Biography: Fritz Bauer

Fritz Bauer was born on July 16, 1903 in Stuttgart. He completed his doctorate in 1928 after studying law in Heidelberg, Munich, and Tübingen. First working in Stuttgart’s district court, Bauer was then named the youngest district judge in the Weimar Republic in 1930. Bauer was a member of the SPD since 1920 and active in the Black-Red-Gold Banner. He was arrested after the Nazis took power and spent a few months in the Heuberg concentration camp and then Upper Kuhberg. In 1936 he emigrated to Denmark and in 1943 fled to Sweden.

Returning to Germany in 1949, Bauer was appointed chief of the state prosecution office in Braunschweig in 1950. He then held the same position in the state of Hesse from 1956, based in Frankfurt. Bauer was actively involved in prosecuting Nazi crimes and prepared the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial in 1963/64. He died on July 1, 1968.