organizer. In 1935, Gerstein was arrested, held for several weeks,
and expelled from the party. Uncertain about the future, he began the
study of medicine in 1937. A brief concentration camp confinement
took place the following year.
In August 1941, wanting to learn more about the Nazi euthanasia
program, he joined the Waffen-SS. With his background in engineer-
ing and medicine, he soon headed the technical health services divi-
sion, where his duties included supervision of the disinfection process
involving highly poisonous gases such as Zyklon B. In August 1942,
inspecting the Belzec death camp in occupied Poland, he learned
of the mass extermination under way. Despite orders to maintain
silence on penalty of execution, Gerstein informed hundreds about
these crimes, among them the secretary of the Swedish legation, the
papal nuncio in Berlin, the Protestant bishop of Berlin, and friends in
the Dutch underground who then notified British officials. No one,
however, saw fit to take any action. Nevertheless, Gerstein continued
in his position, trying to thwart operations whenever possible.
In April 1945, Gerstein surrendered to the French military authori-
ties in Rottweil (Baden-Württemberg), declaring his willingness to
serve as a witness in the prosecution of top Nazis, but his claims
about his own subversive role were rejected. Charged with murder
and sent to Cherche-Midi Prison in Paris, Gerstein committed suicide
on 25 July, apparently overwhelmed by his double life as a resister
and a loyal SS officer. While in French custody, he wrote several
reports (in French and German) with exceptionally detailed descrip-
tions of the gassing of Jews at Belzec. They were later entered as
evidence before the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg
and at the Jerusalem trial of Adolf Eichmann.GERSTENMAIER, EUGEN (1906–1986). A member of the anti-
Nazi resistance and the object of a disinformation campaign by the
Hauptverwaltung Aufklärung (HVA), Eugen Gerstenmaier was
born in Kirchheim unter Teck (Baden-Württemberg) on 25 August
- Trained as a Protestant theologian, he opposed the Nazi re-
gime from the outset and was briefly held by the Gestapo. He later
traveled abroad on behalf of the resistance and became a member of
the Kreisau Circle at the invitation of Helmuth James Count von
Moltke. Gerstenmaier took part in the failed 20 July 1944 conspiracy
134 • GERSTENMAIER, EUGEN