Handloser, Siegfried.

Born 25.3.1895 in Constance, died 3.7.1954 in Munich. Doctor, Prof. Dr. med., Lieutenant General of the German Armed Forces Medical Services, Chief of the German Armed Forces Medical Services. One of the accused in the Medical Trial. Handloser completed his school-leaving examinations in 1904 and entered the Kaiser Wilhelm Academy for military medical training in Berlin, where he passed his board certification examinations in 1910. He then did an internship. One year later, Handloser finished his medical doctorate in Strasbourg on the topic of specific treatment of Typhus Abdominalis. From the beginning of his academic career to the end of the Second World War, he was a member of the German Army Medical Service. In June, 1912, Handloser was promoted to the position of First Lieutenant. During the First World War, he worked behind both east and west fronts as a military physician. After the end of the war, he was transferred to the University of Giessen Medical Clinic to be trained as a specialist. Afterwards, he took on the directorship of the internal medicine department of a military hospital. In 1928, he was promoted to the position of Captain, becoming the official in charge of the Army Medical Inspectorate of the Reich Defense Ministry. In 1932, as a Colonel in the Medical Services, he took charge of the Corps and Military District (Wehrkreis) V in Stuttgart, and afterwards, became surgeon brigadier general, then major general of the Army near Dresden. In 1938, Handloser was promoted to the position of Army Group physician of the Army Group Command 3, and transferred to Vienna. There, as of 1938, he lectured on the problems of military medicine and, in October, 1939, was named honorary professor. After the beginning of the war, Handloser was called as a military doctor to the 141h und 121h Armies. In November, 1940, he was transferred to the Medical Inspectorate of the German Army, and on February I, 1941, he succeeded Anton Waldmann as Medical Inspector of the German Army. Shortly thereafter, he was named Army Physician by the Quarter Master General of the Supreme Command of the Army. In June, 1942, he was also appointed Chief of the Medical Services in the Supreme command of the German Armed Forces, and after this, Lieutenant General of the German Armed Forces Medical Services. Handloser was the highest technical and disciplinary medical authority in charge of the entire any medical personnel and responsible for their training. As of June 1942, this responsibility was extended to all branches of the military, to the Waffen-SS, as well as to the medical personnel in charge of prisoners of war of the German Armed Forces. For this reason, most of the medical war criminals were under his technical and disciplinary supervision. Handloser was relieved of his position as Medical Inspector of the Army and Army Physician in autumn, 1944. He remained, however, in the position of Chief of the Medical Services of the Armed Forces and was, in this capacity, entitled to issue orders to the entire German Armed Forces and the Waffen-SS. Because of his position of leadership and medical responsibility, Handloser was implicated in several cases dealt with during the Nuremberg Medical Trial involving experiments on concentration camp prisoners. He was fully informed of these experiments, yet in not one single case, did he intervene to stop them. He was convicted by the American Military Tribunal No. I in August, 1947, und sentenced to life imprisonment. This was later reduced to 20 years and, in 1954, he was released. Handloser died of cancer shortly afterwards.