Adolf Theuer
Adolf Theuer (sometimes given as Teuer) (20 September 1920 in Henneberg-Bolatitz – 23 April 1947 in Opava) was an SS-"Unterscharführer" at Auschwitz concentration camp. He was executed after the war as a war criminal. Life. Previously a bricklayer by trade, Theuer's SS career began when he was deployed to Auschwitz in 1940 at the rank of SS-"Rottenführer". On 1 August 1941 he was promoted to SS-"Unterscharführer". He served as an SDG or "Sanitätsdienstgefreiter"; a medical orderly as part of the Sanitätswesen, one of the five concentration camp departments involved in running such a facility. He was also  a member of the "Desinfektionskommando" (disinfection squad), the unit of SS medics involved in the mass gassing of prisoners. One of Theuer's responsibilities was inserting the Zyklon B into the gas chamber, a task shared by other SS orderlies such as SS-"Unterscharführer" Hans Koch and SS-"Oberscharführer" Josef Klehr. During the Frankfurt Auschwitz Trials, Klehr, the chief of the "Desinfektionskommando", testified that Theuer explained to him that he would insert the gas when ordered to do so by the accompanying SS doctor. SS-"Unterscharführer" Oswald Kaduk recalled an incident when Theuer, his fellow countryman, was reluctant to insert the gas. Kaduk  stated that: Theuer remained at the camp until its evacuation in January 1945, when he was subsequently deployed in Ohrdruf concentration camp, a subcamp of Buchenwald concentration camp. Post-war. Although Theuer did not torture prisoners, he was still known in the camp as a butcher. After the war he was put on trial along with SS overseer Sophie Hanel in Prague; both were sentenced to death. Theuer was hanged in Opava (Czechoslovakia) on 23 April 1947.