Pauly, Max Johan Friedrich.

Pauly, Max Johan Friedrich, born 01-06-1907 in Wesselburen, the son of a hardware store owner, graduated from the elementary school at the hardware store in his hometown and trained as a salesman. After his father died in 1928, he took over his home goods store. Pauly married the daughter of a cattle dealer from Wesselburen in 1930 and became the father of five children. His wife died in August 1944.

Pauly became end of 1928 member of the SA and NSDAP (membership number 106.204)  and changed from the SA in early May 1930 to the SS (SS No. 5448). In the eyes of the National Socialists, he was considered an “old fighter” “Old Guard” or.”Alter Kämpfer”.  Even before the “seizure of power” of the National Socialists Pauly was appointed on 27-01-1932 SS Storm Leader.   He was head of Sturmbann I / 53 in Rendsburg. As a result of right-wing motivated attacks he was arrested several times and had due to serious breach of the peace in 1932 a seven-month prison sentence. The background was his involvement in the destruction of an SPD campaign car. On 12-06-1933, he rose to SS-Hauptsturmführer;  his appointment as SS Sturmbannführer  Pauly received on 20-06-1934..

From the spring of 1936, Max Pauly was led in the Schutzstaffel as a full-time SS leader and graduated from the police and at the SS Unterführerschule Dachau he followed a course. He then led the II SS Sturmbann of the 53rd SS-Standarte in Rendsburg. On 01-02-1937 Max Pauly took over the command of the 71st SS-Standarte in the district of Danzig-Praust by his predecessor Manfred Körnich. The command of this standard he should hold until the end of the war. On 09-11-1937 Pauly was appointed SS-Obersturmbannführer.  After completing the 14th course at the SS leader school in Dachau, Pauly  was assigned to the newly founded SS-Wachurmbann Eimann in the summer of 1939, where he served as chief of staff. The SS-Wachurmbann Eimann was a special SS unit, which existed from summer to fall 1939 on the territory of the Free City of Gdansk and then merged into the skull and crossbones.  Other names for this SS unit are SS-Sturmbann Eimann and SS-Sondersturmbann “E”. A little later, he took over the organizational control of all incurred in the Polish corridor “internment camp.” He was co-responsible for the murder of 1400 mentally ill and took over in October 1939, the acting head of the “SS Special Stutthof camp”  and other detention sites.

On 20-02-1942, Max Pauly also officially took command of the Stutthof concentration camp and was thus assigned to the notorious SS Totenkopfverband.  With this allocation he was taken over as SS-Sturmbannführer the reserve with effect from 30 January 1942 also in the Waffen-SS. 

In early September 1942, he joined the Neuengamme concentration camp as a commander, which he led until the beginning of May 1945. In this time, numerous war crimes, such as the murder of the children of Bullenhuser dam   and the execution of 58 men and 13 women from the concentration camp Fuhlsbüttel. On the night of 20-04-1945, 20 Jewish children who had been used in medical experiments at Neuengamme, their four adult Jewish caretakers and six Red Army prisoners of war (POWs) were murdered in the basement of the school. Sergio de Simone (born. 29-11-1937 died. 20-04-1945) 7 years old Jewish Italian boy, was one of the killed at the Bullenhauser Damm School 

The seniority list of the Waffen SS with the state of affairs of 01-01-1944 noted under the serial number 2871 for Pauly promotion on 09-11-1944. There, however, was not discussed to which rank Pauly was promoted in the Waffen-SS, especially since this DAL still leads him as Sturmbannführer, although he had already reached the rank of SS Obersturmbannfuhrer  in the General SS. His promotion to the SS standard leader in the General SS Pauly received on 01-03-1945; this may have been one of the rare direct promotions, as otherwise only on “historic days of the Nazi movement” (January 30, April 20 and November 9) was promoted.

Death and burial ground of Pauly, Max Johan Friedrich.

On 30-04-1945 Pauly sat down in Flensburg and was arrested the following autumn in his hometown, where he lived with his sister-in-law and his children.  Together with thirteen other responsible for the Neuengamme concentration camp, Pauly, known for his cruelty in the Neuengamme concentration camp, was brought before a British military court in the Neuengamme trial in Hamburg, with no 1.  Pauly was u. a. the poor supply situation of inmates and murder actions accused. The Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte,

   who led the negotiations with Max Pauly on the evacuation of Scandinavian prisoners by the Swedish Red Cross:* “He was indeed reputed to be one of the worst representatives of his ‘profession’. With ten other defendants Max Pauly was sentenced to death on May 03-05-1946 and hanged on 08-10-1946 in the prison Hameln, by by the English executioner, Albert Pierrepoint. Albert died at his daughter’s home in Bradford on 11-02-1954, aged 83.

Max Pauly’s body, as well as the others who were executed that day, were buried in the prison courtyard until 1954 when they were moved to the Am Wehl Cemetery nearby in 1986 and is now a grass field.

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