Gustav Linse - elevators for Auschwitz

The area of former company Linse is located adjacent to the area of Topf & Soehne. This company was not only situated nearby but also was involved in the business connection of Topf & Soehne with the concentration camp in Auschwitz.

Gustav Linse became employed as chief designer by the pump factory Otto Schwade in 1919. He became joint partner of the mechanical engineering factory "Waechter und Linse". After Waechter left the company he became the head of the company. Now the company specialized in the building of cranes and elevators.

picture: Drawing of David Olère, pushing of a woman's dead body and several children's dead bodies into the cremation room. At the end of the furnace room the elevator of the company Gustav Linse from Erfurt can be seen.

The company moved to Rudolstaedter Strasse 2 in 1937 and Kurt Pruefer (engineer at company Topf & Soehne) got in touch with the company in the neighborhood in 1942. Pruefer was commissioned to search for suitable elevators by Karl Bischof, and found what he was looking for with the Linse company. One elevator was supposed to be delivered to the concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau immediately, two additional elevators had to follow within the next seven months (September 1943). The elevators were to connect the gas chambers in the basement with the crematories in the first floor to speed up the process of burning and removing the dead bodies. Till then the dead bodies were transported over a provisional ramp from the gas chambers to the first floor, where the furnaces were situated.

After 1945 the son Kurt Linse took over the company. The firm was nationalized and renamed to "VEB Aufzugsbau" in 1972. Juergen Linse, grandchild of the founder, managed the company until 1990. Then the firm "Gustav Linse" was refounded. Four years later the swiss-situated company "Schindler Aufzuege" already took over the firm and moved it to Rudolstaedter Strasse 19.

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