Girl Holding Cushion in 1922. And Stutthof Concentration Camp.

            The Postcard

A postcard bearing no publisher's name that was posted in Leigh on Monday the 6th. March 1922 to:

Miss M. Drinkwater,
24, Findlay Street,
Leigh,
Lancs.

The message on the divided back was as follows:

"Best of Wishes for a
Happy and Bright Birthday.
Best of Luck,
Mickey".

Lord Louis Mountbatten

So what else happened on the day that Mickey posted the card?

Well, on the 6th. March 1922, the engagement of the wealthy heiress Edwina Ashley to Lord Louis Mountbatten was announced.

Wanda Klaff

The day also marked the birth of Wanda Klaff.

Wanda Klaff became a Nazi camp overseer. 

Wanda Klaff - The Early Years

Klaff was born in Danzig to German parents as Wanda Kalacinski. She was the daughter of railway worker Ludwig Kalacinski. The family name became Kalden in 1941. 

She finished school in 1938, and began working in a jam factory. This lasted until 1942 when she married Willy Klaff and became a housewife, and then a streetcar operator.

Wanda Klaff's SS Career, Arrest, and Trial

In 1944, Klaff joined the camp staff at the Stutthof's subcamp at Praust (Pruszcz), where she sadistically abused many of the prisoners. On the 5th. October 1944, she arrived at the Russoschin subcamp of Stutthof (present-day northern Poland).

She fled the camp in early 1945, but on the 11th. June 1945, she was arrested by Polish officials, and soon after was laid up in prison with typhoid fever. 

She stood trial with the other former female guards. She stated at the trial: 

"I am very intelligent, and very 
devoted to my work in the camps. 
I struck at least two prisoners every 
day." 

The Execution of Wanda Klaff

Klaff was convicted and received a sentence of death. She was publicly hanged (by the short drop method) on the 4th. July 1946, on Biskupia Górka hill, near Gdańsk, aged 24.

Short drop hanging is where the prisoner only drops a short distance, and their suspended body weight and physical struggling causes the noose to tighten, normally resulting in death by strangulation or carotid or Vagal reflex. It differs from long drop hanging where the neck is broken and death is virtually immediate.

Taken on: January 20, 2021

Tags:

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Girl

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Stutthof

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1922

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Drinkwater

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Street

Lancs.

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divided

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Mickey

Lord

Louis

Mountbatten

Edwina

Ashley

Wanda

Klaff

Nazi

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1941

Kalden

1938

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Sets appears in: • Biographies • Edwardian Beauties

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