DS008 Karl Schirdewan

This interview is about Karl Schirdewan. Karl was born in 1907 in Stettin, Germany and was a German Communist activist, remaining active in the illegal Communist Party after the Nazis came to power in 1933. He was arrested in 1934, sentenced to prison for so-called "conspiracy of high treason," and later placed in protective custody. He spent most of the Nazi era imprisoned in concentration camps, including Sachsenhausen and Flossenbürg, until he was liberated by U.S. forces in April 1945 during a forced march. Karl died July 14, 1998 in Potsdam Germany at the age of 91.