Rudolf Brandt

Rudolf Brandt ( Frankfurt an der Oder , Germany , 2 of June of 1909 - Landsberg am Lech , 2 of June of 1948 ) was a lawyer , Colonel of the SS ( Standartenführer ) and administrative officer who served as the first personal secretary Reichsführer of The SS Heinrich Himmler .

Biography

Rudolf Brandt was born into a modest railway family. In order to survive, he studied stenography first in the Realgymnasium, achieving an extraordinary skill as a typist and stenographer . He became a member of the NSDAP in 1932 under the number NSDP 1331-536.

With a spirit of self-improvement, he studied law at the University of Berlin and the University of Jena at night while working as a reporter at the Provisional Court of the National Economic Council of Germany, graduating as a lawyer in 1933. That same year he joined The SS with the number 129 771 and is called to work in Berlin under the administrative amparo of Heinrich Himmler , who places him in the position as personal secretary of the Reichsführer SS. In this position, Brandt was greatly appreciated by Himmler for his perfection as a stenographer and his full-fledged responsibility under Himmler’s exacting conditions and delivery, and used his transduction skills by performing communications between the Reichsführer and his administrative organizations, Except initially in relation to the Waffen SS and its police agencies.

When Himmler held the post of Reichsminister Minister of the Interior in 1938, Brandt was promoted to the position of Counselor and Chief of Office having responsibility for communications and administration of concentration camps. He also managed the administration of the results of medical experimentation in these fields, a subject for which Himmler had an interim special. He supervised the extermination of prisoners infected with tuberculosis . ¹ In this position, Brandt worked in administrative communications with the Gestapo by Reinhard Heydrich and later by Ernst Kaltenbrunner .

Rudolf Brandt played a decisive role in directly saving his life in a couple of opportunities for Himmler’s personal doctor, Felix Kersten , preventing him from attempting to assassinate Heydrich and Kaltenbrunner, since they suspected him of collaborating with the enemy. By saving the life of this doctor, Brandt indirectly saved the lives of thousands of Jews and victims of repression in Holland from the hands of SS law enforcement agencies.

At the beginning of May 1945, during the end of the Battle of Berlin , Rudolf Brandt, Werner Grothmann and Heinz Macher formed a trust group that accompanied Himmler to Flensburg in order to make himself available to the new German government chaired by Karl Dönitz And Albert Speer , but was flatly rejected as the second man in charge of national security. Then, Himmler and his entourage decided to reach Munich through Bavaria , being stopped by the British in Bremervörde . They were taken to Lüneburg and then separated from Himmler. Brandt and his companions were taken to a prison camp in Westertimke . Himmler would commit suicide in Lüneburg .

Rudolf Brandt was tried in the Trial of the doctors , being acquitted of this in first instance, but considered guilty by a military court of the United States in the positions to collaborate in the administration of the Final Solution . Despite having the evidence in favor of Felix Kersten , was sentenced to the gallows the 2 of June of 1948 , the day of his birthday, at the age of 39 years for crimes against humanity .