Le docteur Friedrich Mennecke, expert 14f13. Biographie, correspondance

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In his correspondence, Dr. Friedrich Mennecke, T4 and later 14f13 expert, sheds light on the private lives of the SS doctors who perpetrated the crimes as well as the psychological and working conditions that they worked under. In the letters Mennecke sent on an almost daily basis to his wife, Eva, who had full knowledge of his work, he shows no compassion for the victims he condemns to the gas chamber. On the contrary, he writes from the perspective of a civil servant away on a post, concerned about his living conditions and anxious to see his beloved wife again. He shares the details of his everyday life with her – the joy of eating a good meal and getting a long, peaceful night’s rest, rest that he “deserves” after a day of hard work. He tells her that he is proud to be the best and most efficient worker among his colleagues, a fact which he, a man obsessed with his career, thinks should lead his superiors to heap praise on him. The majority of Mennecke’s letters have been preserved. They were presented for the first time in Nuremburg at the Doctors Trial (1946-1947).