held this position in Nikolaev in the rank of Major General, officially assigned to Army Group A; his tenure was accompanied by irregularities and further mass executions.

On 19 February 1944, he succeeded Udo von Woyrsch as Higher SS and Police Leader in Dresden. He took the occasion to take action against his creditors, such as Carl Wentzel who was denounced after the 20 July plot, arrested and executed, whereafter Alvensleben was able to release his heavily indebted manor in Schochwitz. In the late days of the war, he left Dresden and fled to the West.

Post-war escape

In April 1945, Alvensleben was apprehended by British forces. At the end of 1945, he escaped from the internment camp at Neuengamme in Hamburg. After a short stay in Schochwitz, he fled with his family to Argentina in early 1946. Although there is no precise data on when they arrived in the country, according to a 2000 documentary film, the government of Juan Perón granted Alvensleben citizenship under the name of Carlos Lücke on 27 November 1952. He lived in Buenos Aires until July 1956 and then moved to Santa Rosa de Calamuchita. From November 1952, he served as inspector of fish farming. A Polish court sentenced Alvensleben to death ''in absentia''.

In January 1964, the district court of Munich issued an arrest warrant for Alvensleben for the killing of at least 4,247 people in Poland by units of the Selbstschutz under Alvensleben's command in late 1939. Attempts by the prosecution had no consequences for Alvensleben and he died in 1970 in Argentina, without having been brought to trial.

References

Bibliography

* Joachim Lilla,''Statisten in Uniform. Die Mitglieder des Reichstages 1933–1945. Düsseldorf, 2004''.
* Andreas Schulz and Günter Wegmann, ''Die Generale der Waffen-SS und der Polizei''. Band 1, Biblio-Verlag, Bissendorf, 2003. .
* Ruth Bettina Birn, ''Die Höheren SS- und Polizeiführer. Himmlers Vertreter im Reich und in den besetzten Gebieten''. Droste Verlag, Düsseldorf, 1986.
* Klaus D. Patzwall (ed.), ''Das Goldene Parteiabzeichen und seine Verleihungen ehrenhalber 1934–1944'', Verlag Klaus D. Patzwall, Norderstedt 2004,

External links

The Last Nazis: Children of the Master Race
BBC documentary about the ''Lebensborn'' project which includes a deposition by his son

{{DEFAULTSORT:Alvensleben, Ludolf-Hermann von
1901 births
1970 deaths
20th-century Freikorps personnel
Stahlhelm members
Military personnel from Halle (Saale)
People from the Province of Saxony
Nazi Party politicians
German untitled nobility
Members of the Reichstag of Nazi Germany
Ludolf
Holocaust perpetrators in Germany
Holocaust perpetrators in Poland
Nazis who fled to Argentina
People indicted for war crimes
SS and Police Leaders
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Prussian Army personnel
SS-Gruppenführer
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