Maria Mandl

Maria Mandl, born on January tenth, nineteen twelve, in Münzkirchen, Austria-Hungary, emerged from a financially stable Catholic family with ties to the Christian Social Party. Following the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in nineteen thirty-eight, she relocated to Munich, where she began her career as an Aufseherin at the Lichtenburg concentration camp. Her tenure there was marked by brutality, as she subjected prisoners to severe beatings and floggings.

In nineteen thirty-nine, Mandl was transferred to Ravensbrück, where she quickly ascended to the role of Oberaufseherin. In this capacity, she oversaw the training of prospective Aufseherinnen and collaborated with Dorothea Binz in the camp's punishment block. Her final promotion came in nineteen forty-two when she was appointed Schutzhaftlagerführerin at Auschwitz II-Birkenau, under the command of Rudolf Höss.

As the Red Army approached the Auschwitz complex in late nineteen forty-four, Mandl was moved to the Mettenheim camp. In May nineteen forty-five, amidst the chaos of the United States Air Force's invasion, she fled with her lover, Kommandant Walter Adolf Langleist, and a Jewish prisoner named Mose. After evading capture for three months, they were apprehended by American military police in August nineteen forty-five.

Mandl faced trial for her crimes against humanity at the Auschwitz trial in Kraków in December nineteen forty-seven. It is estimated that she was complicit in the deaths of approximately five hundred thousand prisoners during her time at Birkenau, based on the death lists she signed. Ultimately, she was executed by hanging in January nineteen forty-eight at the age of thirty-six, leaving behind the haunting last words, 'Polska żyje' ('Poland lives').