Max Henze (23 September 1899 – 10 March 1951) was a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

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 ...

politician and SS-''

Brigadeführer ''Brigadeführer'' (, ) was a paramilitary rank of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) that was used between the years of 1932 to 1945. It was mainly known for its use as an SS rank. As an SA rank, it was used after briefly being known as ''Untergruppenf� ...

'' who was police chief in

Kassel Kassel (; in Germany, spelled Cassel until 1926) is a city on the Fulda River in northern Hesse, Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Kassel and the district of the same name and had 201,048 inhabitants in December 2020 ...

, Bromberg (today,

Bydgoszcz Bydgoszcz ( , , ; german: Bromberg) is a city in northern Poland, straddling the meeting of the River Vistula with its left-bank tributary, the Brda. With a city population of 339,053 as of December 2021 and an urban agglomeration with more ...

), Danzig (today, Gdansk) and

Essen Essen (; Latin: ''Assindia'') is the central and, after Dortmund, second-largest city of the Ruhr, the largest urban area in Germany. Its population of makes it the fourth-largest city of North Rhine-Westphalia after Cologne, Düsseldorf and D ...

. At the end of 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 ...

, he was

executed 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 ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

for war crimes and

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are widespread or systemic acts committed by or on behalf of a ''de facto'' authority, usually a state, that grossly violate human rights. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity do not have to take place within the ...

Early life

Henze was born in Köthen and attended elementary school there and in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

. Upon completing school, he volunteered for

military service Military service is service by an individual or group in an army or other militia, air forces, and naval forces, whether as a chosen job (volunteer) or as a result of an involuntary draft (conscription). Some nations (e.g., Mexico) require a ...

with the

Imperial German Army The Imperial German Army (1871–1919), officially referred to as the German Army (german: Deutsches Heer), was the unified ground and air force of the German Empire. It was established in 1871 with the political unification of Germany under the l ...

in 1917. He served in the

First World War 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 ...

with a

machine gun A machine gun is a fully automatic, rifled autoloading firearm designed for sustained direct fire with rifle cartridges. Other automatic firearms such as automatic shotguns and automatic rifles (including assault rifles and battle rifles) a ...

company in Reserve Infantry Regiment 24 and Infantry Regiment 396. Gassed and wounded twice, he earned the

Iron Cross The Iron Cross (german: link=no, Eisernes Kreuz, , abbreviated EK) was a military decoration in the Kingdom of Prussia, and later in the German Empire (1871–1918) and Nazi Germany (1933–1945). King Frederick William III of Prussia est ...

, second class and the

Wound Badge The Wound Badge (german: Verwundetenabzeichen) was a German military decoration first promulgated by Wilhelm II, German Emperor on 3 March 1918, which was first awarded to soldiers of the German Army who were wounded during World War I. Between th ...

in black. Discharged at the end of the war, he served for several months in 1919 as a rifleman with the

Cuxhaven Cuxhaven (; ) is an independent town and seat of the Cuxhaven district, in Lower Saxony, Germany. The town includes the northernmost point of Lower Saxony. It is situated on the shore of the North Sea at the mouth of the Elbe River. Cuxhaven has ...

coastal defense battery. He completed an

apprenticeship Apprenticeship is a system for training a new generation of practitioners of a Tradesman, trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study (classroom work and reading). Apprenticeships can also enable practitioners ...

in business and worked from October 1919 to 1932 as a commercial clerk. From February 1923 to spring 1926, he belonged to the '' Freikorps Roßbach'', a

paramilitary A paramilitary is an organization whose structure, tactics, training, subculture, and (often) function are similar to those of a professional military, but is not part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. Paramilitary units carr ...

militia.

Peacetime SS, police and political career

Henze joined 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 ...

(Party membership number 80,481) on 1 April 1928. As an early Party member, he would later be awarded the

Golden Party Badge __NOTOC__ The Golden Party Badge (german: Goldenes Parteiabzeichen) was an award authorised by Adolf Hitler in a decree in October 1933. It was a special award given to all Nazi Party members who had, as of 9 November 1933, registered numbers fr ...

. He became a member of the SS (SS number 1,167) on 7 June 1927. Commissioned an SS-''

Untersturmführer (, ; short: ''Ustuf'') was a paramilitary rank of the German ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) first created in July 1934. The rank can trace its origins to the older SA rank of ''Sturmführer'' which had existed since the founding of the SA in 1921. ...

'' on 14 October 1929, he advanced up the ranks, commanding

company A company, abbreviated as co., is a Legal personality, legal entity representing an association of people, whether Natural person, natural, Legal person, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common p ...

and

battalion A battalion is a military unit, typically consisting of 300 to 1,200 soldiers commanded by a lieutenant colonel, and subdivided into a number of companies (usually each commanded by a major or a captain). In some countries, battalions are ...

size units for the next two years. From 18 October 1931 to 22 July 1932, he served as the first commander of the

6th SS-Standarte The 6th SS-Standarte was a regimental command of the Allgemeine-SS situated in the city of Berlin. As the command was located in the capital of Germany, the 6th Standarte was considered one of the more important SS units in Nazi Germany. The mem ...

, headquartered in

. On 7 August 1932, he succeeded SS-''

Gruppenführer __NOTOC__ ''Gruppenführer'' (, ) was an early paramilitary rank of the Nazi Party (NSDAP), first created in 1925 as a senior rank of the SA. Since then, the term ''Gruppenführer'' is also used for leaders of groups/teams of the police, fire de ...

Kurt Daluege Kurt Max Franz Daluege (15 September 1897 – 24 October 1946) was chief of the national uniformed ''Ordnungspolizei'' (Order Police) of Nazi Germany. Following Reinhard Heydrich's assassination in 1942, he served as Deputy Protector for th ...

as the commander of SS-'' Abschnitt'' (District) III, also based in Berlin and overseeing six SS-''Standarten''. In 1933 he was in charge of the newly opened prison called

Columbia-Haus Columbia concentration camp (also known as Columbia-Haus) was a Nazi concentration camp situated in the Tempelhof area of Berlin. It was one of the first such institutions established by the regime. Development Originally called ''Strafgefängn ...

in the

Tempelhof Tempelhof () is a locality of Berlin within the borough of Tempelhof-Schöneberg. It is the location of the former Tempelhof Airport, one of the earliest commercial airports in the world. The former airport and surroundings are now a park called ...

area of the city where hundreds of the regime's opponents were imprisoned. He was transferred on 20 February 1934 to the leadership of SS-''Abschnitt'' XV in Altona where he remained until 25 August 1934. He next was appointed as a special assignment officer in the office of ''

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 ...

. This was followed in March 1935 by a posting as a special duties officer in SS-''Oberabschnitt'' (Main District) ''"Ost"'' in Berlin until April 1936. In January 1937, when SS-''Oberabschnitt'' "Fulda-Werra" was established in

Hesse Hesse (, , ) or Hessia (, ; german: Hessen ), officially the State of Hessen (german: links=no, Land Hessen), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt. Two other major histor ...

, he obtained a staff position at the headquarters in

Arolsen Bad Arolsen (, until 1997 Arolsen, ''Bad'' being the German name for ''Spa'') is a small town in northern Hesse, Germany, in Waldeck-Frankenberg district. From 1655 until 1918 it served as the residence town of the Princes of Waldeck-Pyrmont and t ...

, remaining until November 1938 when he was posted to SS-''Gruppenführer''

Reinhard Heydrich Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich ( ; ; 7 March 1904 – 4 June 1942) was a high-ranking German SS and police official during the Nazi era and a principal architect of the Holocaust. He was chief of the Reich Security Main Office (inclu ...

's ''

Sicherheitsdienst ' (, ''Security Service''), full title ' (Security Service of the ''Reichsführer-SS''), or SD, was the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. Established in 1931, the SD was the first Nazi intelligence organization ...

Hauptamt'' (SD Main Office), an office that would later become part of the infamous

Reich Security Main Office The Reich Security Main Office (german: Reichssicherheitshauptamt or RSHA) was an organization under Heinrich Himmler in his dual capacity as ''Chef der Deutschen Polizei'' (Chief of German Police) and ''Reichsführer-SS'', the head of the Nazi ...

. Also in January 1937, Henze was appointed Acting Police President of

in northern Hesse, a position that was made permanent in October. Thus, he was the leader of security forces in the city when the

Kassel Synagogue The Kassel Synagogue is the description given to a succession of prayer houses of the Jewish community in Kassel, Hesse. Construction in 1839 In 1827, a previous synagogue was closed due to its dilapidated state. In 1828, the government offere ...

was attacked and its contents burned on 7 November 1938, in one of the first events of the anti-

Jewish 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""The ...

pogrom A pogrom () is a violent riot incited with the aim of massacring or expelling an ethnic or religious group, particularly Jews. The term entered the English language from Russian to describe 19th- and 20th-century attacks on Jews in the Russia ...

known as ''

Kristallnacht () or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from ...

''. In addition to the synagogue, around twenty Jewish-owned shops were looted and destroyed. Reportedly, the police "stood by, looked on and did nothing. An eyewitness remembered seeing the police commissioner of Kassel observing the violence passively." Also active in politics, Henze was elected as a member of the

Prussian Landtag The Landtag of Prussia (german: Preußischer Landtag) was the representative assembly of the Kingdom of Prussia implemented in 1849, a bicameral legislature consisting of the upper House of Lords (''Herrenhaus'') and the lower House of Representat ...

on 24 April 1932 and served until its abolition in January 1934. On 12 November 1933, he was elected as a deputy to the '' Reichstag'' from electoral constituency 2 (Berlin), serving until the fall of the Nazi regime. On 17 May 1935, he became a

City Councillor A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, rural council ...

for the district of

Berlin-Weißensee () is a quarter in the borough of in Berlin, Germany, that takes its name from the small lake (literally 'White Lake') within it. Before Berlin's 2001 administrative reform, was a borough in its own right, consisting of the quarters of , , , ...

Second World War

After the German

invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland (1 September – 6 October 1939) was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week aft ...

at the beginning of the Second World War in September 1939, Henze left his police leadership post in Kassel and was temporarily made police chief of Bromberg, which had been annexed from Poland. He was involved at this point in the rounding up and summary executions of the Polish

intelligentsia The intelligentsia is a status class composed of the university-educated people of a society who engage in the complex mental labours by which they critique, shape, and lead in the politics, policies, and culture of their society; as such, the in ...

and

clergy Clergy are formal leaders within established religions. Their roles and functions vary in different religious traditions, but usually involve presiding over specific rituals and teaching their religion's doctrines and practices. Some of the ter ...

.Polish hostages arrested during the "pacification" of Bydgoszcz
in th
US Holocaust Memorial Museum
Retrieved 7 September 2022. This was followed by appointment as Police President of Danzig on 1 April 1940. In October 1941 he left Danzig when he was made Acting Police President of

, becoming permanent in July 1942. He was given the title of ''

Generalmajor is the Germanic variant of major general, used in a number of Central and Northern European countries. Austria Belgium Denmark is the second lowest general officer rank in the Royal Danish Army and Royal Danish Air Force. As a two-star ...

der polizei'' in 1944 and remained in the Essen post throughout the remainder of the war years. After his capture in 1945, Henze was

interned Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...

by the British in

Recklinghausen Recklinghausen (; Westphalian: ''Riäkelhusen'') is the northernmost city in the Ruhr-Area and the capital of the Recklinghausen district. It borders the rural Münsterland and is characterized by large fields and farms in the north and indus ...

and

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

. He was then

extradited Extradition is an action wherein one jurisdiction delivers a person accused or convicted of committing a crime in another jurisdiction, over to the other's law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement procedure between the two jurisdict ...

in 1947. He stood trial from 8 October to 4 November 1949 for crimes committed during his tenure as Chief of Police in Bromberg and Danzig, together with 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 ...

Richard Hildebrandt Richard Hermann Hildebrandt (13 March 1897 – 10 March 1951) was a German Nazi politician and SS-''Obergruppenführer''. During the Second World War, he served as a Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF) in Nazi-occupied Poland, the Soviet Union ...

who had been the Higher SS and Police Leader in Danzig. At the conclusion of the trial, Henze and Hildebrandt both were sentenced to death by the Bydgoszcz court, and the sentences were upheld by the Polish Supreme Court in

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

on 25 November 1950. The Polish President

Bolesław Bierut Bolesław Bierut (; 18 April 1892 – 12 March 1956) was a Polish communist activist and politician, leader of the Polish People's Republic from 1947 until 1956. He was President of the State National Council from 1944 to 1947, President of Polan ...

denied a request for

clemency A pardon is a government decision to allow a person to be relieved of some or all of the legal consequences resulting from a criminal conviction. A pardon may be granted before or after conviction for the crime, depending on the laws of the ju ...

and confirmed the sentences on 3 December. Hildebrandt and Henze were both

hanged Hanging is the suspension of a person by a noose or ligature around the neck.Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. Hanging as method of execution is unknown, as method of suicide from 1325. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' states that hanging in ...

in the Bydgoszcz prison on 10 March 1951.

SS ranks

References

Sources

* * * * *

External links

*
Max Henze
in th
Hessian Regional History Information System (LAGIS)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Henze, Max 1899 births 1951 deaths Executed people from Saxony-Anhalt German people convicted of crimes against humanity German police chiefs Holocaust perpetrators in Germany Holocaust perpetrators in Poland Members of the Landtag of Prussia Members of the Reichstag of Nazi Germany Nazi Party politicians Nazis executed by Poland by hanging People from Köthen (Anhalt) Recipients of the Iron Cross (1914), 2nd class Recipients of the War Merit Cross Reich Security Main Office personnel SS-Brigadeführer 20th-century Freikorps personnel Executed mass murderers