On 9 December, 1946 in Nuremberg, Germany, started the Doctor’s trial with 23 defendants who either
participated in deadly Nazi euthanasia program killing mentally or physically
disabled people deemed “ unworthy of life “ ; or conducted cruel, painful and often deadly
medical experiments on prisoners in Nazi concentration camps during World War II.
After a number of gruesome testimonies, 7 defendants were sentenced to death by hanging. One
of them was Wolfram Sievers - a managing director of pseudo-scientific research center Ahnenerbe.
Wolfram Sievers was born on 10 July 1905 and his father was a Protestant church musician.
He played organ and piano, loved German baroque music and hated Jews. In 1922 he was expelled
from school for being active in anti-Semitic organization and went to Stuttgart's Technical
University where he studied religious studies, philosophy, and history. He joined the Nazi Party
in 1929 and quickly made a career there when in 1933 he became a head of Externsteine Foundation
established by Heinrich Himmler to study sandstone rock formation in the Teutoburg Forest.
Heinrich Himmler, chief of the SS, was exceptionally interested in occultism
and integrated esoteric symbolism and rituals into the SS which Sievers joined in 1935.
Heinrich Himmler was satisfied with Sievers’s work and in 1935 Himmler appointed Sievers a general
secretary of the Ahnenerbe. The Ahnenerbe was the SS political-propaganda association
which promoted the racial doctrines of the Nazi party and supported the idea that an ancient Aryan
race is biologically superior to other racial groups and modern Germans were its descendants.
In 1943 Sievers was appointed a director of Institute for Military Scientific Research
which conducted inhuman medical experiments on prisoners during the war such as high-altitude
experiments in low-pressure chambers simulating conditions at altitudes of up to 21,000 meters to
determine the maximum altitude from which crews of damaged aircraft could parachute to safety or the
so-called freezing experiment to treat hypothermia which occurs when the body temperature drops.
Sievers was one of those responsible for the murder of male and female
Auschwitz Jewish prisoners for the so-called “ Jewish skeleton collection”
which was to be housed at the Reich University of Strasbourg after the victims were photographed and
their anthropological measurements taken. It is believed that 86 inmates – 57 men and 29 women
were gassed for this project by Josef Kramer, who later became the last commandant of Bergen Belsen
concentration camp. The gassing was conducted at Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp.
The purpose of this project was to prove the alleged racial inferiority of the so called “
Jewish race “ and to emphasize that the Jews were “ subhumans” and Germans were “ superhumans”.
This project was never completed and when the allies discovered the corpses,
some of them were beheaded and they were preserved by formalin.
After the war, Wolfram Sievers was arrested and faced justice for his crimes.
He was tried at the Nuremberg Doctors' trial where he had earned seat next to evil doctor
Joachim Mrugowsky who used to shoot into prisoners’ thigh with poisoned ammunition
and then watched them die in slow and painful death or Victor Brack who played a crucial
role in the implementation of involuntary Nazi euthanasia program codenamed “ Aktion T4”.
Wolfram Sievers was accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity and membership in the criminal
organization the SS. In summer 1947 a tribunal found Sievers guilty of crimes against humanity
and sentenced him to death by hanging. The verdict was carried out on 2 June,
1948 in Landsberg Prison. He was 42 years old. There were no tears shed for Wolfram Sievers.
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