Hanns and Rudolf

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Hanns
and Rudolf
The German Jew and the Hunt for the Kommandant of Auschwitz

Welcome to hannsandrudolf.com, a digital collection of artefacts recounting the extraordinary true story of Hanns Alexander, the German Jewish investigator who pursued and captured Rudolf Höss, one of Nazi Germany’s most notorious war criminals. Featuring a wide range of exclusive material, including maps, audio and video files, and many previously unseen images, the website expands and augments the physical text in a unique and compelling way.

To use this site, simply click anywhere on the screen and drag. To view an image, click on it and when the ‘i’ appears, click on this to read more.
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Characters
  • All
  • Alfred Alexander
  • Anita Lasker
  • Ann
  • Bella
  • Cacilie
  • Elsie
  • Hanns
  • Hedwig
  • Henny
  • Kramer
  • Paul
  • Richard Glucks
  • Rudolf
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Hanns
and Rudolf
The German Jew and the Hunt for the Kommandant of Auschwitz

Clearing Belsen Concentration Camp

April/May 1945

​Clearing bodies at Belsen concentration camp. Hanns' experiences at Belsen were to change him forever.

AKG

Clearing Belsen Concentration Camp
April/May 1945
Lieutenant Hanns Alexander arrived at the Bruxelles-Nord station on 8 May 1945, and made his way to Belsen, where he was tasked with interrogating the SS officers arrested at the camp. It was early evening on 12 May 1945 when he arrived at the barbed-wire gates of Belsen. Inside the camp, corpses lay piled on top of each other. Bulldozers had begun the work of disposing of the bodies, pushing the dead into mass graves. The living prisoners were so thin that their ribs poked through their skin. Mothers clutched dead children; shaven-headed survivors in black-and-white-striped uniforms stared vacantly by decrepit wooden barracks; painted signs warning of typhus epidemics were every­where. There was no water, no food, inadequate medical supplies and little shelter. Hanns' experiences at Belsen were to change him forever: 'There were dead bodies walking about, dead bodies lying about, people who thought they were alive and they weren't. It was a terrible sight.'
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