Claus Göttsche, 1899-1945 "Jew Specialist" of the Hamburg Gestapo until 1943 Hamburg's Organiser of the "Final Solution" © Bundesarchiv From 1941 to 1943, Claus Göttsche, the head of the Hamburg Gestapo's "Jewish Department", organized the deportation of Hamburg's Jewish residents. He selected the victims, confiscated their possessions, and signed their deportation orders. Because of the immense power that made him the master of life and death, as well as the brutal harshness of his actions, the name "Herr Göttsche" became a byword in the Jewish community for mercilessness and deadly arbitrariness. Claus Götttsche was born on 27 May 1899 in Aasbüttel, Rendsburg rural district, as the son of a master shoemaker and the daughter of a small farmer. He attended the local village school from 1905 to 1914, and then worked in agriculture. Göttsche was drafted into military service in 1917, was wounded on the western front in 1918, and released from the army in 1919, with the rank of Private. In Aasbüttel, he returned to agricultural work. In 1921, the Hamburg police authority accepted him on a twelve-year contract as Hilfswachmeister, within the newly established Ordnungspolizei (Order Police). These new police formations were very much inspired by the military standpoint of their spiritual father, General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, and recruited primarily ex-soldiers lacking any sense of democracy. Promoted to Hauptwachmeister in 1930, Göttsche became qualified for a career in the higher senior service. In 1932, he switched from the Order Police to the Political Police. Back then, this "state police" was under the Criminal Police. In 1936 it was renamed the Geheime Staatspolizei ("Ge-sta-po). After the National Socialists assumed power Göttsche remained in the state police. On 1 April 1933, he was appointed administrative secretary, and in May 1933 he joined the Nazi Party. According to witnesses, he began as part of the "Kraus Special Commando", a police unit that persecuted communists using barbaric methods. After the assets of Hamburg's Social Democratic Party were confiscated on 10 May 1933, he worked on the seizure of the forbidden party's bank accounts and moveable goods. Beginning in 1935, Göttsche belonged to the Gestapo unit for "Jewish matters, church affairs, Freemasonry and sects". After becoming a "Jew specialist", Göttsche worked on the ruthless implementation of the Reich leadership's terror decrees against the Jews. The Gestapo became the "supervising authority" over the closely monitored Jewish community, whose representatives were directly subject to Göttsche's commands. He fed them deceptions and lies whenever it seemed useful. As was done elsewhere, he disguised the deportations as "resettlements", so that the transports took place "without a hitch." In his dealings with the Jewish community leadership, he appeared willing to allow occasional exceptions; this is how he secured their willingness to keep fulfilling their functions. In 1943, when only a few hundred Jews still remained in Hamburg, Göttsche's assignment was considered complete, and he went from the "Jewish Department" to the Gestapo's intelligence unit. As a "Jew specialist" in the Hamburg Gestapo, Claus Göttsche worked with public bodies, the justice authorities and businesses, which made his murderous activities widely known. Although the Gestapo completely destroyed their files shortly before the end of the war, the records of those who received Göttsche's correspondence still contained extensive evidence of his activities. These indicate the image of an inhuman bureaucrat who performed his work with extreme meticulousness. As far as is known, Göttsche himself did not use physical force but did not act against assaults committed by his subordinates. In the final weeks of the National Socialist regime, Göttsche made provisions for the future. He acquired false identity papers under the name of Claus Clausen, as well as a cyanide capsule. On 25 April 1945, he had 47,927 Reichmarks transferred from the Gestapo's Deutsch Bank account to his personal account; five days later, another 189,231.17 Reichmarks. This Deutsch Bank account held the Gestapo's profits earned by auctioning off the possessions of deported Jews. Göttsche chose an apartment in Hamburg-Volksdorf as his hiding place. On 6 May 1945, Hamburg's police stations received an order for the immediate arrest of all Gestapo members. Claus Göttsche was at first listed as "absent from the scene," but was then arrested by British soldiers at his Volksdorf hideout on 12 May 1945. At the moment of capture, Claus Göttsche bit into his cyanide capsule, thus escaping his responsibility for exterminating Hamburg's Jews and Jewish life.