Rolf Grashey (1903–1937), 1936.
©Staatsarchiv München, Polizeidirektion München 12955
The gifted and sensitive literary scholar, Slavist, translator and writer came from a well-known family of physicians and led a carefree life in Munich. He published in the satirical magazine Simplicissimus and had no sympathy for the National Socialists. In the mid-1930s, Rolf Grashey was a target of the intensified persecution of homosexuals. The Gestapo forced confessions out of him; he was taken to Weimar in 1937 and committed to the Buchenwald concentration camp as a possible witness in a show trial being conducted at the time. Out of desperation – in part because he did not want to damage his family’s reputation – he decided to commit suicide two days after his committal and deliberately entered the SS sentry line.
