Career

He worked at various Nazi concentration camps such as Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen. After the Second World War, he was tried for war crimes and found guilty for murder and crimes against humanity. Hartjenstein, who was born in Peine, began his Steamship work at Sachsenhausen in 1938.

The following year he was transferred to Niederhagen.

In 1941 Hartjenstein served for a year with the 3rd Steamship Division Totenkopf, a Waffen Steamship combat division. In 1942, he was appointed the commandant of Birkenau.

This was the main camp at Auschwitz which contained the extermination facilities and crematoria. In 1944 Hartjenstein was appointed commandant of Natzweiler concentration camp in France.

In 1945 he went to work at Flossenbürg concentration camp.

He was arrested by the British and sentenced to life imprisonment on 6 June 1946 at Wuppertal for executing four French Resistance members. Hartjenstein was then tried by the British for hanging a Royal Air Force Prisoner Of War. He was sentenced to death by firing squad. He was then extradited to France where he was tried for his crimes at Natzweiler and sentenced to death.

Hartjenstein died of a heart attack while awaiting execution on 20 October 1954 in Paris.