Friday, October 03, 2008

A Libran Exception: Irma Grese

A look at one daughter of Libra who flew against the usual personality patterns associated with this zodiac sign. She's also a far cry from those "superwomen" I've featured recently.

This woman, with natal Libra Sun, Venus and Saturn, most certainly didn't live up to the reputation of charm, tact, diplomacy and the easy-going, often indecisive nature associated with this sign. Irma Grese, also known as The Beautiful Beast, Bitch of Belsen, Angel of Death, was the most notorious and brutal of all young female guards employed in Nazi prison camps. She was 18 when she took up her duties, and 22 when she was hanged, after trial by a British Military Tribunal.


"Another product of the Nazi’s final solution, Irma Grese or the “Bitch of Belsen” was a guard at concentration camps Ravensbrück, Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. Transferred to Auschwitz in 1943, (she must have shown particular enthusiasm and dedication to the job), she was promoted to Senior Supervisor, the 2nd highest ranking female in camp, by the end of the year. In charge of over 30,000 Jewish female prisoners, she reveled in her work. Her work included; savaging of prisoners by her trained and half starved dogs, sexual excesses, arbitrary shootings, sadistic beatings with a plaited whip, and selecting prisoners for the gas chamber. She enjoyed both physical and emotional torture and habitually wore heavy boots and carried a pistol to facilitate both."
From Top Ten Most Evil Women.


WARNING: skip this paragraph if you are of delicate disposition:

"Irma Grese apparently gave orders to other soldiers asking them to remove the breasts of Jewish and gypsy women in the camps or to ask that specific women be gased or killed for her so that she could collect their skins. Irma made lampshades, bookcovers, and other household items from the human skins of the prisoners at Auschwitz" (From here)





A stellium (cluster of planets) in Libra: Sun, Venus and Saturn afford a good helping of Libran flavour. She was said to be quite beautiful, in a typically Ayrian way, blonde with blue-eyes, so it's a physical fit, for Libra is ruled by Venus, planet of beauty.

Mercury and Mars in Virgo add little that would portray such a brutal character. One might expect a harsh turn of phrase, a little aggression on occasion, but in discerning Virgo, this would usually be tightly controlled. Grese's birth time at Astrotheme is stated as 12 noon, without the usual note that actual time is unknown. I think it unlikely to be an accurate time, especially as it produces Sagittarius rising. The only rising sign I can imagine fitting this woman would be one with the malefic Fixed Star Algol sitting right on it (which would mean 25 Taurus). That's just my view though.

There's a Grand Trine in Water signs harmoniously linking Uranus in Pisces, Jupiter in Scorpio and Pluto in Cancer. Again, this hardly fits what we know of Grese. In most cases I'd look on this as an indication of a creative, highly sensitive and emotional individual.

Okay. There has to be something which could turn a beautiful young woman into one who could be called "Beast". Saturn and Venus are conjoined in Libra. Venus rules Libra so would have been unsullied in its own domicile, were it not strongly challenged, modified even, by Saturn one of the so-called "malefics", which could account for the way the reflection of her Libran planets seems to deviate from the norm. Likewise, Mercury (in its own sign, Virgo) and Mars are close enough to be in conjunction, with Mars' aggression modifying Virgoan restraint. It's as though the two planets thought of traditionally as "malefics" have zeroed in on two personal planets in their own domiciles and "sucked the goodness out of them" leaving a much changed picture.

The Moon, in early Virgo at 12 noon, would have been in late Leo if birth time was around 1 or 2 am. It's impossible to judge which is more likely.

Chiron "The Wounded Healer" lies in Aries, opposite the Venus/Saturn conjunction. Neither Grese nor her victims were ever healed (a reflection of this opposition), all were sorely wounded, they by her unspeakable brutality, and she by the dogma and brainwashing inflicted by Hitler's inhuman regime.

Astrology is sometimes eerily accurate, other times, as here, not so much. There is some astrological evidence for the way in which Irma Grese developed. It has to be remembered that she was but a teenager when it all started, lacking in relevant experience and judgement, gullible, a young farm girl, possibly short on education and intellect. There was potential for her to have developed into a very different character under different circumstances. Here is more evidence that astrology isn't the only, or even prime, element in personality. The planets provide a hint of potential, and just one strand in a complicated web.

9 comments:

  1. She was a real cutie. With more time and experience, and the right training, Lynndie England may well have matched her.

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  2. Hi RJ~~~ I didn't recognise the name Lynndie england, but having looked at the entry in wikipedia, I remember her reputation!

    You're right, I think. England seems to have similar potential to plumb the dark side of human nature.

    I had a very quick look at her natal chart (8 Nov. 1982, Ashland, KY) and see that she has Jupiter at the exact same degree of Scorpio (19*) as Irma Grese had.
    Veeery Inter-esting!

    Astrologer Ed Tamplin points out, at "Gods or Monsters"
    http://www.edtamplin.com/cycles/Jupiter_in_Scorpio.htm

    that

    Jupiter in Scorpio wasn’t limited to celluloid psychos. Real life ones, like serial killer Ted Bundy, made darkness a reality. Instead of evolving beyond the certainty of death, he reveled in it. Charles Manson was another caught in the base chakra of a Jupiter in Scorpio placement. The key to this is transmutation, turning the base metal into the philosopher's stone.

    One who varied between both worlds was the renowned occultist Aliester Crowley. Showing a developed sense of Jupiterian humor, Crowley modestly claimed to be the Devil incarnate and wore the numbers 666 across his forehead. But true to the spiritual mentor that is Jupiter, he rose to prominence as a leading esoteric teacher. Crowley was at one time head of the Golden Dawn, a gathering of occultists drawn from the European glitterati.


    Hmmm - i've learned something there - thanks RJ!

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  3. Hard to imagine, T that 3 years in a young womans' life could inflict such horrific death and cruelties. I had read of her before. The Holocaust has always fascinated me, not in a morbid way but I am of a very strong belief that I had a previous life as a victim. Or something. I still can't make myself go to the sites, I've planned trips before and can't go through with it for some reason.
    I think these women's backgrounds/childhoods would yield other influences.
    XO
    WWW

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  4. Hi WWW ~~~ In younger years I was always fascinated by books about the experiences of prisoners of war and their attempts to escape from German or Japanese camps.
    "Boldness Be My Friend" by Paul Brickhill is one I particularly remember about German camps, and "Naked Island" about Japanese atrocities. I never did venture into the Holocaust book-wise though, I couldn't face the thought of it.

    I agree that there must have been something peculiar in the background of women such as IG to send them on such a vile life-path.

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  5. You are entitled to your own opinion of me of course, anonymous, as I am entitled to mine, about your very rude comment.

    If you had read the last two paragraphs of my piece carefully you'd have seen that I did point out that Irma Grese was a victim of the brainwashing of Hitler's regime.

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  6. how can you claim that imre grese was brainwashed by hitler when she denied the false accusations made against her,if you had taken the time to research imre grese ,the allegations against her and the brave way she went to her death you would have not made such disgusting comments about her.ask yourself ,are you a victim of brainwashing.i await your responce.

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  7. Any truth of this matter disappeared with Grese's death. You have no better or more reliable information than I had about it. I have posted my own view based on the best information I could find. This is an astrology blog, I approached the subject of this woman from an astrological point of view only.

    No further comment on the topic will be published.

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  8. It was actually Ilse Koch who was tried for having the human skin lampshades despite what your source says...your source actually lists both Irma and Ilse as having done this...trying doing a little more research next time and you'll find that it was Ilse Koch that was tried but not convicted for this, not Irma.

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  9. Anonymous - Comments on this post are closed, as I have pointed out to the previous commenter.

    In the interests of fairness I have published yours. I was not writing about Ilse Koch, but used the information available to me.
    If the information is inaccurate, then I apologise.

    However, I was born and grew up in England, during the war and after wards. The information I posted was common knowledge after the war - 60 years ago. I would not have posted it without a source to back it up, however, as stories do get muddled over time.

    The primary focus of this post was on the astrology of Irma Grese, the added information was background for any reader who had never heard of the lady.

    Whether the detail, as it relates to human skin, is accurate or not, the main thrust of her history and what she did remains, and is relevant to the astrology here.

    This post is now closed for comment.

    ReplyDelete