The Brandenburg Euthanasia Centre (), officially known as the Brandenburg an der Havel State Welfare Institute (''Landes-Pflegeanstalt Brandenburg a. H.''), was a killing centre established in 1939 as part of the Nazi euthanasia programme, known after the war as "''

Aktion T4 (German, ) was a campaign of Homicide#By state actors, mass murder by involuntary euthanasia which targeted Disability, people with disabilities and the mentally ill in Nazi Germany. The term was first used in post-WWII, war trials against d ...

''". Nearly 10,000 people were murdered there during its operation, primarily those with mental and physical disabilities.

Overview

The killing centre was located in

Brandenburg an der Havel Brandenburg an der Havel (; ) is a town in Brandenburg, Germany, which served as the capital of the Margraviate of Brandenburg until it was replaced by Berlin in 1417. With a population of 72,040 (as of 2020), it is located on the banks of the ...

in the old gaol in ''Neuendorfer Straße'' 90c. Brandenburg Concentration Camp was housed in these buildings from August 1933 to February 1934. A

concentration camp A concentration camp is a prison or other facility used for the internment of political prisoners or politically targeted demographics, such as members of national or ethnic minority groups, on the grounds of national security, or for exploitati ...

, one of the first in Germany, was located on ''Neuendorfer Straße'' in Brandenburg Old Town. After closing this inner city concentration camp, the

Nazis Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

used the Brandenburg-Görden Prison, located in Görden, a suburb of Brandenburg. Later the old gaol became the Brandenburg Euthanasia Centre where the Nazis killed people with mental problems, including children. They called this operation "

Action T4 (German, ) was a campaign of Homicide#By state actors, mass murder by involuntary euthanasia which targeted Disability, people with disabilities and the mentally ill in Nazi Germany. The term was first used in post-WWII, war trials against d ...

" because of the Berlin address, Tiergartenstraße 4, the headquarters of this planned and well-organized killing "

euthanasia Euthanasia (from : + ) is the practice of intentionally ending life to eliminate pain and suffering. Different countries have different Legality of euthanasia, euthanasia laws. The British House of Lords Select committee (United Kingdom), se ...

" organisation. Brandenburg an der Havel was one of the first locations in the

Third Reich Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...

where the

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

s experimented with killing their victims by gas. This foreshadowed the mass killings in

Auschwitz Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, 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 consisted of Auschw ...

and other

extermination camp Nazi Germany used six extermination camps (), also called death camps (), or killing centers (), in Central Europe, primarily in occupied Poland, during World War II to systematically murder over 2.7 million peoplemostly Jewsin the Holocau ...

s. After complaints by local inhabitants about the smoke, the mobile furnaces used to burn the corpses ceased operation. Shortly after this, the Nazis closed the old prison. At the Centre

Christian Wirth Christian Wirth (; 24 November 1885 – 26 May 1944) was a German ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) officer and leading Holocaust perpetrator who was one of the primary architects of the program to exterminate the Jewish people of Poland, known as Opera ...

experimented in developing gas chambers for gassing the physically and mentally disabled. The killing of people with

carbon monoxide Carbon monoxide (chemical formula CO) is a poisonous, flammable gas that is colorless, odorless, tasteless, and slightly less dense than air. Carbon monoxide consists of one carbon atom and one oxygen atom connected by a triple bond. It is the si ...

started in January 1940 at the Centre headed by

Irmfried Eberl Irmfried Eberl (8 September 1910 – 16 February 1948) was an Austrian psychiatrist and medical director of the euthanasia institutes in Brandenburg and Bernburg, who helped set up and was the first commandant of the Treblinka extermination camp ...

. The

gas chambers A gas chamber is an apparatus for killing humans or animals with gas, consisting of a sealed chamber into which a poisonous or asphyxiant gas is introduced. Poisonous agents used include hydrogen cyanide and carbon monoxide. History Gener ...

were disguised as showers. The victims were take to the Centre under the false statement, that they were being transferred to a mental hospital. In October 1940, the Brandenburg institution and all of its staff were transferred to the newly established

Bernburg Euthanasia Centre The Nazi Euthanasia Centre at Bernburg () operated from 21 November 1940 to 30 July 1943 in a separate wing of the State Sanatorium and Mental Hospital (''Landes-Heil- und Pflegeanstalt'') in Bernburg (Saale), Bernburg on the River Saale in the Ger ...

Victim numbers

According to a table compiled in 1942 and discovered in 1945, the so-called Hartheim Statistics, a total of 9,972 people were murdered in a

gas chamber A gas chamber is an apparatus for killing humans or animals with gas, consisting of a sealed chamber into which a poisonous or asphyxiant gas is introduced. Poisonous agents used include hydrogen cyanide and carbon monoxide. History Donatie ...

at the Brandenburg Euthanasia Centre or the Bernburg Euthanasia Centre in 1940.: Ernst Klee (ed.): ''Dokumente zur "Euthanasie".'' Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag Nr. 4327, Frankfurt am Main 1985, , Doc. 87, p. 232 / Henry Friedlander: ''Der Weg zum NS-Genozid. Von der Euthanasie zur Endlösung.'' Berlin 1997, , p. 190, also gives a figure of 9,772. These statistics only cover the first killing phase, under ''Action T4'', that was halted by an order from

Hitler Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his suicide in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the lea ...

dated 24 August 1941.

References and footnotes

Sources

* (Probevergasung, Hungerkost) *

External links

www.doew.at

Table from the Hartheim Statistics
(PDF) {{Coord, 52, 24, 38.5488, N, 12, 33, 2, E, type:landmark_dim:500_region:DE-BB, display=title Aktion T4 euthanasia centres 20th century in Brandenburg Brandenburg an der Havel

Overview

Victim numbers

See also

References and footnotes

Sources

External links