Karl Eberhard Schöngarth (22 April 1903 – 16 May 1946) was a German lawyer and SS-Brigadeführer in Nazi Germany. He was a war criminal who perpetrated mass murder and genocide in German-occupied Poland during the Holocaust. He participated in the January 1942 Wannsee Conference, at which the genocidal Final Solution to the Jewish Question was originally planned.
After the war, Schöngarth and six others were tried for murdering an American pilot, Americo S. Galle, who was shot down over the Netherlands in November 1944. They were all found guilty. Schöngarth and four others were sentenced to death and executed in 1946.
Early life
Schöngarth was born on 22 April 1903 in Leipzig, the son of a master brewer. He displayed ethno-nationalistic sentiments at an early age. He began high school at the age of 11 but, after the outbreak of the First World War, dropped out of school in order to work at a garden center to support the war effort. On 7 March 1918, Schöngarth was awarded a Young Men's Iron Medal.
After the war, he was to go back to high school to complete his education, but instead joined a Freikorps paramilitary group in Thuringia. He participated in the Kapp Putsch in 1920 and, in 1922, he joined the Nazi Party Ortsgruppe (local group) in Erfurt (membership number 43,870) and the Viking League. That year he also joined the Sturmabteilung (SA), the Nazi paramilitary organization, earned his Abitur and obtained a job as a bank teller at Deutsche bank. Following the failed Beer Hall Putsch, Schöngarth fled to Coburg to avoid a charge of treason but eventually returned to Erfurt and was granted amnesty.
By 1924, as Schöngarth's involvement with the Nazi Party waned, he briefly served in the Reichswehr Infantry Regiment 1/15 in Gießen and then enrolled at Leipzig University, majoring in economics and law. He joined a Student Corps, Corps Germania, and continued his studies at the University of Greifswald and the University of Halle. The Einsatzgruppe led by Schöngarth murdered more than 5,000 Jews from the Brześć Ghetto between 10 and 12 July 1941. Schöngarth was a fanatical enemy of the Jews and utterly ruthless in his determination to carry out the executions. In Lwów, he informed officers under his command that anyone failing to carry out the execution orders would himself be shot, and that he would support any officer that shot a comrade for this failure.
Wannsee Conference
The Wannsee Conference, called to formulate the implementation of the Final Solution of the Jewish Question, took place during a fraught political atmosphere in the General Government. Hans Frank, the Governor General, was at odds with HSSPF Krüger who, though technically subordinate to Frank, was appointed by Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler and took orders only from him. They had major disagreements over control of the police forces, over Jewish policy and over the issue of the protection of German ethnicity and culture. Himmler, as the Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood, felt that this was solely in his purview. Heydrich, the conference organizer, wanted to ensure that the meeting ran smoothly and came to an agreement with regard to the planned actions. Due to the intense personal and political hostilities involved, Heydrich made the decision not to invite Krüger. He opted, instead, to invite Schöngarth who was less likely to clash with the representative of the General Government, Frank's deputy, State Secretary Josef Buhler.
Schöngarth attended the Wannsee Conference on 20 January 1942, along with SS-Sturmbannführer Rudolf Lange, representing the Reichskommissariat Ostland, who also had participated in the Holocaust with Einsatzgruppe A. The official minutes of the meeting (Wannsee Protocol) do not record any comments from Schöngarth who, given his recent Einsatzgruppe experience, certainly knew exactly what was being proposed and raised no objections. Despite the euphemisms used in the minutes, its author, SS-Obersturmbannführer Adolf Eichmann, testified at his trial in 1961 that the participants: "were discussing the subject quite bluntly, quite differently from the language which I had to use later in the record. During the conversation they minced no words about it at all … they spoke about methods of killing, about liquidation, about extermination."
Police service in Greece and the Netherlands
In June 1942, charges of embezzlement, corruption, plundering and art racketeering were brought against Schöngarth. Himmler decided to defer any disciplinary action in order to quell rumours of corruption in the SS. Later in 1942, disputes arose in the General Government about whether to transport to the east the Jews who were working in the armaments industry. Schöngarth agreed that they were not replaceable and he began to agree with Frank that the policy should be relaxed. Krüger complained to Himmler that Schöngarth was contravening orders and was sympathetic with the views of the civil administration. He insisted that one or the other of them had to go, because they were unable to cooperate.
In June 1943, Schöngarth was removed from his post in Poland and was replaced by SS-Oberführer Walther Bierkamp, who had led Einsatzgruppe D. Schöngarth was transferred for disciplinary reasons to an SS anti-aircraft artillery replacement regiment in Munich. This was part of a Waffen-SS unit. After a short training period, he was sent as a company commander with the 4th SS Polizei Panzergrenadier Division to Lamia in occupied Greece, where he remained until July 1944 conducting anti-partisan operations.
From early July 1944 until the German surrender, Schöngarth was again made the Commander of SiPo and SD forces, this time at The Hague in the occupied Netherlands under HSSPF SS-Obergruppenführer Hanns Albin Rauter. After Rauter was seriously wounded in an ambush by members of the Dutch resistance on the night of 6-7 March 1945, Schongarth immediately ordered mass executions in reprisal. A total of 263 Dutch citizens were executed, including 117 at Woeste Hoeve, the location of the ambush. On 10 March, Schöngarth was deputized to act as HSSPF for Rauter while he recovered from his wounds. During the course of the war, Schöngarth was awarded the War Merit Cross, 1st and 2nd class with Swords. After the surrender of German forces in the Netherlands, Schöngarth was taken into custody by British troops.
Trial and execution
After an investigation, British occupation authorities charged Schöngarth with the murder of Americo S. Galle, an American pilot. On 21 November 1944, Galle's plane had been shot down in Enschede. He was captured by German soldiers, taken to a villa which the SD was using in Enschede, and made to change from his uniform into civilian clothes.
The charge came after several Dutch people came forward and told British investigators that they had seen Galle's plane being shot down. Galle had been captured alive, but was later escorted into the woods, after which the witnesses said they heard a gunshot.
Schöngarth and his condemned accomplices were all executed by hanging by Albert Pierrepoint at Hamelin Prison on 16 May 1946. Also hanged on the same day for unrelated crimes at Hamelin were Bruno Tesch and Karl Weinbacher.
While awaiting execution, Schöngarth was interviewed by a Dutch investigator. He was asked about suspected war criminal Pieter Menten and atrocities in which he was suspected of involvement. At the end of the interview, the investigator asked Schöngarth if he was telling the truth, he replied "You know, I have only three weeks to live. That's the whole truth." Shortly before his execution, Schöngarth was visited by Menten; the two turned out to be close friends. Schöngarth told Menten he'd done him many favours in the past. He made Menten promise to look out for his family, after which he gave him legal advice.