Bolender was born in 1912 in
Duisburg and stayed in school until the age of 16 when he became a blacksmith apprentice. He joined the
NSDAP in 1930. In 1939, he joined the
SS-Totenkopfverbände ("Death's Head Unit"). He was attached to the
Action T4 euthanasia program and worked at
Hartheim,
Hadamar,
Brandenburg and
Sonnenstein killing centers where physically and mentally disabled Germans were exterminated by gassing and lethal injection. Bolender was involved in the
cremation process of disposing of victims, as well as "test" gassing procedures during the
Action T4. He was the commander of Sobibor's extermination area and he personally supervised gassings and cremations. He was entrusted with this job due to his prior working relationship with Sobibor commandant
Franz Stangl.
SS-Scharführer Erich Fuchs, who served with Bolender, testified about him in 1966: Part of Bolender's duties included supervision of the Jewish work details in
Lager III. In his own words:
SS-Oberscharführer Erich Bauer, who also served with Bolender at Sobibór, testified about him in 1966: Also, according to Bauer, Bolender participated in gang rapes of female prisoners prior to killing them: In 1965, Ada Lichtman, a Sobibór survivor, described Bolender and his dog: In fall 1942, Bolender became the commander of the Ukrainian camp guards at Sobibór. Moshe Bahir, a Sobibór survivor, wrote about Bolender: In December 1942, Bolender's duties at Sobibór were temporarily put on hold when he was sent to prison for intimidating a witness involved in his divorce. After serving the sentence, Bolender returned to Operation Reinhard, where he assisted in the dismantlement and liquidation of Sobibor. Afterwards he served at the SS labor camp at
Dorohucza and subsequently to
Trieste in
Italy. On 18 January 1945, Bolender was awarded the
Iron Cross 2nd class.
Arrest and trial and suicide After World War II, Bolender assumed a fake identity, did not contact his family or his relatives, and after some time, had himself declared deceased. He was recognized in May 1961 working as a
bouncer at a nightclub in Germany and was immediately arrested. He was arrested under an assumed name
Heinz Brenner. It is probable that after the war he also went by the
pseudonym Wilhelm Kurt Vahle while working as a bouncer at the
Er- und Siebar and the
Hofbräuhaus in
Hamburg. In 1965, Bolender, along with 11 former SS guards from Sobibór,
was tried in Hagen, West Germany. At the trial Bolender initially claimed that he had never been in Sobibór, but instead fought against partisans around
Lublin, Poland. However, he broke down under cross-examination and confessed to being present at Sobibór. Prior to the completion of the trial, Kurt Bolender died from
suicide by hanging in his prison cell. In his suicide note, he insisted that he was innocent. ==See also==