Irma Grese

Irma Grese was a German SS guard at Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. Convicted of war crimes at the Belsen trial, she was executed in 1945.

Auschwitz concentration camp: A Nazi concentration and extermination camp complex in occupied Poland, where more than one million people were murdered. Grese served as a guard at Auschwitz before being transferred to Bergen-Belsen.
Schutzstaffel: A Nazi paramilitary organization that controlled the concentration camp system and carried out state terror and genocide. Grese served within the SS system that administered the camps.
Josef Kramer: An SS officer who commanded Bergen-Belsen and previously served as commandant at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Kramer and Grese were defendants together at the Belsen trial.
War crimes: Serious violations of the laws and customs of war that incur individual criminal responsibility. Grese’s conviction treated her conduct as criminal responsibility, not merely service in a camp.
Bergen-Belsen concentration camp: A Nazi concentration camp in Germany, where tens of thousands of prisoners died from starvation, disease, and abuse. Grese was a guard there when British forces liberated the camp in April 1945.
SS female auxiliaries: Women employed by the SS as guards and support staff in Nazi concentration camps. Grese belonged to the female guard workforce that staffed camps including Auschwitz.
Elisabeth Volkenrath: An SS guard who served at Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen and was executed after the Belsen trial. Volkenrath was a fellow defendant and camp guard in Grese’s trial.
Nuremberg trials: A set of postwar trials prosecuting Nazi leaders and organizations for crimes committed during World War II. The Belsen trial formed part of the broader postwar effort to prosecute Nazi crimes.
Belsen trial: A British military trial in 1945 that prosecuted former SS personnel for crimes at Bergen-Belsen and Auschwitz. This trial convicted Grese and sentenced her to death.
Nazi concentration camps: A network of camps established by Nazi Germany for imprisonment, forced labor, persecution, and mass murder. Grese’s career unfolded within this system of imprisonment and violence.

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