T4

Aktion T4

Aktion T4 was the Mass Murder of the Mentally and Physically Disabled in Nazi Germany and across Nazi-Occupied Europe (from September 1939 until May 1945.

T4 is an abbreviation of the Street Address (Tiergartenstraße 4 in Berlin, Germany) where the Program was run from.

300,000 Men, Women and Children were murdered in Hospitals across Nazi Germany, Austria, German-Occupied Poland and German-Occupied Czechoslovakia.

200,000 were murdered in Germany (and Austria) alone and 100,000 in German-Occupied Poland and German-Occupied Czechoslovakia.

The Disabled were also killed in every Country in German-Occupied Europe, but not under T4 and most of the Disabled Men, Women and Children were deported from their Home Country to the Deaths Camps where they were murdered.

The Numbers of those Disabled killed are unknown because the Germans didn’t register those selected to go from the Cattle Cars right into the Gas Chambers.

T4 started In July 1933 with the "Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring" (German: Gesetz zur Verhütung erbkranken Nachwuchses) ordered Forced Sterilization for People with conditions thought to be Hereditary, such as Schizophrenia, Epilepsy, Huntington's Chorea and "Imbecility.”

The Germans first murdered Disabled Children in what they called a “Mercy Death” (German: Gnadentod) and then moved on to the murder of Disabled Adults.

When the Germans started murdering Disabled Adults any Disability (Hereditary or not) was grounds for killing the Person (Blindness, Deafness, Down Syndrome, Amputations (including World War 1 Veterans), etc.

The German Interior Ministry used Special Hereditary Health Courts (German: Erbgesundheitsgerichte), which examined the Inmates of Nursing Homes, Asylums, Prisons, Aged-Care Homes and Special Schools, to select those to be sterilized.

380,000 Men, Women and Children were Forcibly Sterilized between 1933-1945.

On December 2, 1940 the Catholic Church in the Vatican declared that T4 was contrary to Divine Law and that "the direct killing of an innocent Person because of Mental or physical defects is not allowed".

It was the first time the Catholic Church openly opposed Mass Murder by the Nazis.

In the Summer of 1941 Mass Protests were held across Nazi Germany calling for an end to T4.

It was one of the few times the German People actually stood-up against Hitler and his Policies.

Officially, T4 was ended in August 1941, but Unofficially it continued until Germany was defeated in May 1945.

There were 6 “Euthanasia Centers” in Germany and Austria (Grafeneck, Brandenburg, Bernburg, Hartheim, Sonnenstein and Hadamar) and 13 in German-Occupied Poland.

Disabled Children and Adults were murdered in various ways.

Many were starved to death, some were gassed in Gas Vans and many were given Lethal Injections.

The Germans later used the same methods and the same People to murder other Groups (the Jews, Slavs, Homosexuals, Roma and Sinti, etc.) in Concentration and Deaths Camps.

After Germany’s Defeat in 1945 The Euthanasia Trials (German: Euthanasie-Prozesse) took place to try those responsible for T4.

The Americans and Soviets (and later the West Germans and the East Germans) tried many of the Doctors, Nurses and other helpers involved in Aktion T4.

Several of the Doctors committed Suicide either right when Germany was Defeated in 1945 or shortly before their Trials began.

Philipp Bouhler the Reichsleiter (National Leader) and Chief of the Chancellery of the Führer of the NSDAP. He was also the SS official responsible for the Aktion T4 committed Suicide in May 1945 after being captured by the Americans.

As with most things dealing with Mass Murder in Nazi Germany the West Germans gave light sentences to many of the Doctors and Nurses involved.

In November 2010 the German Society of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Neurology (German: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Psychiatrie und Psychotherapie, Psychosomatik und Nervenheilkunde) apologized for their role in T4.

In 2014, Germany opened The Memorial to the People with Disabilities Murdered by the Nazis on the site of Aktion T4 wartime Headquarters in Berlin.

Hadamar Killing Center in Hadamar, Hessen, Germany  where 15,000 Disabled Men, Women and Children were murdered under T4 continues to be a Hospital (there is a Memorial at the Gas Chamber and Crematorium.)