Fritz Sauckel: ‘Humans More Primitive Than Machines’
Coming from pretty humble origins - being the only child of a postman and seamstress - it’s unlikely that Ernst Friedrich Christoph “Fritz” Sauckel, ever imagined, while a child, that he would grow up to be a slave owner. Presumably he never dreamt of such a thing during his adolescence, joining the Merchant Navy aged 15 in 1909 and sailing in Swedish, Norwegian and German ships. He became a first-class sailor - which shows he wasn’t afraid of hard work - rising to the rank of Able Seaman. It was Nazism that made him a slave owner and a criminal.