In April 1945, the 3rd US Army liberated the Buchenwald concentration camp. The Americans found survivors who had been reduced to skeletons, discovered evidence of horrific atrocities, and heard stories about the cruelty of camp commandant Karl Koch and his wife Ilse. In these stories, Ilse Koch, who had risen from being a stenographer at a cigarette company to the "commandantess," was depicted as a perverse nymphomaniac who tortured people to satisfy her sadistic desires. She noted the numbers of inmates with distinctive tattoos, intending to kill them and have their skin made into lampshades, gloves, and a photo album. Karl Koch, once a model concentration camp commander for the Nazis due to his ruthlessness and organizational skills, had been executed in 1944 for corruption and large-scale enrichment. Ilse Koch remained unpunished due to a lack of evidence.