20th September 1938
Deforth & Scheuerbrand

The case of Otto Scheuerbrand and the involvement of Dr. Deforth

In a message from the command of the Mauthausen concentration camp on 20th May 1944, the Scheuerbrand family received the news that their son Otto Scheuerbrand, born on June 8, 1917, had 'died of general physical deterioration in the local hospital.' The family can request the death certificate by sending the fee of Reichsmark 0.72 to the Mauthausen II registry office. His parents are Otto Johann Scheuerbrand and Philippine, née Stohner. Otto Scheuerbrand died at the age of 27.

After the end of the war, the father submitted an application to the mayor of Ludwigshafen on 9th April 1946 and wanted to have his son recognised as a victim of fascism. The assessment and response of the criminal police on 7th May 1946 is very clear at this point: 'Scheuerbrand has to attribute it to his criminal misconduct that he was sent to a concentration camp. Scheuerbrand should not be viewed as a victim of fascism in the sense of the guidelines of the regional council.'

Between October 1935 and June 1941, Otto Scheuerbrand came to the attention of the police and received previous convictions for begging, indecent acts and fornication with men. At the same time, from 1st September 1935, a tightening of the penal provisions for Section 175 RStGB (homosexual paragraph in the Reich Criminal Code) came into force. From now on, the term 'fornication' leads to a considerable expansion of the criminal offence. Criminal judges are also given scope to make discretionary decisions, which can be based on 'common sense of the people'. From this point onwards, there has been a huge increase in final convictions under Section 175.

From 1942 onwards, Otto Scheuerbrand experienced a cruel odyssey through the Dachau, Flossenbürg and Mauthausen concentration camps. This was preceded by a conviction on 27th June 1941, in which he was sentenced to one year in prison by the Mannheim district court for causing sexual offence. After serving his sentence, Scheuerbrand was initially sent to the Dachau concentration camp for 'endangering public morals'. On 4th June 1943, his father wrote a courageous and help-seeking letter to the camp management and asked that his son be released and sent back home because he urgently needed their help to support his parents and his four sisters. He points out that he not only served his one-year sentence, but also spent another year in the camp and that atonement should have been made.

What this file does not tell us is the fact that Otto Scheuerbrand was made sterile in the Ludwigshafen Municipal Hospital when he was just 17 years old. On 23rd May 1934, the city and school doctor Dr. Werner made a report, as a result of which Dr. Roeder has applied for infertility. The basis for this decision is the 'Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring', which took the entire family into account. Otto Scheuerbrand is spared nothing: he then has to undergo an intelligence test and face a non-public session of the hereditary health court at the Frankenthal district court. After secret consultations with the District Court Councilor Gerle, the district doctor Dr. Weiss and the specialist in nervous diseases Dr. Deforth, as assessor, Scheuerbrand is ordered to be sterilised, for which the state treasury bears the costs. There was an objection from the father for this meeting on 14th July 1934, which he withdrew on 19th October 1934. It remains to be assumed that this was not entirely voluntary.

Two years after the news of his son's death, the father Otto Johann Scheuerbrand received a negative response to his request for recognition as a victim of fascism from the care center for victims of fascism - which was to be expected based on internal considerations. The justification emphasises that only those people who were imprisoned because of their political or religious views or for racial reasons would be compensated.

Source: Monika Kleinschnitger writing for 'Ludwigshafen sets stumbling blocks eV'.

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