Interesting Insight about Fredrich Jecklen

Some of the men who were involved in the Holocaust are well-known. Others aren’t as popular, but were still an integral part of the entire event. Fredrich Jecklen is of the latter group, and is an important person to know about. He was an SS-Obergruppenfuhrer, or a Senior Group Leader, the highest ranking Nazi official second only to the Reichsfuhrer. That position was held by Heinrich Himmler. Jecklen was an SS General that oversaw the largest group of Einsatzgruppen, or task force, in the Nazi regime. He also holds personal responsibility for more than 100,000 deaths in the Holocaust, carried out on his orders.
 
Fredrich Jecklen was born in Baden in 1895. He began serving the military in World War I, fighting for Germany. He was then discharged and became an engineer for a short time. In 1929, Jecklen joined the Nazi Party and became an SS member in the following year. In just a year or two, he had been promoted many times and by 1936, he had risen to the rank of SS-Obergruppenfuhrer, where he remained for the rest of his service as a part of the Nazi party.
 
Jecklen is best known for creating his own method for killing a large number of people at once. His method involved removing people from the Riga Ghetto, separating them based on who was to be eliminated, and then grouped into sections of 500-1000 people and driven to the killing camps. There were pits waiting when victims arrived. They were stripped of clothing and valuables and led into the pits. Then, they were required to lay down, and they were shot in the back of the head. Victims were only shot once, and those who didn’t die from the shot were buried alive once the killing was done.
 
Jecklen was even awarded for his service to the Nazi party and recognized for his sheer lack of concern and killing power. At the end of World War II, Jecklen was captured by the Soviets and taken to trial as a war criminal. He was tried with the others from the Riga district. All the men, including Fredrich Jecklen, were found guilty and sentenced to death. They were all hanged on February 3, 1946 at Riga. This man was responsible for perpetuating the Nazi killing machine, and is an important name to remember in regard to the Holocaust. People like Jecklen are the reason so many Jews died at the hands of the Nazis in the first place.