Oskar Gröning

Who is Oskar Gröning?

Oskar Gröning is a German former SS-Rottenführer who was stationed at Auschwitz concentration camp.

Gröning was born in Lower Saxony. After his mother died when he was four, he received a strict upbringing from his father, a skilled textile worker. During his childhood, he joined various nationalist youth groups, including the Hitler Youth when the Nazis came to power in 1933, convinced that Nazism was advantageous to Germany. After school, Gröning got a job as a trainee bank clerk, but inspired by Germany's military victories in France and Poland, subsequently joined the Waffen-SS. His role in salary administration suited his aspirations, but in 1942 the SS ordered that desk jobs should be reserved for injured veterans, and that fit members in administrative roles were to be subjected to more challenging duties.

This resulted in the culmination of Gröning's SS career: his deployment at Auschwitz. His responsibilities included counting and sorting the money stolen from exterminated prisoners, and guarding other prisoner belongings in the camp before they were plundered. While at the camp, he witnessed the entire killing process. After being transferred from Auschwitz to an active unit in 1944, Gröning was captured by the British on 10 June 1945 when his unit surrendered. After being temporarily held in a former concentration camp he was transferred to England in 1946, working as a forced labourer. He returned to Germany to lead a relatively normal life, preferring not to discuss his association with Auschwitz. However, he decided to make it public after learning about Holocaust denial, and has since openly criticised those who deny the events that he witnessed, and the ideology he once subscribed to.