Karl Ibach

Karl Ibach (April 3, 1915 – May 3, 1990) was a German member of the resistance against the Third Reich and later, a writer and politician.

Ibach was born in Elberfeld, today part of Wuppertal, Germany. At the age of 16, he joined the Young Communist League and later, the Communist Party (Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands or KPD). He had planned to become a bookseller, but in spring 1933, was arrested and detained at the Kemna concentration camp in Wuppertal, becoming one of the youngest prisoners at the age of 18. He spent 74 days at Kemna and was not tortured. Ibach was apparently seen by the SA guards as having been a misguided teenager and was allowed to work in the camp administration office. He was released in October 1933, when the SA released a large number of prisoners.

He continued his resistance activities, fleeing to the Netherlands, but was arrested again shortly after returning to Germany. He was charged with suspicion of preparing to commit high treason and was convicted in Hamm to an 8-year sentence in a Zuchthaus. Until 1943, he was imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps and Zuchthouses, in Esterwegen, Börgermoor and Zuchthaus Waldheim. In 1943, he was transferred to Lager Heuberg and Punishment Division 999, where he was drilled for later military deployment to the front to defend the Third Reich. In 1944, Ibach became a Soviet prisoner of war and was released in 1947. In 1948, Ibach published a report about his experiences at Kemna. For more than three decades, his and Willi Weiler's published reports were the only published sources of information about the history of the regional concentration camp system.

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