PFAFFERODE

The Pfafferode sanatorium and nursing home near Mühlhausen (Thuringia) was opened on 2 December 1912 as the third institution of its kind in the Prussian province of Saxony. It was initially designed to accommodate 800 patients. By 1929, the number of beds had risen to around 1,200. In 1940, more than 300 patients from Pfafferode were murdered in the Brandenburg killing centre as part of »Aktion T4«. In April 1943, Theodor Steinmeyer became medical director. From then on, at the latest, Pfafferode became a killing centre and patients were murdered with medication. Pfafferode was also suitable as a killing centre because it was directly connected to the Mühlhausen tram network, making it possible to transfer patients in collective transports without much additional effort. The murders took place mainly in houses 17 and 18. Around 2,000 patients are considered victims of »decentralised euthanasia«. The medical records of the victims of »Aktion T4« were stored in Pfafferode until the Soviet occupation. From there, they were transferred to the Ministry for State Security of the GDR. During the GDR era, the institution also cared for patients with neurological disorders. In the course of the dissolution of the former Ministry for State Security of the GDR in 1990, the medical records of the victims of »Aktion T4« were secured, transferred to the Federal Archives and scientifically evaluated for the first time. In 1999, the psychiatric and neurological clinic, which had been publicly funded until then, was privatised and in 2002 it was taken over by the state of Thuringia.