Josef Mengele

Josef Mengele was a German SS officer and physician who served at Auschwitz during the Holocaust.

Josef Mengele was a German SS officer and physician who served at Auschwitz during the Holocaust. He became notorious for selecting prisoners for the gas chambers and for conducting cruel pseudo-medical experiments, especially on twins. After World War II, he evaded capture for the rest of his life and died in Brazil in 1979 without being brought to trial.

Early life and education

Josef Mengele was born in 1911 in Germany and trained as a physician. He later became associated with Nazi racial ideology and worked in academic settings before joining the SS medical system.

Auschwitz service

Mengele served as a camp physician at Auschwitz-Birkenau during the Holocaust. In that role, he helped determine which prisoners were selected for forced labour and which were sent to immediate death.

Medical experiments

Mengele became infamous for pseudo-scientific experiments on inmates, especially twins and other vulnerable prisoners. These experiments were cruel, harmful, and not medically legitimate.

Flight and postwar evasion

As the Red Army approached Auschwitz in 1945, Mengele fled and later escaped Allied capture. He lived in hiding in South America for decades and died in Brazil in 1979.