Ilse Koch (22 September 1906 – 1 September 1967), was the wife of Karl-Otto Koch. (Before getting married, Koch's maiden name was Margarete Ilse Köhler.) During World War II, Karl-Otto Koch was the Commandant (commander) of the Nazi concentration camps at Sachsenhausen, Buchenwald, and finally Majdanek. In 1947, Ilse Koch became one of the first important Nazis to be tried by the United States Military.
Mass media around the world covered Ilse Koch's trial. People who had survived the Buchenwald and Majdanek camps talked about how she enjoyed abusing prisoners at the camps. For example, they said she used to like beating prisoners with her riding crop, and that she used to make prisoners do exhausting exercise because she liked watching them suffer. In Germany after the war, Koch was seen as "the concentration camp murderess." She was accused of having prisoners with interesting tattoos murdered so she could take their skin as souvenirs.
The prisoners at the concentration camps called Koch Die Hexe von Buchenwald ("The Witch of Buchenwald") because of she would act cruelly and sexually towards prisoners at the same time. In English, she has also been called "The Beast of Buchenwald," the "Queen of Buchenwald," the "Red Witch of Buchenwald," the "Butcher Widow," and, most often, "The Bitch of Buchenwald."