Elli Smula

Elli Smula (1914–1943) was a Berlin tram conductor who was arrested in September 1940. She was accused of seriously compromising the Berlin Transport Authority (BVG) by failing to report for work after going out drinking with female fellow workers. Like her colleague Margarete Rosenberg, she was detained by the Gestapo in the prison on Alexanderplatz. BVG had received complaints that some of their female employees were taking their colleagues home, encouraging them to consume alcoholic drinks and involving them in lesbian sexual relationships. The following November both women were transferred to the Ravensbrück Concentration Camp where Smula "suddenly died" on 8 July 1943.