English source-aligned edition
Wilhelm Schäfer
Wilhelm Schäfer served as SS-Hauptscharführer and member of Kommando 99 at Buchenwald. The profile reconstructs the person’s function in Buchenwald through documented office, decisions, supervision or operational conduct. It does not assign every crime committed by an institution or region to one individual.
Confirmed findings
- Wilhelm Schäfer was born in Obhausen on 20 October 1911 and died in Leipzig on 16 June 1961. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
- At Buchenwald he belonged to Kommando 99, whose members carried out mass shootings of Soviet prisoners of war in the neck-shot facility. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
- The Supreme Court of the GDR attributed violence at Lichtenburg and Buchenwald, participation in the shooting of between 700 and 1000 prisoners, and acts during anti-partisan operations in Estonia to him; on 20 May 1961 it sentenced him to death. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
Place in the chain of responsibility
Schäfer’s responsibility rests on his documented membership in a specialised execution unit and on judicial findings about specific forms of violence, not merely on SS membership. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
Key events and mechanisms
- In 1941–1942 he participated as a Kommando 99 member in executions of Soviet prisoners at Buchenwald. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
- He was sentenced to death on 20 May 1961 and the sentence was carried out on 16 June 1961. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
The circle records authority, function and agency. Several profiles may describe different parts of the same persecution chain, so profile-level totals must not be added together.
Postwar accountability
After a former Buchenwald prisoner recognised him, the Supreme Court of the GDR tried and sentenced him to death; he was executed in Leipzig on 16 June 1961. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
Limits of the evidence
The range from 700 to 1000 describes executions in which the court found that he participated, not a number killed by him alone. No portrait with clearly documented publication rights was found. (Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record; Source: cited institutional or judicial record)
Sources
The source set combines institutional, archival, trial or scholarly material from at least two independent publishers.