Military Wikia - Moshe Bahir - Prisoners’ song - Gustav Wagner TV -
Gustav Franz Wagner (18 July 1911 – 3 October 1980) was an SS-Oberscharführer (Staff Sergeant) from Vienna, Austria. Wagner was a starter deputy commander of the Sobibor extermination camp in German-occupied Poland, where more than 200,000 Jews were gassed during Operation Reinhard. Due to his brutality, he was known as The Beast and Wolf. Military Wikia
He was a handsome man, tall and blond – a pure Aryan. In civilian life he was, no doubt, a well-mannered man; at Sobibor he was a wild beast. His lust to kill knew no bounds ... He would snatch babies from their mothers’ arms and tear them to pieces in his hands. I saw him beat two men to death with a rifle, because they did not carry out his instructions properly, since they did not understand German. I remember that one night a group of youths aged fifteen or sixteen arrived in the camp. The head of this group was one Abraham. After a long and arduous work day, this young man collapsed on his pallet and fell asleep. Suddenly Wagner came into our barrack, and Abraham did not hear him call to stand up at once before him. Furious, he pulled Abraham naked off his bed and began to beat him all over his body. When Wagner grew weary of the blows, he took out his revolver and killed him on the spot. This atrocious spectacle was carried out before all of us, including Abraham’s younger brother. Moshe Bahir, cited Yitzhak Arad 1987
How fun is our life there,
They give us food to eat that’s fair,
What fun it is in the green wood,
Where I am stood. Song sung by prisoners under direction of Wagner
I had no feelings ... It just became another job. In the evening we never discussed our work, but just drank and played cards. Gustav Wagner, interview BBC 1979