'but many died later durina a famine.'" Now, think carefully, so that we don't have to get the police records from Vienna. Do you remember saying that?
A I can take an oath that I did not say that.
Q Do you think that the Vienna police official invented it?
A In the first place, I wasn't in Munich; I was only in Dachau.
Q Maybe it says a gypsy from Munich.
A That's right.
Q I ask you above all, did you more than a year ago when it was officially written down, say that people later died in a famine?
A Yes.
Q Who kept the records in the camp during the experiments?
A What kind of records?
Q Records as to the course of the experiments, how much water was drunk, whether people had fever, and so forth.
A The records of fever and pulse, partly Pillwein and partly myself.
DR. STEINBAUER: Mr. President, might I ask that the fever charts be produced, inasmuch as the witness said he helped to record them, that they be shown to him for identification? They are right here.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, the fever charts may be shown to the witness.
(Charts handed to witness and examined by him.)
Q Are these the records which you kept at the time?
A Yes.
Q Who compiled these records?
A Pillwein and I.
Q Didn't some of the prisoner-doctors write some of these records?
A I don't know.
Q Were the people weighed?
A Yes.
Q Who weighed them?
A Pillwein.
Q Did he always record the weight?
A Yes.
Q Can you show me where he recorded the weight and tell me. in particular who entered these final weights at the right, at the top?
A I was never present when that was done.
Q You don't know?
A No.
Q How were these people quartered? What kind of accommodations wore they given? Were they in dirty barracks, or in clean beds -
A They had nice beds.
Q Did it look like a stall or like a decent hospital?
A No, it didn't look like a stall, but one can't say that it looked like a decent room either.
Q I am afraid I don't understand you.
A It was more like a camp.
Q But it was clean and neat.
A Yes, it was clean.
Q And then when the people left the experiment, were they given food that was more than the camp food or less?
A It was the same as the regular camp diet.
Q Weren't they given additional food?
A I don't know anything about it.
Q Didn't you give out milk just after the experiments were finished?
A I don't know anything about it.
Q But you must know about it, if you helped to distribute the food to these people every day.
A I wasn't there every day.
Q Oh, you weren't there every day? You have already said that nobody died during the experiments, is that true?
A Yes.
Q Now, when were the experiments finished?
A Three weeks later, when I came.
Q When was that? Can you give us the date?
A I can't say.
Q Was it January, February, March or August?
A It was in July or August.
Q Couldn't it have been September? Look at the charts. Look at the charts. The date is on there.
(Examined by the witness.)
A Yes, August -
Q And -- look carefully.
(Charts again examined by witness.)
AAugust, September.
Q That's right: August and September. The last man finished drinking his sea-water and then what happened?
A Then special experiments were performed.
Q Mr. Vorlicek, you don't understand me. When the experiment proper was finished, completely finished.
A Yes?
Q Then what happened? Did they all stay together? Was the laboratory loft there or were things taken away?
A No, it was dissolved. The people wore sent back to the Block.
Q That's the time I want to talk about. Who packed up the things, the bottles, equipment, scales and so forth?
A I don't know.
Q Did you not help?
A No.
Q Were the gypsies still there?
A I don't know, because I went back as a patient.
Q When did you leave?
A I can't say that.
Q Was the hospital where you were sent far away from Station 11?
A There were five Blocks between them.
Q Did you have an opportunity during this period to sec one or another of these people at the beginning of September, the middle of September?
A No.
Q You didn't see any of them?
A No.
Q You didn't see Pillwein either?
A Yes.
Q Who examined the blood?
A They were Frenchmen.
Q Did they know how to do that?
A I don't know.
Q Were they locksmiths, electricians?
A No, they were doctors.
Q. I see, they were doctors. Now we will talk about the weighing. Did the people gain weight or lose weight?
A. They lost weight.
Q. How long did they lose weight?
A. All the time.
Q. As long as they Were in the experiment?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you know, since you helped to write the records, whether, at the end, after the people were out of the experiment, their weight was higher or lower?
A. That I do not know.
Q. Did you see anybody with a high fever?
A. At the most, up to 38 or 30.
Q. 33, or 39. Was that at the beginning of an experiment or at the end?
A. I can't remember that.
Q. Were you ever present when an experiment was stepped or changed?
A. Yes.
Q. How was that done?
A. The patient was sitting and Dr. Beiglboeck undertook the experiment and when the patient began to cry...
Q. No, that is not what I want to know. I want to know how the experiments were stopped in the case of the individual persons. Were they given something to drink, or to eat, or did they just say "You can go now?" Did they give them an injection? What happened?
A. He went back to bed.
Q. When he was given water again, did he recover quickly, or did it take days?
A. I don't know.
Q. Pillwein says in his affidavit that at the end of the exper iment all tho experimental subjects were still there and they were given a few days special care and then released for labor.
Can you confirm this sworn statement of Fritz Pillwein?
A. No.
Q. Why not?
A. Because I didn't take any interest in it.
Q. Do you consider it incorrect?
A. No.
DR. STEINBAUER: I have no further questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Any questions of this witness by any other defense counsel? Any re-direct examination by the Prosecution?
DR. HOCHWALD: No further question on the part of the Prosecution, your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness is excused from the witness stand, there being no further questions to be propounded to him.
Does the Tribunal understand that the witness, Haagen, is now available?
MR. HARDY: The witness Haagen is now available, your Honor, and will be called by the defense counsel.
DR. TIPP (Counsel for the defendants Schroeder and BeckorFreyseng): With the permission of the Tribunal I should like to call the witness, Haagen, for my two clients.
THE PRESIDENT: The marshal will summon tho witness, Haagen.
DR. TIPP: Mr. President, the witness has been brought from French custody. It is to be expected that he will be put before a Military Tribunal in France. I should be grateful if the Tribunal would inform him that he does not have to testify anything that will incriminate himself, but that, whatever he does say must be the truth, in the customary form.
MR. HARDY: Before the Tribunal advises the witness, may I request how long Dr. Tipp anticipates the examination of this witness will take on his part and how long it will take on the part of defense counsel Fritz for Rose and if any other defense counsel will want to examine him?
THE PRESIDENT: Will counsel enlighten us upon that point?
DR. TIPP: I will need about a day and a half, Mr. President. I believe that Dr. Fritz will not take very long; I think 2 or 3 hours will cover Dr. Fritz' questions, but I cannot say for usre. I also know that my colleague, Dr. Nelte, for Handloser, would like to ask a few questions, but this will not take very long.
MR. HARDY: It seems to me, Your Honor, that a day and a half will be a considerable length of time for examination of this witness. I should think the defense counsel could cooperate with one another and substantially reduce the time.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal would appreciate defense counsel expediting examination of thid and other witnesses to the greatest possible extent.
EUGEN HAAGEN, a witness, took the stand and testified as follows:
BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q. Witness--do you hear me?
A. Yes, I hear you.
Q. You are now about to be sworn as a witness before this Military Tribunal I, trial of the case, the United States versus Karl Brandt and others. I desire to inform you that you are not required to answer any questions which may be propounded to you by any party or by the Tribunal itself if, in your judgment, answering those questions would tend to incriminate yourself. Do you understand that?
A. Yes, I have understood that.
Q. If at any time you are in doubt upon any matter you are privileged to ask the Tribunal's advice upon that subject. Do you understand?
A. Yes, I understand that.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness will now be sworn.
BY JUDGE SEBRING:
Hold up your right hand and be sworn, repeating after me the oath:
I swear by God, the almighty and Omniscient, that I will speak the pure truth and will withhold and all nothing.
( The witness repeated the oath.)
JUDGE SEBRING: You may be seated.
DIRECT EXAMINATION
BY DR. TIPP:
Q. Professor, you are here as a witness for the first time before this Tribunal. To avoid difficulties I should like to point out to you, purely from a technical point of view, that to make the translation easier you will have to make a pause between question and answer and wait for the interpreter.
Now, Professor, your name is Dr. Eugen Haagen. You were born on the 17th of June 1898 in Berlin. At present you are a prisoner in the Court Prison in Nurnberg. You are a doctor of medicine by profession and your specialty is hygiene and bacteriology,--is that correct?
A. Yes, that is correct.
Q. Now will you please describe briefly to the Tribunal your medical training and career?
A. From 1919 to 1923 I studied medicine in Berlin. In 1923 I took the State examination. In 1924 I was licensed as a physician and at the same time received the Degree of Doctor of Medicine. After that I studied internal medicine as an intern and later as an assistant at the First Medical Clinic, at the Charite, in Berlin, under Geheimrat Hiss.
Q. Now, professor, please describe your specialized professional training.
A. In 1926 I became a scientific assistant in the Reich Health Office in Berlin, in the Bacteriological Department in Berlin-Dahlem. There I founded the department for virus and tumor research, a new field of research, which was to be set up in the Bacteriological Department of the Reich Health Office at the time. Already as an assistant I did quite a bit of -I may say- fundamental work in the field of experimental virus and tumor research in this position. In 1927 I already became a member of the German Central Committee for fight against cancer. In 1928 I received the annual prize of the Reich Health Office. Since I was very much interested in learning the American methods of virus research, I went, in 1928 as an assistant to the Rockefeller Institute for medical research in New York, where I remained for about one year. There I worked with Dr. Rivers on experimental questions of smallpox and herpes, especially immunology research with the aid of tissue cultures. As a result of this work....
DR. TIPP: Please speak more slowly with this difficult material, witness.
A. The result of this work was published in American scientific journals. During this time I was merely on leave from the Reich Health Office. In 1929 I returned there. In 1930 I became Regierungsrat and was appointed Extraordinary Member of the International Health Department of the Rockefeller Foundation in New York, with the assignment to work at the yellow fever laboratory of this Institute and to try to breed the yellow fever germ, work which had been attempted already for years without any success. I succeeded in 1931-32. This work was published in American and German journals. I succeeded, for the first time, in making artificial pure cultures of the agent causing yellow fever. Important work of American scientists Was built up on this, and this culture made it possible to develop a vaccine against yellow fever which is used throughout the world today and was of great significance for the Allies in tropical warfare.
After this 3-year interruption of ay work in Berlin I returned to the Reich Health Office and was appointed a member of the Reich Health Office.
A. (cont.) There I continued to work in the Bacteriological Section as head of the department for virus and tumor research and when in the course of the incorporation of Prussia into the Reich the Bacteriological Section was dissolved, my colleagues and I moved to the Robert Koch Institute which is also in Berlin. On the 1st of March 1936 I became department chief and professor there. I continued to work there too in the same research field; that is, virus and tumor research. In 1933 I received the Hans Arendsen prize for my work in the field of infectious diseases. On the 1st of October 1941 the Robert Koch Institute made me a regular professor of bacteriology and hygiene at the University of Strassbourg where, at the same time, I became director at the Hygiene Institute. I remained there until Strassbourg was taken in November 1944.
For reasons connect d with the war, on approximately the 1st of September 1944 I already took part of my institute to Oberschreiberhau and, when we had to evacuate this town, we went to Thuringia -- that is, Saalfeld on the Saale -- where in April 1945 I was captured and put under arrest by the Americans.
Q. May I ask you witness to tell the Court briefly about your fate after you were taken prisoner.
A. From Saalfeld I was taken to an American interrogation camp in France. There I was interrogated about a number of questions in the field of virus diseases and from there I was sent to various American PW and internment camps.
On the 10th of November 1945 I was brought to the court prison in Nurnberg and interrogated thoroughly about my work.
Q. Professor, were you interrogated here by the Office of Chief of Counsel for War Crimes?
A. Yes, I was interrogated on behalf of this office on the subject.
Q. And the subject of the interrogations, what was it?
A. I was interrogated on the same charges which are the subject of the indictment in this trial.
Q. Were you shown documents in the course of this interrogation, Professor?
A. Yes, I was shown documents, documents which I have not seen again among the records of this trial.
Q. Can you tell us the result of this interrogation?
A. I was not told the result of the interrogation but after about two months, in January 1946, I was taken from Nurnberg to the Hersbruck internment camp. From there I was sent to Plattling. There is another internment camp. Then on the 15th of June 1946 I was released in Plattling by the American Army to Saalfeld in Thuringia and I returned there.
In Saalfeld I received a call from the Russian Military Government to head a newly founded institute for virus and tumor research in Berlin. I answered this call, and I worked in this institute which is attached to the Institute for Medicine and Biology until the 16th of November 1946 when, on the occasion of a visit at Zehlendorf in the American sector, I was suddenly arrested by a British military policeman without any warrant or any document. I was taken away by force and was kept hidden for two and a half months in an English prison in **den. This was obviously a case of kidnapping.
Only in January 1947 I got out of this prison. I was turned over to the French authorities and was taken to Strassbourg where I have been in custody ever since. On the 16th of May I was transferred here.
In connection with this trial, Professor, we are interested in the military positions which you held during the war. Will you please tell us briefly what they were?
A. From 1936 to 1939 I was in the Reserve. I was always in a position of a consulting hygienist with the air force physician, of the first air Force in Berlin. On the 26th of August 1939 I was called up for war service as Oberarzt in the Reserve, again as consulting hygienist for the physician of the First Air Force. My activity a s consulting hygienist, as the name says, consisted primarily of advising the air force physician on hygienic questions.
This activity made it possible for me, even during the war, to continue working at my civilian job at the Robert Koch Institute.
When I was called to Strassbourg on the 1st of October 1941 I was first given a leave. Then I was no longer working as consulting hygienist. As late as the summer of 1943, at the request of the chief of the medical service of the Luftwaffe, through the mediation of Professor Rose, I resumed the position of a consulting hygienist, this time for air force physician, Reich, who was also in Berlin. My position was again the same advisory activity and I was able to continue my work at the institute in Strassbourg, that is, my research and my teaching activity. My activity as a consulting hygienist thus consisted of primarily of trips to check hygienic conditions with the troops; secondly, of drawing up factual reports which could be important for the air fleet physician; and I held this position until the collapse.
Q. Your military ranks, Professor? Could you list them, too?
A. As I said, on the 26th of August 1939 I was called up as an Oberarst (First Lieutenant) of the Reserve; then on the 1st of April 1941 I became Stabsarzt, (Captain); then on the 1st of January 1944 I was promoted to Oberstabsarzt, (Major).
Q. Then your promotions were quite the normal thing?
A. Yes, quite normal.
A. And one more question on this subject, Professor: in your various positions, civilian as well as military, who were your superiors?
A. First, I shall discuss my civilian positions. As a member of the Reich Health Office my immediate superior was the president of the Reich Health Office and the next superior agency was the Reich Ministry of the Interior. As professor and department chief at the Robert Koch Institute my superior was the president of this institute and this, as long as the Institute was under Prussia, the Prussian Minister of the Interior; later, when it became a Reich institute, the Reich Minister of the Interior.
As a professor at the University of Strassbourg, I was immediately under the rector and the curator of this university arid also under the Minister of Education.
My military superior during the way was always the same air force physician of the First Air Force or air physician, Reich, in Berlin. I may point out that, as consulting hygienist, I was not in a position to issue any orders myself, but if I wanted to have orders carried out I had to make suggestions to the air force physician which he passed on as orders to the subordinate agencies or units. My reports, mostly factual reports, went directly to the air force physician and, when he considered it advisable or when there was an order to that effect, he passed them on to the Chief of the Medical Services of the Luftwaffe.
Q. Professor, did you not hold another position which might be of interest in connection with this trial?
A. Yes, I had another position as hygienic consultant of the health director of the government in Alsace.
Q. That was after you became a professor in Strassbourg?
A. That was from 1941 on.
Q. And who was your superior in this position?
A. In Strasbourg?
Q. Yes.
A. That was the health director with the Alsatian government.
Q And a final question, Professor, were you a member of the NSDAP?
A Yes, I was a member of the NSDAP.
Q Did you hold any office or rank in the party?
A No, I had no office and no rank in the party.
Q Now let's go on to your work, Professor. What specific fields of work did you have in detail?
AAs I have already said my work was that of virus and tumor research, including tissue cultures which has a great significance in this type of research. I dealt primarily with virus research because parts of the tumors are among the virus diseases. Here I was primarily interested in discovering the causes, that is finding the virus responsi ble for the various virus diseases, breeding this virus, making it microscopically visible and in connection with that, questions as to immunity. Then I also dealt with the development of vaccines against virus diseases. Virus production on a large scale, however, never interested me. Since this is not the duty f a research worker in normal times but the war created conditions so that for military reasons and also for general reasons it became necessary to accept such vaccine production assignments.
Q Well, we will come back to vaccine production later. I should like to ask you now, witness, since when had you worked in this specialized field?
A Since I entered the Reich Health Office, since 1926.
Q And what diseases, Professor, were you specifically interested in?
A In the course of the years I worked on quite a number of virus diseases. I can only mention small pox, herpes, influenza, various forms of inflammation of the brain, psittacosis, than tumor diseases and then the diseases which are of interest primarily in this trial, typhus, yellow fever, epidemic jaundice or hepatitis and influenze.
Q Professor, your work is very important here and in connection with your work, the research assignments which were issued to you. First I should like to ask you to speak as generally and briefly as possible on research assignments in general.
A From the files which I have seen here I have seen that the term "research assignment" has been considerably misused. The term "research assignment" is not a clearly defined term with only one meaning. It must be divided into various groups, the majority of the research assignments came about because the scientists asked for assistants because largo funds are generally not available to tho institutes for research but in Germany we had the Reich Research Council which developed from the unfortunate position of German science and. during the war we had an opportunity to ask the medical inspectorate of the various branches of the Wehrmacht for research assignments. Then one made an application, one indicated the subject and the problem one wanted to work with, and the reasons why this work was important and why one needed assistance. If this application was approved, then as a rule this involved financial support but this was especially important during the war. In these research assignments we had an opportunity to obtain material and equipment which had become scarce because of the war and also an opportunity to employ additional personnel and to have some of tho more important workers deferred. It also happened, but rather rarely, that tho agency which I have mentioned, issued the research assignments. These were generally development assignments, especially in the field of technique, physics and chemistry. I cannot remember any such assignments in my field of bacteriology and particularly virus research. Tho third group one cannot call research assignments, but simply production assignments, which the institute did not like to accept, for instance, vaccine production, that was the duty of industry, in this case, the serum and vaccine industry, but during the war we had to subordinate such objections and be willing to take over production assignments.
Q Witness, will you please look at document book 8, look at page 6, The document I should like to discuss with you is Prosecution Exhibit No. 137, Exhibit 189. It is a letter from you to the Rector of the University at Strassburg dated the 7th of October 1943. In this letter you ask that the Hygiene Institute be recognized as a war plant and under the numbers 1 to 5 you cite a number of research assignments. Will you please tell us, Professor, under which category of the question you have just mentioned the various assignments fit?
A I will go into the individual assignments briefly one after the other. The first assignments is a production assignment for yellow fever vaccine given out by the "Reich Aviation Ministry and the Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe from the Medical Inspectorate. This is purely a production assignment.
The second one also issued by the Inspectorate of the Medical Service of the Luftwaffe is an assignment on typhus vaccine, again a research assignment.
The third assignment is also from the Aviation Ministry, Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe, Chief of the Medical Service of the Luftwaffe, subject, influenza. It was a pure research assignment to discover the cause of the disease. It included the development of a practical procedure for the development of vaccine, a research and development assignment, but not a production assignment.
The fourth assignment was issued by the Reich Research Council and refers to typhus. It is also a research assignment.
The next one that is listed is also an assignment of the Reich Research Council on hepatitis, or epidemic jaundice, This was a subject I was especially interested in.
Q Now this Tribunal is especially interested in the following question, witness: In working on these research assignments were you under the supervision of the offices which had given you these
A No, in my capacity as director of the University Institute I was working only under the Rector and Curator of this University and then the Reich Ministry of Education.
Q In such research assignments and production assignments, was it customary, Professor, for the work of the scientists to be checked in any way?
A No, there was no right to check the work nor any duty, as an Institute director is in an independent scientific position and no one got the idea of exercising any control. If one had a research assignment one was merely obligated at certain intervals to report on the progress of the work and with the aid of these reports the agency that issued the assignment decided whether it was worth while to continue the work, or not, that is, whether it was worth while to issue further funds and so forth.
Q: Now, was it not another duty, that is, to give an accounting of the money?
A: Yes, of course, accountings were generally given at least that was the case with us. The money was administered by the University Treasury and the accounting went through that office.
Q: Professor, you said you worked with research on small pox, yellow fever, jaundice, influenza, and typhus. Now, I should like to go on to various research work. Going over these research assignments, Mr. President, it will be necessary to use certain specialized terms repeatedly as was shown in the Rose case. In order to avoid long theoretical explanations I have asked the witness to make a brief affidavit of this subject. I believe that will serve the Tribunal's purpose better than a long discussion. I have put the document in Becker-Freyseng Supplemental No. 6, which is not ready yet. I have the necessary number of English and German copies here and I should like to ask the representative of the General Secretary's office to distribute these to the Tribunal, the Prosecution, and the interpreters so that I may read it now.
Professor Haagen was in America for many years and he has given the affidavit in German as well as in English. There are two originals. I think that is the best way to avoid difficulties. I offer this as Becker-Freyseng Document 75, it will be Exhibit 51 for Becker-Freyseng, and here is the original.
THE PRESIDENT: Copies of the affidavit in the German language will in due time be furnished to the Tribunal I assume?
DR. TIPP: Yes. I will bring it tomorrow morning. I am afraid I don't have enough right now. So that it will be understandable, Mr. President, I should like to read the most important parts of this affidavit. No. I deals with the professional concern of the witness. I have already gone into that. I needn't read that I begin on page 2 - 11.
II. Therefore I believe myself able to give the following short statement about the terms, used especially in virus research.
III. 1). Virus means originally poison or better living poison. Today virus means a group of germs of a special kind.
2). Virulence - the total action or effect of the virus.
DR TIPP: Virulent is the adjective.
3). The action of virulence is establishes essentially by the presence of a pathogen and an antigen factor.
a) pathogen - pathogen action - capacity to produce a typical manifest disease.
pathogen for human being - the virus produces a disease in human being.
pathogen for animals - the virus produces a disease in animals. A virus may be either exclusively pathogen for human being or pathogen for animals or pathogen for bath at the same time.
b) antigen - antigen action - capacity to produce a specific immunity or specific antibodies against a later infection in question.
4) One doesn't speak of a virus virulent for human beings, but of a virus pathogen for human beings.
5) Only living virus is virulent, that is to say active in some way. Killed by physical or chemical means it looses at the same time its activity or virulence, that is to say the antigen and pathogen factors disappear. Than the virus is a virulent. It is not able to produce immunity or disease.
6) Infection - introduction of a germ or active parts of it into the body without regard to the special action.
7) Not every infection must result in a manifest diseases.
8) Toxic - poisoning action.
Toxin - poisoning part of virus with a pathogen and an antigen factor.