Helmut Poppendick

File:SS-Oberführer Dr. med. Helmut Poppendick, Leitender Arzt im SS-Rasse- und Siedlungs-Hauptamt, Chef des persönlichen Stabes des Reichsarztes SS und Polizei, as a defendant in the Doctors Trial.png

SS-Oberführer Dr. med. Helmut Poppendick, Leitender Arzt im SS-Rasse- und Siedlungs-Hauptamt, Chef des persönlichen Stabes des Reichsarztes SS und Polizei), as a defendant in the "Doctors Trial".

Helmut Poppendick (b. 6 January 1902 in Hude, Grand Duchy of Oldenburg, German Empire; d. 11 January 1994 in Oldenburg, Lower Saxony, Germany) was a German physician and SS officer. For his service as a medical doctor of the File:SS rune.png he became a defendant in the Doctors Trial. He was alleged to have been involved in experiments on camp prisoners, but was acquitted on this charge, nevertheless sentenced 10 years imprisonment for "membership in a criminal organization", the SS.

Life

Poppendick studied medicine from 1919 to 1926 in Gottingen, Munich, and Berlin, following the teachings of Prof. Dr. med. Fritz Gottlieb Karl Lenz and Prof. Dr. med. Eugen Fischer. Poppendick received his medical license on 1 February 1928. Then, he worked for four years as a clinical assistant at the First Medical Clinic of Charité in Berlin. In 1932, he became a member of the NSDAP (NSDAP-Nr.: 998,607) and the Allgemeine SS (SS-Nr.: 36,345). From June 1933 to October 1934 he was the assistant medical director at Virchow Hospital in Berlin.

In 1935, he completed training as an expert for raciel hygiene at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Genetics and Eugenics. After this, he became the adjutant of the ministerial director SS-Brigadeführer Dr. med. Arthur Julius Gutt at the Reich Ministry of the Interior. He was also the chief of staff at the SS Office for Population Politics and Genetic Health Care, which in 1937 became the SS Main Race and Settlement Office (SS-RuSHA). Poppendick was departmental head and staff leader of the Genealogical Office.

At the beginning of the World War II, he was drafted as an adjutant to a medical department of the army and took part in the attack on Belgium, France and the Netherlands. In November 1941, Poppendick was accepted into the Waffen SS. In 1943, Reichsarzt SS und Polizei (Reich Physician SS and Police) Ernst Robert Grawitz appointed him to lead his personal staff.

He was sentenced to ten years imprisonment by the American Military Tribunal No. I on 20 August 1947. He was released from the prison on 31 January 1951. He then worked as an internist in Oldenburg, from 1957 on with health insurance approval (Kassenzulassung).

See also

• Holohoax camp experiments on prisoners