Postwar Naturalization Files: Untapped Sources for the Study of Non-German Holocaust Perpetrators and Nazi Collaborators

Over the fifteen years, scholars have dedicated considerable attention to the involvement of non-Germans – that is to say, individuals without German citizenship – in the extermination of European Jewry (e.g. Sandkühler 2022), and as soldiers fighting for Germany in the war, especially as members of the Waffen-SS (e.g. Bohler/Gerwath 2016, Christensen/Smith/Poulsen 2022, Zaugg 2016 and 2021). While there has been considerable research on how these collaborators were treated in their countries of origin following the end of the War, there has been less work examining how these individuals tried to establish lives in the Federal Republic of Germany after 1949.

An examination of naturalisation files from early West Germany show that many non-German collaborators sought refuge in the country’s territory after the war. Far from hiding this in their dealings with West German state authorities, these individuals reported details regarding their military (and camp) service for Germany in their applications for naturalisation and frequently received preferential treatment as a result.

Drawing on my ongoing research into West German citizenship law and naturalisation practice, I will argue that naturalisation files present an overlooked and valuable resource for examining both the postwar fates of Nazi perpetrators, and potentially for developing a better understanding of aspects of the concentration camp system. This latter point is related specifically to a set of thousands of naturalisation files of Waffen-SS veterans held by the Bundesverwaltungsamt in Cologne, which have not been offered to the Bundesarchiv despite being 50, 60, or 70 years old. These files offer new and exciting insights into the social profile and postwar fates of a group of individuals central to the functioning of the Holocaust – camp guards – about whom we still know relatively little due to an otherwise abysmal source base.