Wanda Klaff

Female guards of Stutthof and Bromberg-Ost concentration camps at the Stutthof Trial.
Wanda Klaff is on the right, front row.

Wanda Klaff (March 6, 1922 – July 4, 1946) was a Nazi camp overseer.

Klaff was born in Danzig to German parents as Wanda Kalacinski. She finished school in 1938 and began working in a jam factory. This lasted until 1942 when she married Willy Gapes and became a housewife.

In 1944 Klaff joined the camp staff at the Stutthof's subcamp at Praust (Pruszcz). There, she abused many of the prisoners. On October 5, 1944, she arrived at the Russoschin subcamp of Stutthof (today northern Poland). There she continued to sadistically abuse prisoners.

She fled the camp in early 1945. On June 11, 1945, she was arrested by Polish officials and soon after was laid up in prison with typhoid fever. She stood trial with the other former female guards. It is said, that she stated at the trial, "I am very intelligent and very devoted to my work in the camps. I struck at least two prisoners every day." Klaff was found guilty and received a sentence of death for her abuse. She was publicly hanged on July 4, 1946, on Biskupia Górka hill near Gdańsk.

References

• Benjamin B. Ferencz, Less Than Slaves: Jewish Forced Labor and the Quest for Compensation
• Stutthof Trial. Female guards in Nazi concentration camps