Bernhard Klepper (14 July 1890 – 15 May 1945) was the Gauleiter of Brescia in Italy under Nazi Germany.
Biography[]
Bernard Klepper was born on 14 July 1890 in Neumarkt in der Oberpfalz in the Kingdom of Bavaria in the German Empire (present-day Germany). Klepper enlisted in the Bavarian Army in 1907 and rose to the rank of Major by 1914, when he served in World War I in the war with the Russian Empire. He won the Wound Badge in the Battle of Gumbinnen that year, and later gained the Iron Cross in the Battle of Tannenberg. Klepper became a lawyer and a Nazi Party member after the war, and Klepper became the Gauleiter of Brescia in 1944 after Nazi Germany occupied Italy. Klepper was responsible for the deportation of partisans and Jews to concentration and extermination camps, and in 1945 he was captured by the Allies. On 15 May, he was executed by Italian rebels.