The Nazi Camp Commandants
Inside Dachau’s Brutality: Crimes of Nazi Commandant Alexander Piorkowski
15m
At Dachau concentration camp, brutality was not random—it was enforced.
Alexander Piorkowski served as Nazi commandant from 1940 to 1942, overseeing a system built on violence, punishment, and death. Soviet prisoners of war were secretly executed and erased from records, while the sick and weak were selected for transports that meant certain death. Floggings, torture, and inhumane punishments became routine under his authority.
Medical experiments were carried out with his approval, as SS doctors used prisoners as test subjects in deadly procedures. Thousands suffered, and many never survived.
When Dachau was liberated in April 1945, Piorkowski was no longer in command—but the system of suffering he helped shape remained.
After the war, he was brought to trial and ultimately paid for his crimes.
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