Abstract

Positioned on Tiergartenstrasse across from Berlin’s large metropolitan green space of the same name, the T4 Program’s (Aktion T4) headquarters were located in a luxurious late-nineteenth century villa. Completed in 1890 for the wealthy banker Valentin Weissbach, the building was sold in 1909 to a successful Jewish factory owner, Georg Liebermann—the brother of German impressionist painter, Max Liebermann. After 1933, the SA confiscated the villa, the exterior of which is featured below. In 1940, the building was chosen to host the administrative and coordinating offices of the Nazis’ euthanasia project. Similar to the affluent surroundings in which the Nazis finalized the plans for genocide at a villa in Wannsee, here another bourgeois environment was home to the “mercy killing” program. While the T4 personnel ensured the efficient operation of the Nazi regime’s murder of disabled and terminally ill people across Germany, they were surrounded by lavish interiors with custom made furniture and beautiful crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceilings. While the program was scaled back after criticism in 1941, the T4 Program continued to operate in this villa until the end of the war, when it was significantly damaged and eventually torn down in 1946.

The Villa at Tiergartenstrasse 4 (c. 1935)

Source

Source: Photo, c. 1935. Photographer: Walter Köster. Landesarchiv Berlin.