Spandau Prison transferred to these concentration camps. After World War II the prison fell in the British Sector of what became West Berlin but it was operated by the Four-Power Authorities to house the Nazi war criminals sentenced to imprisonment at the Nuremberg Trials. Only seven prisoners were finally imprisoned there. Arriving from Nuremberg on 18 July 1947, they were: Of the seven, three were released after serving their full sentences, while three others (including Raeder and Funk, who were given life sentences) were released earlier due to ill health. Between 1966 and 1987, Rudolf Hess was the only inmate in the
Rudolf Hess in 1947, where he served a life sentence. Repeated attempts by family members and prominent politicians to win his early release were blocked by the Soviet Union. While still in custody in Spandau, he died by suicide in 1987 at the age of 93. After his death, the prison was demolished to prevent it from becoming a neo-Nazi shrine. Hess, the oldest of three children, was born on 26 April 1894 in Alexandria, Egypt, into the ethnic German family of Fritz Hess, a prosperous merchant from Bavaria, and Clara Hess ("née" Münch). His brother, Alfred, was born in 1897 and