The Dachau concentration camp was one of the first concentration camps built by Nazi Germany, and it was initially intended for political opponents. It is located near Munich, and eventually, it also became a place of imprisonment and forced labour for Jews, Romani and other groups. There were around 32,000 documented deaths at the camp, although many may have gone unrecorded. It was liberated by US troops on 29 April 1945.
We know that several royal women were imprisoned at Dachau. The first was Noor Inayat Khan, whose great-great-great-grandfather was Tipu Sultan, ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore in South India. Noor served as a Special Operations Executive under the codename Madeleine. In June 1943, she was flown into France, where she was a radio operator. She was betrayed to the Nazis, and she was arrested by the Gestapo in the middle of October 1943. She underwent interrogations and even managed to escape the following month. Unfortunately, she was caught not much later.
She was moved to Pforzheim prison in Germany on the day she was recaptured, and she arrived there on 27 November. She was kept there for months, chained by her hands and feet and kept on the lowest rations. It wasn’t until February of the following year that Noor was allowed to walk outside. Still, the conditions in the prison remained harsh, and time passed slowly.
In September, Noor was discharged from the prison and taken to Karlsruhe, where she would meet the head of the Karlsruhe Gestapo, Josef Gmeiner. In his office, she met three other SOE agents, Elaine Plewman, Madeleine Damerment and Yolande Beekman. Here, the four women were ordered to the Dachau concentration camp, where, unbeknownst to them, the commandant had received the order to execute them. They arrived at midnight on the night of 12/13 September, and the four women were taken to their cells. The former prison of the camp can now be found behind the main, which houses the exhibition about the history of the camp.
For Madeleine, Elaine and Yolande, the end came early the following morning. They were marched from their cell, past the barracks, and they were shot near the crematorium. There are two different versions of Noor’s end. One version states that she was with the three other women. The other version says that Noor was abused for the entire night, being kicked and beaten by German officers in her cell. After being beaten to a bloody mess, the officer became tired of her, ordered her to kneel and put his pistol against her head. She reportedly said, “Liberté” (liberty) just before being executed. All four women’s bodies were burnt in the crematorium, where a memorial plaque in their memories is now placed.1
The other royal women were Princess Irmingard of Bavaria and her sisters, Editha, Hilda, Gabrielle and Sophie, the daughters of Rupprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria and Princess Antonia of Luxembourg. The family of her half-brother Albrecht was also imprisoned with them, so the list also includes his wife, Countess Maria Draskovich de Trakostjan and two daughters, Marie Gabrielle and Marie Charlotte (and their two sons, Franz and Max).
The former royal family of Bavaria (the Kingdom ceased to exist in 1918) had remained relatively safe at the start of the Second World War. When a friend of Crown Prince Rupprecht was arrested and tortured in an attempt to implicate him in treasonous acts against the Nazis, he went into hiding. His only son from his second marriage, Heinrich, went into hiding as well. He had wished for his wife and five daughters to go to a Salvatorean convent, but Princess Antonia feared the heat and believed she would be safe in the Italian Tyrol.
After an assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler’s life in 1944, he went after Antonia and her four youngest daughters as he could not get to Rupprecht. They were arrested, even though Antonia was ill with pleurisy at the time. A doctor tried to delay the orders for Antonia, but her four youngest daughters were taken from her and sent to Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Irmingard had managed to evade arrest by going underground near the Austrian border, but she was eventually forced to seek medical help after contracting typhus. In January 1945, she too was taken to Sachensenhausen, where she also encountered her half-brother Albrecht (from her father’s first marriage to Duchess Marie Gabrielle in Bavaria) and his family. Meanwhile, Antonia lingered in a hospital in Innsbruck.
The Russian advance in February 1945 meant that they were all transferred to Flossenbürg concentration camp, where they lived in two crowded rooms as “special” prisoners. From the window, they could see the stacked bodies waiting to be burnt at the crematorium. When Albrecht became seriously ill, the commandant worried what his possible death might mean, and he had the family moved to a forester’s house outside Flossenbürg. While there, they were allowed to take walks, but they were taunted by a guard who showed them pictures of murdered women and children. Irmingar later wrote that she shouted at him, “Tell me, you are in your prime. Why aren’t you at the front defending your beloved Führer? This is a post for old, retired soldiers, isn’t it?”2
When Albrecht had recovered, the family was transferred to the Dachau concentration camp on 8 April. Irmingard had a fainting spell during the transport, and she suspected she was ill with typhus. About Dachau, she wrote, “I started to feel faint again and was supported by a very nice camp doctor. As there was no room in the actual camp, we were housed in the adjoining Red Cross barracks. […] We were still kept apart and couldn’t speak to each other. During the day, we were led around the square in front of the barracks for an hour, always in a circle. Two guards with rifles accompanied us.”3
One of the guards whispered to her that the Americans were close. She later wrote, “It was exciting news that could mean imminent freedom or imminent death.”4
One final transport brought the family to Ammerwald, where they stayed in an inn. As the US army advanced, the guards began to flee, and eventually, they were freed. Irmingard wrote, “More and more Americans came. They gave us presents of canned food, cigarettes and chocolate. It was hard to believe that we were now liberated and could move around freely.”5
The family was able to reunite with Antonia, who was found emaciated in a hospital near Buchenwald concentration camp. A year later, they were also able to reunite with their father.
Plan your visit to the Dachau concentration camp here.
- Read more about Noor in Spy Princess: The Life of Noor Inayat Khan by Shrabani Basu
- Jugend-Erinnerungen by Prinzessin Irmingard von Bayern p.318
- Jugend-Erinnerungen by Prinzessin Irmingard von Bayern p.320
- Jugend-Erinnerungen by Prinzessin Irmingard von Bayern p.321
- Jugend-Erinnerungen by Prinzessin Irmingard von Bayern p.327
Excellent article. Very informative. I hope you have a book in mind.Sandra