Secret State Police (Gestapo)

The Secret State Police pursued people who were regarded as opponents of the regime by the Nazi system for political, ideological or racist reasons. An important instrument for this was so-called ‘protective custody’ – a power instrument that was not subject to control by a judge. In Bavaria, this police organization operated until the “centralization” in October 1936 under the name “Bavarian Political Police,” which emerged in March 1933 from the political department (Department VI) of the Munich Police District. Its first director was Reinhard Heydrich. The personnel consisted of bureaucrats who had been taken over from the rest of the police, reinforced with SS members who had been named “political auxiliary police”. In contrast to the way it was perceived at the time, the Gestapo was not an “all-powerful agency”. Due to its relatively small apparatus, which included about 300 employees starting in Munich in 1935-36 (including an estimated 30 women), it was always dependent on tips from the population and the cooperation of other offices, especially other parts of the Munich police.

The Gestapo pursued its opponents with extreme brutality. They were humiliated, tortured, killed, or driven to commit suicide. The Gestapo was the driving force for the pursuit and deportation of the Munich Jews. In the war, it was responsible for monitoring foreign forced laborers, who were sent to concentration camps or penal camps for the slightest reasons. Special commandos of the Munich Gestapo killed hundreds of Soviet POWs in the Dachau Concentration Camp. During the war, agents of the Munich Gestapo also spread fear and horror in the occupied territories.

After 1945, most agents of the Munich Gestapo were imprisoned; some succeeded in fleeing to foreign countries, others went underground with fake names. Only a few had to answer for the crimes they had committed. Some also succeeded in returning to police service.