{{Short description|German-American eugenicist and Nazi collaborator (1882–1955)}} {{Infobox criminal | name = Edwin Katzenellenbogen | image = Katzen-Ellenbogen.png | alt = | caption = Katzenellenbogen in U.S. custody (April 1947) | birth_name = Edwin Maria Katzenellenbogen | birth_date = {{Birth date|1882|05|22}} | birth_place = [[Ivano-Frankivsk|Stanislau]], [[Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast]], [[Austria-Hungary]] | death_date = 1957 <!-- {{Death date and age|YYYY|MM|DD|YYYY|MM|DD}} (death date then birth date) --> | death_place = | other_names = | occupation = Psychiatrist | years_active = | known_for = | notable_works = | conviction = [[War crimes]] | conviction_status = [[Deceased]] | criminal_penalty = [[Life imprisonment]]; commuted 12 years imprisonment | trial = Buchenwald trial }}
'''Edwin Maria Katzenellenbogen''', also spelled '''Katzen-Ellenbogen''' (22 May 1882 – after 1955) was an [[Who is a Jew?|ethnically Jewish]], German-American [[Wartime collaboration|Nazi collaborator]], [[Eugenics|eugenicist]], and [[physician]] in the [[concentration camp]] of [[Buchenwald Concentration Camp|Buchenwald]].<ref name= Black>{{cite web |last=Black |first=Edwin |author-link= Edwin Black |title= The Story of the New Jersey Doctor Who Helped Kill Prisoners at Buchenwald in the Name of Eugenics |date= 11 November 2003 |publisher=[[History News Network]] (HNN) at [[University of Richmond]] |url=https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/1791 |access-date=29 November 2021}} Based on E. Black's book ''[[War Against the Weak]]: Eugenics and America's Campaign to Create a Master Race''.</ref>
==Early life and education== Born in 1882 in [[Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria|Austrian Galicia]], he attended a [[Polish language|Polish-speaking]] [[Jesuit]] high school, and was a practicing [[Catholic Church|Catholic]].<ref name= Black/> In 1905 he graduated as a doctor from [[Leipzig University]].<ref name= Black/>
==Career== He emigrated to the United States that same year, where he was [[Naturalization|naturalized]] a citizen.<ref name= Black/> Katzenellenbogen worked as a eugenicist for the [[Carnegie Institution for Science|Carnegie Institution]]. At one point, he was a faculty member at [[Harvard Medical School]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Samaan |first=A. E. |title=From a "Race of Masters" to a "Master Race": 1948 to 1848 |date=9 November 2020 |publisher=Library Without Walls, LLC. |isbn=978-0-9964163-4-4 |pages=45–46 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1ivsDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA45}}</ref> During this time, Katzenellenbogen married Aurelia Pierce, the daughter of a [[Massachusetts Supreme Court]] Justice, whom he later divorced.<ref name= Black/> He would be asked by then [[Governor of New Jersey]], and later [[President of the United States]], [[Woodrow Wilson]], to draft a law for [[Sterilization (medicine)|sterilising]] [[Epilepsy|epileptics]] and those he considered as being so-called "defectives".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Agar |first=Nicholas |title=Liberal Eugenics |date=January 2004 |publisher=Wiley |isbn=978-1-4051-2389-1 |doi=10.1002/9780470775004}}</ref>
Katzenellenbogen returned to Europe in 1915 and moved between several countries on the continent. While in Holland, he was informed by telegram from the US that his only son had fallen from a roof and died. The shock affected his psyche for the rest of his life.<ref name= Black/>
He and his new female partner were living in Germany during Hitler's ascension to power in the 1930s.<ref name= Black/><ref name= PW>{{cite book |last=Weindling |first=P. |author-link= Paul Weindling |title=Nazi Medicine and the Nuremberg Trials: From Medical Warcrimes to Informed Consent |year= 2004 |publisher=Springer |page=229 |isbn=978-0-230-50605-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2L4WDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA229}}</ref>
==Arrest and activity in Buchenwald== [[File:Edwin Katzenellenbogen Buchenwald Arolsen Archives DocID6250462.jpg|thumb|Registration card of Edwin Katzenellenbogen as a prisoner at Buchenwald Nazi concentration camp]]
He tried to escape arrest as a Jew under the 1935 [[Nuremberg laws]] by successively moving to [[Czechoslovakia]], Italy, and after the start of the war in 1939, to France. Once that country was also [[Battle of France|partly occupied]], he managed to gain a privileged position among Germans as a medical specialist with rare and much-needed professional and language skills. After several temporary arrests, he was first detained by the [[Gestapo]] in late summer of 1943, and then in September deported to [[Buchenwald concentration camp]] near [[Weimar]] in Germany. There he continued collaborating with the Nazis as a doctor, also conducting [[Nazi human experimentation|human experiments]].<ref name= Black/><ref name= PW/> He once again gained a position of privilege and even strong influence over the Nazi staff, while becoming infamous amongst prisoners for his cruelty, especially towards [[French Resistance|French communists]].<ref name= Black/><ref>{{Cite web |title=Katzenellenbogen, Buchenwald Doctor, Denies Cruelty at War Crimes Trial |website=[[Jewish Telegraphic Agency]] |date= 18 July 1947 |url= https://www.jta.org/archive/katzenellenbogen-buchenwald-doctor-denies-cruelty-at-war-crimes-trial |access-date= 2022-07-22}}</ref>
==Trial and imprisonment== [[File:Edwin Katzenellenbogen.jpeg|thumb|Katzenellenbogen testifies during his trial]]
In September 1945, Katzenellenbogen was arrested by the British occupation authorities in [[Marburg]].<ref>{{Cite news |date=September 18, 1945 |title=Der letzte von fünfundvierzig |trans-title= The last of forty-five |language= de |newspaper= {{ill|Weltpresse|de|Weltpresse}} |url= https://anno.onb.ac.at/cgi-content/anno?apm=0&aid=dwp&datum=19450918&seite=2}}</ref> In the [[Buchenwald Trial|Buchenwald Camp Trial]] (part of the [[Dachau Trials]]), he was charged along with 30 others. Katzenellenbogen was accused of mistreating prisoners and killing 1000 of them via lethal injection. After being found guilty, Katzenellenbogen requested a [[Capital punishment|death sentence]] in a very twisted manner, by referring to himself in the third person and not actually admitting his guilt: <blockquote>"You have placed the [[mark of Cain]] on my forehead. Any physician who committed the crimes I am charged with deserves to be killed. Therefore, I ask for only one grace. Apply to me the highest therapy that is in your hands."<ref>{{Cite book |last= Copjec |first= Joan |author-link= Joan Copjec |title= Radical Evil |year= 1996 |publisher= Verso |isbn=978-1-85984-911-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y9CD65m42-YC&pg=PA84 |access-date= 31 May 2025}}</ref></blockquote> On August 14, 1947, Katzenellenbogen was sentenced to life in prison. Given the fact that eyewitnesses of his alleged major crimes - murder by injection and human experiments, including on the inmates' eyes - were out of reach, being either back home or dead and cremated, military prosecutors failed to present conclusive evidence that he [[Murder|killed anyone]]. As a result, he was only found guilty of committing non-fatal [[Prisoner abuse|abuse]].<ref name= Black/>
Katzenellenbogen's sentence was later commuted to 12 years,<ref>Buchenwald-Hauptprozess: ''Deputy Judge Advocate's Office 7708 War Crimes Group European Command APO 407 (United States of America v. Josias Prince zu Waldeck u. a. – Case 000-50-9), November 1947, p. 58.'' ([http://dev.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/files/Items/PdfFile/6699.pdf PDF]{{Dead link|date=March 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted= yes}})</ref> and he was already released from prison on September 26, 1953,<ref>{{Cite web |title=Nazi Doctors (mostly SS) - Axis History Forum |website=forum.axishistory.com |url=https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=9564 |access-date=2022-06-27}}</ref> eight years after his arrest by the British.
==Later years and death== Katzenellenbogen returned to the U.S. and resumed practice as a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst until at least the end of 1955.<ref name= CFX>{{cite book |last= Charet |first=F. X. |title= Spiritualism and the foundations of C.G. Jung's psychology |date=1993 |publisher=State University of New York Press |url=https://archive.org/details/spiritualismfoun0000char/page/271/mode/1up?q=conference&view=theater}}</ref> He died in 1957.<ref>Domański, C. W. (2010). "Awans i nieslawa Edwina Katzenellenbogena" [The rise and fall of Edwin Katzenellenbogen] (in Polish). ''Przegląd Psychologiczny'' '''53'''(3), pp. 291–302.</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== {{commons category-inline}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Katzenellenbogen, Edwin}} [[Category:1882 births]] [[Category:Date of death unknown]] [[Category:20th-century deaths]] [[Category:American eugenicists]] [[Category:American people convicted of war crimes]] [[Category:American people of Polish-Jewish descent]] [[Category:American prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment]] [[Category:American collaborators with Nazi Germany]] [[Category:Jewish collaborators with Nazi Germany]] [[Category:German eugenicists]] [[Category:German psychiatrists]] [[Category:German emigrants to the United States]] [[Category:Harvard University faculty]] [[Category:People convicted in the Dachau trials]] [[Category:People convicted in the Buchenwald trials]] [[Category:Prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment by the United States military]] [[Category:Leipzig University alumni]]