Josef Kramer (10 November 1906 – 13 December 1945) was the Commandant of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Dubbed "The Beast of Belsen" by camp inmates, he was a notorious German Nazi war criminal, directly responsible for the deaths of thousands of people. He was detained by the British army after the Second World War, convicted of war crimes and hanged on the gallows in Hamelin prison by British executioner Albert Pierrepoint.