Forgotten Horrors
The Nazi sub-camp system
Heidenheim
Heidenheim was the former site of the Police School Heidenheim, which in 1941-2 was already holding prisoners from Dachau. In mid-December 1944, prisoners from Natzweiler Strutthof camp were taken there. By that time the Police School itself had already left the building because of the approaching allies, so the SS Signal Intelligence Female Assistants School occupied the empty rooms instead, along with 20 prisoners assigned to the camp.
The prisoners were kept busy hauling boxes around, felling trees in the nearby forests for firewood (due to the coal shortage), cleaning, clearing snow, etc.
Seven of the eight German prisoners were considered as 'criminals', with the eighth being a Communist. Other prisoners of other nationalities consisted of seven men from Luxembourg, three Polish, one Frenchman and one Russian. One of the Luxembourg prisoners was transferred to Leonberg subcamp on December 31st 1944 while two of the Germans escaped on February 25th 1945 by cutting through the fence at night, with the help of the SS guard, who intentionally le t them go. As a result, there were no deaths in Heidenheim.
The commandant of the camp was SS Oberscharfuhrer, later Hauptscharfuhrer Hermann Stiefel, who was relatively old, small and fat. The prisoners didn't have any trouble from him or the guards, possibly because the end of the war was approaching but also because they wanted to keep the labour unit together in order to avoid being sent to the rapidly approaching eastern front. The Female Assistants School, along with the prisoners, was evacuated on April 5th 1945. Stiefel himself was arrested by the Americans on May 1st 1945 as he tried to return home.
After the war, the building was taken over by the Americans as a displaced persons (DP) camp.