Escorted by a priest and U.S. military police, Dr. Claus Schilling, 74, is led to the gallows. Convicted of causing the deaths of hundreds of prisoners via unethical experiments, he was of the oldest war criminals to be legally executed after World War II (Landsberg Prison, 1946) [774 x 1000].

lightiggy on March 14, 2026 3:35 am

[Claus Schilling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claus_Schilling)

Schilling was an anomaly among his codefendants. He wasn’t a member of the Nazi Party. All evidence indicates that he was indifferent to the Nazi ideology and was instead an opportunist who exploited the situation for personal gain. Born in Munich, Schilling studied medicine in his native city, receiving a doctor’s degree there in 1895. He was a professor of parasitology at the University of Berlin and a member of Malaria Commission of the League of Nations. Within a few years, Schilling was practicing in the German colonial possessions in Africa. Recognized for his contributions in the field of tropical medicine, he was appointed the first-ever director of the tropical medicine division of the Robert Koch Institute in 1905, where he would remain for the subsequent three decades.

Schilling returned to Germany after a meeting with Leonardo Conti, the Nazis’ Health Chief, in 1941. In 1942, he was provided with a special malaria research station at Dachau’s concentration camp by Heinrich Himmler, the leader of the SS. Despite negative assessments from colleagues, Schilling remained in charge of the malaria station for the duration of the war. The Dachau subjects included prisoners who were injected with synthetic drugs at doses ranging from high to lethal. They had been exposed to malaria mosquitos in cages strapped to their hands or arms so as to ensure infection with the parasite. Of the more than 1,000 prisoners used in the malaria experiments in Dachau during the war, 300 to 400 of them died as a result; among survivors, a substantial number remained permanently injured.

[Schilling’s booking photo](https://imgur.com/a/qKYlX2p)

Schilling was arrested on April 29, 1945, the day that Dachau was liberated. He was charged as a war criminal. That November, he tried an American military tribunal convened on the grounds of the former concentration camp. Schilling was one of 40 people to be charged with jointly participating in a common design to commit war crimes at Dachau. Now known as the Dachau camp trial, it was the first mass trial heard by the tribunal.

[A group portrait of the defendants](https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/pa1184056)

[Some testimony from the trial](http://hrlibrary.umn.edu/edumat/witness/wtb_25.pdf)

Schilling initially claimed that his patients had volunteered for the experiments. Dr. Franz Blaha, a Dachau inmate, testified that none of the prisoners had volunteered. Blaha was initially chosen to be experimented on, but was spared after saying he was a physician, which meant he could be useful. Reverend Theodore Koch, a Catholic priest, was one subject of Schilling’s malaria experiments. He testifies that he was on his last legs and put in the prison hospital. Upon release, he was sent to Schilling’s experimental station.

>”For two days, I didn’t eat and I was very tired, so for two days, and two nights almost, I slept. On the next day, not only I, but also the others who were in the same room with me, were sent to another room where pestilent mosquitoes were in little boxes… Each received a small box, with a mosquito, and we had to hold our hands over that box, which was covered with a towel. That lasted a half-hour or an hour a day for almost one week. Also a male nurse brought us another box with mosquitoes and it was put in the bed, between our legs for either a half-hour or an hour… Then each morning the blood smear was taken from the ear my temperature was taken during the day and also at night.”

Shortly before the verdict was read, Schilling made a final plea to the court. His voice then broke and he cried.

>”I have worked out this great labor. It would be really a terrible loss if I could not finish this work. I don’t ask you as a court, I ask you personally to do what you can; to do what you can to help me that I may finish this report. I need only a table and a chair and a typewriter. It would be an enormous help for science, for my colleagues, and a good part to rehabilitate myself.”

[Schilling testifying in a visibly unconvinced courtoom](https://imgur.com/a/E7we2SX)

In his final plea, the Chief Prosecutor, Lieutenant Colonel [William Denson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Denson) highlighted the occurrence of a continuous crime. He said that through their participation in the Dachau system, all of the defendants were inherently guilty. This included the Kapos, who he deemed co-responsible. Denson did not accept the claim superior orders. He said he did not see any mitigating circumstances for the accused and pleaded for hard sentences. The tribunal agreed. It read out a special verdict declaring everyone jointly guilty. However, sentencing was done on an individual basis. Each person was called out to hear their sentence. Most of them were condemned to death. Eventually, Schilling’s name was called.

[Schilling standing to hear his sentence](https://imgur.com/a/0IAz1x8)

>”Dr. Klaus Karl Schilling, the court in closed session, at least two thirds of the members present at the time the vote was taken, concurring, sentences you to death by hanging at such time and place as higher authority may direct.”

Many in the German medical community protested the verdict for Schilling. [Ernst Nauck](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Georg_Nauck) of the Hamburg Tropical Institute, who had retained his post despite “prescribing” the ghettoization as a way to control infectious diseases in Poland, was outraged with the prosecution. Schilling’s other advocates included former colleagues from the Robert Koch Institute and other prominent people in the German medical community. Two advocates were [Hans Nachtsheim](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Nachtsheim), the Director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Biology, and Berlin pharmacologist [Wolfgang Heubner](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Heubner). Schilling’s advocates called him a passionate researcher who had acted humanely and never intended for anyone to die during his experiments. They insisted that he had wanted to save lives.

>”Entirely unpolitical, he only loved his science, his violin and his wife.”

Schilling was apolitical, but that only made him worse. He was an amoral opportunist who exactly what he was doing and how wrong it was. In the 1930s, Schilling had stressed that malaria research on human subjects could be performed in an entirely harmless fashion. But as soon as the opportunity arose to act with consequences, he performed tests on unwilling subjects. As early as 1936, Schilling was conducting immunization experiments on inmates of the psychiatric asylums of Volterra and San Niccolò di Siena in Italy.

But when it came to seeking clemency, Schilling was again an anomaly:

>”I beg you not to insist on acting for my innocence. I wish to die. The life I live now in prison is no life. If the Court is inclined to do me a favor, let me have a quick and painless death.”

After a mandatory review of the cases, all of the verdicts were confirmed. Most of the death sentences, including the one for Schilling, were confirmed. According to an article from the BBC, Schilling continued to work on his records until just a few hours before his execution. Schilling, 74, was executed by hanging at Landsberg Prison in Allied-occupied Germany on May 28, 1946. He was one of the oldest people to be legally executed for war crimes committed during the Second World War. As far as I am aware, only [Nikola Mandić](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Mandi%C4%87) and [Feodor Fedorenko](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feodor_Fedorenko) were older.

Asked if he wanted to make a final statement, Schilling said, “I am not guilty. Please get it over with.”

[A photo of Schilling moments before his execution](https://imgur.com/a/4x5yxYv) (the photo was taken from a [video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0QDPSVuW1c))

In 2014, [an article from the BBC](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26193808) said the Germans had been researching a way to weaponize malaria-infected mosquitoes.

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3 Comments

lightiggy on March 14, 2026 3:35 am

[Claus Schilling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claus_Schilling)

Schilling was an anomaly among his codefendants. He wasn’t a member of the Nazi Party. All evidence indicates that he was indifferent to the Nazi ideology and was instead an opportunist who exploited the situation for personal gain. Born in Munich, Schilling studied medicine in his native city, receiving a doctor’s degree there in 1895. He was a professor of parasitology at the University of Berlin and a member of Malaria Commission of the League of Nations. Within a few years, Schilling was practicing in the German colonial possessions in Africa. Recognized for his contributions in the field of tropical medicine, he was appointed the first-ever director of the tropical medicine division of the Robert Koch Institute in 1905, where he would remain for the subsequent three decades.

Schilling returned to Germany after a meeting with Leonardo Conti, the Nazis’ Health Chief, in 1941. In 1942, he was provided with a special malaria research station at Dachau’s concentration camp by Heinrich Himmler, the leader of the SS. Despite negative assessments from colleagues, Schilling remained in charge of the malaria station for the duration of the war. The Dachau subjects included prisoners who were injected with synthetic drugs at doses ranging from high to lethal. They had been exposed to malaria mosquitos in cages strapped to their hands or arms so as to ensure infection with the parasite. Of the more than 1,000 prisoners used in the malaria experiments in Dachau during the war, 300 to 400 of them died as a result; among survivors, a substantial number remained permanently injured.

[Schilling’s booking photo](https://imgur.com/a/qKYlX2p)

Schilling was arrested on April 29, 1945, the day that Dachau was liberated. He was charged as a war criminal. That November, he tried an American military tribunal convened on the grounds of the former concentration camp. Schilling was one of 40 people to be charged with jointly participating in a common design to commit war crimes at Dachau. Now known as the Dachau camp trial, it was the first mass trial heard by the tribunal.

[A group portrait of the defendants](https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/pa1184056)

[Some testimony from the trial](http://hrlibrary.umn.edu/edumat/witness/wtb_25.pdf)

Schilling initially claimed that his patients had volunteered for the experiments. Dr. Franz Blaha, a Dachau inmate, testified that none of the prisoners had volunteered. Blaha was initially chosen to be experimented on, but was spared after saying he was a physician, which meant he could be useful. Reverend Theodore Koch, a Catholic priest, was one subject of Schilling’s malaria experiments. He testifies that he was on his last legs and put in the prison hospital. Upon release, he was sent to Schilling’s experimental station.

>”For two days, I didn’t eat and I was very tired, so for two days, and two nights almost, I slept. On the next day, not only I, but also the others who were in the same room with me, were sent to another room where pestilent mosquitoes were in little boxes… Each received a small box, with a mosquito, and we had to hold our hands over that box, which was covered with a towel. That lasted a half-hour or an hour a day for almost one week. Also a male nurse brought us another box with mosquitoes and it was put in the bed, between our legs for either a half-hour or an hour… Then each morning the blood smear was taken from the ear my temperature was taken during the day and also at night.”

Shortly before the verdict was read, Schilling made a final plea to the court. His voice then broke and he cried.

>”I have worked out this great labor. It would be really a terrible loss if I could not finish this work. I don’t ask you as a court, I ask you personally to do what you can; to do what you can to help me that I may finish this report. I need only a table and a chair and a typewriter. It would be an enormous help for science, for my colleagues, and a good part to rehabilitate myself.”

[Schilling testifying in a visibly unconvinced courtoom](https://imgur.com/a/E7we2SX)

In his final plea, the Chief Prosecutor, Lieutenant Colonel [William Denson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Denson) highlighted the occurrence of a continuous crime. He said that through their participation in the Dachau system, all of the defendants were inherently guilty. This included the Kapos, who he deemed co-responsible. Denson did not accept the claim superior orders. He said he did not see any mitigating circumstances for the accused and pleaded for hard sentences. The tribunal agreed. It read out a special verdict declaring everyone jointly guilty. However, sentencing was done on an individual basis. Each person was called out to hear their sentence. Most of them were condemned to death. Eventually, Schilling’s name was called.

[Schilling standing to hear his sentence](https://imgur.com/a/0IAz1x8)

>”Dr. Klaus Karl Schilling, the court in closed session, at least two thirds of the members present at the time the vote was taken, concurring, sentences you to death by hanging at such time and place as higher authority may direct.”

Many in the German medical community protested the verdict for Schilling. [Ernst Nauck](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Georg_Nauck) of the Hamburg Tropical Institute, who had retained his post despite “prescribing” the ghettoization as a way to control infectious diseases in Poland, was outraged with the prosecution. Schilling’s other advocates included former colleagues from the Robert Koch Institute and other prominent people in the German medical community. Two advocates were [Hans Nachtsheim](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Nachtsheim), the Director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Biology, and Berlin pharmacologist [Wolfgang Heubner](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Heubner). Schilling’s advocates called him a passionate researcher who had acted humanely and never intended for anyone to die during his experiments. They insisted that he had wanted to save lives.

>”Entirely unpolitical, he only loved his science, his violin and his wife.”

Schilling was apolitical, but that only made him worse. He was an amoral opportunist who exactly what he was doing and how wrong it was. In the 1930s, Schilling had stressed that malaria research on human subjects could be performed in an entirely harmless fashion. But as soon as the opportunity arose to act with consequences, he performed tests on unwilling subjects. As early as 1936, Schilling was conducting immunization experiments on inmates of the psychiatric asylums of Volterra and San Niccolò di Siena in Italy.

But when it came to seeking clemency, Schilling was again an anomaly:

>”I beg you not to insist on acting for my innocence. I wish to die. The life I live now in prison is no life. If the Court is inclined to do me a favor, let me have a quick and painless death.”

After a mandatory review of the cases, all of the verdicts were confirmed. Most of the death sentences, including the one for Schilling, were confirmed. According to an article from the BBC, Schilling continued to work on his records until just a few hours before his execution. Schilling, 74, was executed by hanging at Landsberg Prison in Allied-occupied Germany on May 28, 1946. He was one of the oldest people to be legally executed for war crimes committed during the Second World War. As far as I am aware, only [Nikola Mandić](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Mandi%C4%87) and [Feodor Fedorenko](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feodor_Fedorenko) were older.

Asked if he wanted to make a final statement, Schilling said, “I am not guilty. Please get it over with.”

[A photo of Schilling moments before his execution](https://imgur.com/a/4x5yxYv) (the photo was taken from a [video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0QDPSVuW1c))

In 2014, [an article from the BBC](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26193808) said the Germans had been researching a way to weaponize malaria-infected mosquitoes.
Durutti1936 on March 14, 2026 3:40 am

Good.
Hey_HaveAGreatDay on March 14, 2026 3:52 am

He could have chosen to go to any malaria ridden country and studied but instead chose to be around some of the worst horrors on humanity in history. Something tells me he wasn’t *super opposed* to the Nazis.

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