Since the inoculations did not take place, we do not, of course, know whether there would have been such reactions.
Q. Professor, if I understand you correctly, the anti-infectious effect of your vaccine was tested by you, in the way you have just described, in the course of your first vaccinations in December of 1943 and January of 1944 in Natzweiler. Was this planning that is described in Document NO-127 essentially different from the work that you had previously carried on in Natzweiler?
A. There was no fundamental difference; the only difference was that the vaccine had been stored away for a longer time in the second case, so that we anticipated that the vaccine would have matured further; thus we could expect a further reduction in the reaction to the vaccine, but it could be proved only in practice to what extent this would actually be the case. This again was a testing of the tolerability of the vaccine.
Q. Do I understand you to say that these plans were never put into effect and that in January of 1944 was the last time you carried out inoculations in Natzweiler?
A. Yes, no further vaccinations were carried out in Natzweiler.
Q. Now I shall have to turn back to the testimony of the witness Edith Schmidt. On 9 January 1947, page 1378 of the English transcript, Edith Schmidt said that your vaccinations in Natzweiler were continued until July of 1944. Now, did you make many trips to Natzweiler in the summer of 1944?
A. Yes, I was in Natzweiler several times during the epidemic in the summer of 1944. I went to the camp at irregular intervals to assist the doctors who were combatting the epidemic there, which had reached considerable proportions. I did so to deliver the delousing apparatus, which has already been mentioned, but no vaccinations were being administered at that time. That was prevented by, among other things, the fact that I had many military duties and as consulting hygienist simply was not in a position to spend the time carrying on observations in Natzweiler.
Therefore I had no time to carry out inoculations.
Q. But, Professor, Fraulein Schmidt said that you went to Natzweiler with all your material and from this she drew the conclusion that further inoculations were carried out.
A. It is true that in my trips to Natzweiler I took material with me. These were packages of phenol which were to serve for the sterile extraction of blood for the Weil-Felix reaction. This test was carried out by us during the course of the epidemic. The doctors at the camp had no test tubes and no sterile apparatus for taking blood tests, and that is why I took this material with me, and this is the material that Miss Schmidt saw me taking along, although it bore no direct relationship to the typhus laboratory.
DR. TIPP: May it please Your Honors, the witness Schmidt herself said during her testimony that she merely concluded that the inoculations were continued at Natzweiler, but she did not say that she had any knowledge of her own on this fact.
BY DR. TIPP:
Q. One question that arises from your testimony yesterday, witness. You said that you had no virus strain in Strassbourg that was pathogenic for human beings. Where did you get your Rickettsia strain of lice typhus with which you manufactured your vaccine?
A. This lice typhus strain was a virus sent us by Professor Giroud from the Institut Pasteur in Paris; this typhus virus had gone through several animal passages and it was sent to us in this form from Paris. This was the only laboratory strain that we had.
Q. Professor, wouldn't it have been very easy, or at least a layman imagines this to be so, to breed a strain pathogenic for human beings, or can that not be done so easily in the laboratory?
A. Well, perhaps the layman thinks it is very easy to obtain a strain pathogenic for human beings, but we know from literature that this doesn't seem to be quite so easy. If one wishes to have such a strain, then one must catch the infected persons at a very early stage.
Q. Professor, you are using the term "infected persons". What do you mean by that? Do you mean real, actual cases of typhus, or do you mean artifically infected persons?
A. I mean natural cases of actual typhus. As I was saying, in general one does not know when the actual infection began.
The infected person reaches the clinic only after the disease has progressed into a relatively late stage. At this point in the course of the disease, unfortunately, the Rickettsia virus is no longer in the blood but has already taken up its residence in the tissue. Thus an extraction of blood and passage through animals succeed in only a very small percentage of the cases, and only in early cases. Thus you will see that transmission is not so easy and does not always achieve its goal. A really successful transmission to animals - this we also know from literature - can usually be done only if a human being is used so that the virus is passed through the human organism first. In other words, it isn't so easy.
Q. Then I can sum up as follows: You had no strain pathogenic for human beings. Further, neither in Natzweiler nor in Schirmek did you carry out experiments in which you infected prisoners with a living virulent virus that was pathogenic for human beings. You simply used your living, that is to say, virulent, virus in Schirmek and Natzweiler for purposes of protective vaccination. Furthermore, you said that the experimental aspects of your work consisted in testing the tolerability of the vaccine and that you collected further data for the study of typhus vaccine production, is that correct?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, Professor, I turn to the next point, namely, the research assignments that you received. At the very beginning of your testimony you said that your typhus research rested on your own initiative and that to receive aid, particularly financial aid, in this research you applied for research assignments, is that correct?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. Would you please tell us again from whom you received these assignments?
A. Some of them I received from the Reich Research Council, others from the Medical Inspectorate of the Luftwaffe.
Q. Perhaps we had better turn back to Document NO-137. Document Book 12, page 76.
This is your application to the rector of the Reich University Strassbourg, 7 October 1943, in which you ask that your institute be accepted as a military installation. Will you please take a look at this document and tell us how it came about?
A. This application is based on a circular letter sent out by the Reich Ministry of Education to the rectors of all the universities. In this circular letter we were asked to state whether our institutes were militarily necessary, to decide whether or not we should receive corresponding assistance. Here is an application for a research assignment under No. 2 here from the Luftwaffe Medical Inspectorate, namely, a research assignment in typhus vaccines. No. 4 is another typhus application. It was issued by the Reich Research Council. Again the subject is typhus, and this is a purely research assignment.
Q. professor, one question about this last point. This application of the Reich Research Council bears the note "top secret". Why is this top secret?
A. That I can't tell you, but I assume that during the war such themes were handled as top secret and were given preference in terms of priority of raw materials, and so forth. I can't give any other reason. They received a very high priority rating.
Q. Then you don't think, Professor, that there were any reasons for maintaining secrecy in this matter?
A. No, I don't, and that can be seen from the fact that the results of this work were subsequently published.
Q. I am, of course, particularly interested in No. 2, the assignment you received from the Medical Inspectorate of the Luftwaffe. Tell me, Professor, which Referat of the Medical Inspectorate took care of the typhus assignments, and with whom did you carry on negotiations?
A. The Hygiene Referat was the one I negotiated with. This was the Referat that concerned itself with virus questions. I negotiated first of all with Professor Rose, as he has said several times, then with Dr. Atmer. He was the Referent for Hygiene. And then I spoke with the man in charge of the funds, Amtsrat Grinzel.
Q. You said that you negotiated with Rose as consulting hygienist and with Atmer as the competent Referent. However, as you can see from this document, the research assignments all bear the file number 55, and also the Referat number 2 II B. These are the numbers of the Referat for aviation medicine. Consequently the prosecution has assumed that Dr. Becker-Freyseng had something to do with the giving of these assignments, because he was the competent Referent in the Referat of which this is the file note. What do you have to say about that?
A. As scientist and consulting hygienist I really concerned myself very little with file notes and such matters. Consequently I cannot give you any really satisfactory information on this point. I do know that the file note 55 always meant research, because it always appeared on research assignments. And I do know that all applications for research were worked on by the Referat for Aviation Medicine. But since I didn't belong to this agency, I didn't concern myself with the red tape that went on inside the Medical Inspectorate. I simply went to Mr. Atmer or to Professor Rose if I wanted their support.
Q. Professor the Prosecution has asserted that you received orders from Dr. Becker-Freyseng, to carry out your research assignments. Did you?
A No. I never received an order. I can't imagine how such an order or even instructions for scientific work could have been worded. I don't think that any of the gentlemen there had such insight into this work as to have enabled them to give me any instructions. In addition, research cannot be directed according to orders or directives, because the path that is to be taken is precisely what the research man is trying to find out.
Q Then, Professor, I understand you to say that you received no orders from the Medical Inspectorate in this direction. Was your work supervised by the Medical Inspectorate or, more specifically, were you checked on in detail in the course of your work by the Medical Inspectorate?
A You cannot speak of any such thing as supervision or checking on my work. They did not have thorough enough knowledge. Of course, the gentlemen in the Medical Inspectorate were interested in the progress the work was making, and I spoke about it with several gentlemen, for example Professor Rose, as he himself has said.
Q Well, Dr. Becker-Freyseng said here on the stand that he visited you once in your Institute in Strassbourg in July 1944. This visit has been touched on briefly during your testimony. May I ask you now when you first made Dr. Becker-Freyseng's acquaintance?
A I had heard of Dr. Becker-Freyseng and knew that he was subordinate to Professor Anthony in the Referat for Aviation Medicine. I made his personal acquaintance on a trip from Heidelberg to Freiburg in Bresgau, in June or May of 1944, and then Dr. Becker-Freyseng visited me the end of July 1944, at Professor Schroeder's suggestion, in order to discuss with me the problem of acquiring experimental animals. He was to find out my specific wishes in this matter, because at that time he was in charge of acquiring experimental animals in the Medical Inspectorate Dr. Becker-Freyseng had connections with Dr. Suchalla, who was breeding animals on a large scale, and he wanted to mobilize this man's energies for me.
This, however was not done in Strassbourg, but Dr. Suchalla visited me in Oberschreibergau, where we discussed setting up the necessary apparatus for breeding and where he promised to provide me with the necessary animals. Dr. Suchalla visited me then, because Dr. BeckerFreyseng could not give him any full satisfactory information about my needs and requirements.
Q You also mentioned a visit by Professor Schroeder. Can you tell us when this visit was?
AAt the end of May 1994, Schroeder visited me in Strassbourg and spent a few hours with me in the Hygienic Institute.
Q Perhaps you could tell us what happened during this visit?
A It went in the way any visit from a high military chief would take place. I showed him through the Institute, particularly the animal section, which interested him greatly; then we had a conversation in very general terms that concerned itself with my scientific work.
Q At these visits from Dr. Becker-Freyseng and Prof. Schroder, was there mention of the fact that you had carried out or intended to carry out experiments in Natzweiler or Schirmek?
A No, I don't think so. At least I can't remember any mention of that.
Q Now, Professor, regarding these research assignements, you said that you received no orders as to how the assignements were to be carried out - you received no commands or directives. You said that they were not supervised and that you spoke neither with Dr. BeckerFreyseng or Professor Schroeder about details, such as the vaccinations in Natzweiler or Schirmek. Now to return to the research assignments. Undoubtedly you reported on them, didn't you?
A Yes. It was, I believe prescribed that every quarter or semi-annually a report was to be sent in on the progress that one's research was making.
I was very irregular in meeting this requirement, which is quite understandable because one cannot procedure results, at any prescribed date, of the sort that one can report on. Now and then I did sent interim reports to the Medical Inspectorate, but I did not abide by that directive very often. It was, for purely factual reasons, impossible to give reports on specified dates.
Q Can you tell us what the contents of these interim reports were?
A In general, leaving out all the details, we described the progress the work was making, My reports were sent in, first of all, when I was specifically asked to send in a report; or secondly, when I had used up all my funds and had to give some reason for wishing additional funds. These reports were much the same in form as the one here to the Reich Research Council. In other words, they were very general in form.
Q Witness, the Prosecution has asserted that from your interim reports the fact could be seen that the innoculations, or the experiments, as the Prosecution calls them, were carried out on prisoners. Did you mention any specific details in your interim reports?
A In these interim reports I certainly did not mention any specific details, if only for the reason that no researcher gives information on his plans and results before the work is concluded. The only thing that could interest the Medical Inspectorate in this matter was when I could begin large-scale manufacture of the vaccine, and it was not necessary to go into details in order to give them this information.
Q Professor, none of your interim reports to the Medical Inspectorate are here in evidence. However, there are many documents referring to yo-r typhus research as such. We want to go through these documents to find out whether there is anything in them that you carried out experiments on human beings. You wrote to Hirt, as we have already seen, but we can ignore that because that does not concern the Medical Inspectorate. Do you agree with me?
A Yes. That is true. What I sent to Hirt was copies of letters I had sent elsewhere.
A Then, witness, please turn in Document Book 12 to page 86. This is a letter from you of the 27th of April 1944, to the Reich Minister of Aviation and Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe-L-in 14-in other words, to the Medical Inspectorate. This is Document NO-302, Exhibit 302. This document is pretty long, Professor; perhaps you could just tell us briefly what it is about and specifically tell us whether there is any indication in this document that you innoculated prisoners experimented on human beings.
A I have this document before me. It is simply an opinion on a vaccine production by a firm. This letter mentioned here of 8 January 1944, does not seem to be here, nor can I remember what it said, but it can be seen from this document here what the subject must have been. I was asked to test this vaccine because there were doubts as to its efficacy. This vaccine was a killed virulent from the Behring Works. On contrast to the vaccine of Koch, Gildemeister, and myself, this vaccine used not only the irtelline sac but--
Q Witness, I don't think the details are of interest to the Tribunal. This, then was a vaccine manufactured, by somebody else, the Behring Works, and you were to test it. Now, how were you to test it and how did you test it?
A.- The testing was carried out in the laboratory. It was ascertained microscopically whether the vaccine manufactured by the Behring Works contained more or less Rickettsias than the vaccine made accor ding to our specifications.
Q.- I believe that is enough for this point. Then the testing was carried out in the laboratory?
A.- Yes, in the laboratory and with the aid of a microscope.
Q.- And the result of this test is set down here in this letter?
A.- Yes.
Q.- Then this letter has nothing to do with any inoculations or experiments?
A.- Nothing at all.
Q.- Then let's turn to page 98, the next document, Document NO-131, Exhibit 309, a letter of 29 August 1944, Saalow, from the High Command of the Luftwaffe. It bears the file number 55 and the Referat notation "2IIB". It is addressed primarily to you. It refers to a letter of 21 June 1944 from you. Can you recall what that letter had in it? It was not offered in evidence.
A.- No, I can't, but from this letter here I can more or less reconstruct what it must have been. I assume from this, as can be seen from Number I, that I am requesting additional funds for typhus research. When so doing, as I have said, I always sent in brief reports on my work. I gather from paragraph 2 and 4 that I wrote that my work was proceeding satisfactorily that the vaccine had already been testes in practice and had proved its efficacy, namely, in Natzweiler in the summer of 1944 during the epidemic there. I mention this because during that epidemic our vaccine had proved itself.
Q.- Then there is discussion of setting up a manufacture for vaccine, and you have already said that you intended to undertake this manufactury in your institute at the request of the medical Inspectorate.
I believe that we can skip that point now, but I am afraid I have to bother you again about tins file number. Again we have the file number 55, and this time the Referat additional notation "2IIA."
THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, when you read that series of numbers before you read "2IIB." On the Tribunal's copy it is "2IIA."
DR. TIPP: This document, Your Honor, bears the notation "2IIA" whereas the former document bore the number "2IIB". NO-131 has the number-
THE PRESIDENT: The translation seems to be "B."
INTERPRETER: My fault, your Honor.
BY DR. TIPP: *' Q.- From this file notation, witness, the Prosecution has drawn the conclusion that all the contents of this letter, numbers 1 to 4 were worked on by Dr. Becker-Freyseng, the Referent for Aviation Medicine.
What do you have to say to that?
A.- To that I can only say that this was a hygiene matter and, in my opinion, must have been worked on by the Referent for Hygiene; namely Atmer, or at best by the consulting hygienist, Prof. Rose.
Q.- The Prosecution lays great weight on paragraph IV in this document. This paragraph reads, and I quote: "The report of 21 Jume 1944 in which the investigations at Natzweiler are mentioned should have been sent as secret." From this the Prosecution draws the conclusion that in your letter of 21 June 1944 there must have been some mention of experiments or inoculations in the concentration camp of Natzweiler. Can you explain that, witness?
A.- This report dealt with a typhus epidemic, as you can see from paragraph III in this letter, and typhus epidemics in any camp were to be reported on as secret. That was a general directive.
Q.- Then, witness, you say that this request for secrecy has nothing to do with any experiments in a concentration camp.
A.- No, as I said, the fact that there was a typhus epidemic in the camp was enough reason for having the matter kept secret.
Q.- Now, witness, let's turn to Document NO-132 on the next page of the document book, a letter from you dated 19 September 1944, to the High Command of the Luftwaffe, Chief of the Medical Service. The re ference is the document we just discussed, namely, NO-131. This, then, is your reply to that letter. Who in the Medical Inspectorate received letters of this sort?
A.- This again is a hygiene matter, and I know for certain that these were handled either by Dr. Atmer, who was the Referent for Hygiene, or by Prof. Rose, the Consulting Hygienist.
Q.- Now, witness, in conclusion, regarding these two documents, you said that this typhus epidemic and thus also your investigations were carried out in the concentration camp of Natzweiler, but here in Document NO-132, you speak of the camp as such.
A.- That is to be traced back to my duty to maintain secrecy. I could not give precise details.
Q.- In other words, you didn't mention the fact that Natzweiler was a concentration camp?
A.- No. I did not.
Q.- That concludes the discussion of the interim reports, and now I shall turn to your final reports. What sort of reports did you have to turn in when a piece of work was finished?
THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, how long will your further examination of this witness continue?
DR. TIPP: I think I shall be done by the intermission.
THE PRESIDENT: You mean you estimate fifteen minutes further? The Tribunal will now be in recess for a few minutes.
(Thereupon a recess was taken.)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
May it please your Honors, the defendant Porkorny having been excused by the Tribunal yesterday is now absent from the Court.
THE PRESIDENT: The Secretary General will note the absence of the defendant Porkorny pursuant to excuse by the Court on request of his counsel.
The Tribunal now desires to announce that the Tribunal will be in session all day Saturday of this week. Some time ago the Tribunal made an estimate of the time that would be necessary to finish the taking of testimony in this case. That estimate has now been exceeded and the end is not yet. The Prosecution informs us that they have five more witnesses to call in rebuttal, and the Tribunal, while feeling it necessary to expedite the taking of testimony, and while not desiring to hamper either the Prosecution or the Defense, the Tribunal will hear the witnesses who are offered, but it may even be necessary due to circumstances beyond anyone's control that the Tribunal will even proceed to hold night sessions, but in any event the Tribunal will be in session all day Saturday of this week for the usual hours, and preparations will be made to have luncheon served in the Courthouse as usual on ordinary court days.
Counsel may proceed.
BY RR. TIPP:
Q.- Professor, we come now to your final reports. In what form did you make these final reports?
A.- I did not submit any specific final reports, but when the results seemed to be worth publication I submitted a manuscript for approval, and the contents of the manuscript were at the same time the final report.
Q. And how many manuscripts, that is, now many final reports were submitted by you, Professor?
A.- As far as the typhus work was concerned, two manuscripts of that kind were submitted as final reports, one was published subsequently, that is, at the beginning of 1944, the other study, which concerned. vaccinations with the louse vaccine, was published at the end of 1944.
Q.- And where were your papers published, Professor?
A.- "Zentralblatt fuer Pathologie." (The Central Journal for Pathology).
Q.- These papers have not yet been submitted in this trial, only various documents referring to them, witness. First of all the document of the Prosecution NO-128, Exhibit 307, that is in Document Book No. 12 on page 95 of the English and 97 of the German book. It is the letter with the heading: "Medical Academy of the Luftwaffe" Training Group Science and Research, 7 July, 1944, and it is signed by Oberstarzt Professor Dr. Luxenburger, Witness, from that document I should like to discuss merely one point with you, and that is the following: It is mentioned here, about the middle of the page, that one has to compare the results or vaccines with the average fever charts of the experimental on the one hand and the control persons on the other hand. May I ask you to tell us, you know the contents of your papers, what control persons are referred to in connection with that work?
A That study contains the results of vaccination with a living virus, and the most essential point was the fever charts were attached to these manuscripts originally. They are charts of average figures which later, for reasons of saving space, had to be omitted. I should like to emphasize in this connection that the original author, the man who wrote this paper, put innoculation and infection or the same level.
Professor Rose has also already spoken about that point in detail. As far as the central subjects mentioned, are concerned, that is the one group of vacciness who were only treated with the sacrification method. I believe that is about the most important thing I want to mention in that connection.
Q Now, witness, the main points in this connection could be soon from your study - that your vaccinations or experiments as we can read from this document were carried on in a concentration camp and on concentration camp inmates.
A No, of concentration camps nothing was said here. The vaccinations , as I have said, were in connection with a typhus epidemic in a concentration camp, and there was a duty to keep such matters secret, as I have already pointed out. I may also refer to my publication where I mentioned vaccination in a unit in order to act according to instructions.
Q The fact, therefore, that you had made vaccinations in concentration camps could not be seen from this study?
A That could not be seen from it.
Q Witness, then there is another document from which it can be seen that the Reichsfuehrer-SS, the SS Wirtschafts-VerwaltungsHauptant and, also the Institute for Military Scientific Research was to be mentioned in this study. That remark is in Document NO - 129, Exhibit 308, page 97 of the English and 98 of the German Document Book. That remark might lead the reader of that study to believe that your research was in some connection with the SS or the administration of concentration camps.
Let me ask you, did your work, your study, have that notation already when it was submitted for approval for publication?
A No, that can be seen beyond doubt from the dates. Document 128, which contains approval for publication of my study, was dated 7 July 1944, whereas the document just mentioned, where that passage can be found, dates from 10 July 1944. So that that footnote was added later because one couldn't help but comply with that request.
Q In summarizing, Professor, may I say, therefore, that interim reports were made only at irregular intervals and did not contain any details regarding your work? Your final reports consisted in submission of scientific studies designed for publication? And from neither kind of report could one see that your work was conducted in a concentration camp, is that correct?
A Yes, that is correct.
Q Now, unfortunately, concerning those reports I have to put to you a witness testimony which does not entirely agree with your statement. That is the testimony of the witness Olga Eyer who was examined on 15 January 1947. Her testimony is on page 1761 of the German and 1759 of the English transcript. Could you tell us first what the position of Fraulein Eyer was in your institute?
A Fraulein Eyer, as I have already said, was my secretary in the Hygienic Institute at Strassbourg and was entrusted with the care of my correspondence based on stenographic notes, as is usually the case. She sat in the anteroom before my office.
Q That witness said here, Professor, that on your experiments at Natzweiler quarterly reports were sent to the Mededical Inspectorate. She furthermore stated that from what could be seen from these reports fifty prisoners had been vaccinated with virulent typhus virus. Can you say any more, or tell us with whom you had correspondence by way of reports, etc.
A I had to send reports only on my research assignments and that, as I have mentioned before, to the Reich Research Council and the Medical Inspectorate of the Luftwaffe, These were reports which I made in my capacity as a research man or director of the Hygienic Institute.
Then I also had to submit reports, beginning with the middle of 1943 particularly, in my capacity as Consulting Hygienist, to the Air Fleet Physician and those, as I have said already, were mostly reports on experiences which were passed on to the Medical Inspectorate. My correspondence, as you can imagine, was very extensive and it may be assumed that in fact every three months a report of some sort or other was made, either to the Medical Inspectorate or to the Reich Research Council. Considering the large number of assignments I had that was quite possible, but it is not correct that regularly every three months I reported to the Medical Inspectorate about vaccinations, because that was hardly possible, since altogether vaccinations were administered only twice -- in May 1943 and in the winter, that is December 1943 to January 1944. It is incorrect that from any report it could have been seen that I had innoculated fifty prisoners with virulent typhus virus. The witness Eyer no doubt refers to the document previously discussed here, where I requested another 200 prisoners for vaccination, and where I mentioned the fifty control persons. That letter I dictated to her. I have also discussed that here already. The witness apparently from this request drew the conclusion which she presented here.
Q Professor, the witness furthermore told us that from your report it appeared quite obvious that those experiments had been conducted on human beings, specifically on inmates of concentration camps. Could you say anything about that?
A Yes, I have already elucidated this point, and reports are available; if the witness mentions my letter to Hirt, She is right, but I have to object to the expression "experiments on human beings" in the sense which is understood in this trial.
As far as reports to the Medical Inspectorate and the Reich Research Council go she is mistaken; or her recollection is not quite correct.
Q You mean to say, Professor; that the witness confused your letter to Hirt with the reports to the Medical Inspectorate and the Reich Research Council?
A Yes, I could not think of another explanation -- that must be a mistake.
Q In this connection may I refer the Tribunal to the fact that the witness Eyer in cross-examination -- on page 1770 of the English transcript -- was forced to withdraw in part her statement made in direct examination. She had to admit once that she did not understand much about the contents of these reports because she was not a specialist in that field. And she furthermore had to admit that as far as the contents of the report to the Medical Inspectorate are concerned she may have been mistaken, that she did not have exact knowledge about that.
Professor, there are two more points to clear up. First, your connection with Professor Hirt. You have already, if we may say so, explained what kind of correspondence you had with Dr. Hirt. Were you in any relation to Hirt? Did you work together with him in a scientific field? Did you participate in Hirt's experiments at Natzweiler?
A I can say the following. Professor Hirt and myself were faculty colleagues. And our relations were of course those of colleagues. He was the expert on anatomy at the University of Strassbourg and I was the hygienist. That already shows that our fields of work were entirely different.
No close cooperation on any scientific or any similar field ever took place with Professor Hirt. In particular, we never made any scientific studies together at Natzweiler.
Q Then you were at no time an assistant of Professor Hirt in his work, as the Prosecution alleges?
A. No, I was never an assistant of Hirt.
Q. The last point which still needs to be clarified is the question of the vaccinees, or, as the Prosecution calls them, the experimental subjects. You told us that the vaccinees were members of various nationalities. Now, we have had three witnesses here who said literally the same thing; that is to say, that these vaccinations in Schirmek were made only on Poles. That was stated by the witness Eyer, as well as by the witness Hirtz, and that statement is also contained in an affidavit by a Dr. Schuh of the 18th of November, 1946, and all three of these witnesses have testified that they protested to you against these experiments at Schirmek, and the assistant at that time, Dr. Graefe, had stated that there were no misgivings against this work because the experiments would not be conducted on human beings but on Poles. Could you say anything about the assertions of these three witnesses?
A. It seems to me quite impossible that these three people, at the same time or one at a time allegedly protested to me in almost the same words. I am of the opinion that the statements of these three witnesses were, in fact, put in their mouths for obvious reasons. A protest of that kind was never expressed to me, and I have never made a statement in such poor taste; that Poles were not human beings. I consider it quite impossible that Dr. Graefe said anything similar.
Q. The last question, witness, that is concerning the experimental subjects. That is to say, the vaccinees. You told us that your vaccinees at Schirmek were not volunteers. May I ask you, were your vaccinees at Natzweiler volunteers, and if they were not volunteers, why did you believe that you could waive the principle of their being volunteers?
A. In this case may I again refer to what I have described breifly before. The vaccinees were not volunteers. They were selected by the camp command, and the only influence I had in their selection was that I could stress the medical points of view.