However, I would be very grateful to your Honor if on this occasion you could give me the exact number.
THE PRESIDENT: There were so many that no one could count them. No one knows how many, but all of the evidence points to several million at least.
THE WITNESS: I am very grateful to your Honor for the information which you have just given me.
BY DR. SEIDL:
Q Witness, during the time you served in the war, did you meet many high SS leaders?
A Yes. I saw the majority of them on the occasion of visits at the front or whenever they were given high awards at the Fuehrer's headquarters, and also when occasionally I came to the Field Command Agency of the Reichsfuehrer-SS.
Q. Did any of the high SS leaders discuss the extermination program of the Jews with you in any form? At any time.
A. No.
Q. Did anybody at the headquarters of the Reichsfuehrer-SS ever discuss this extermination program of the Jews with you?
A. No.
Q. During the time you stated at the Fuehrer's headquarters did anybody discuss this extermination program of the Jews with you?
A. No.
Q. Since September, 1943, you were the Highest SS and Police Leader in Italy. In this capacity did any high SS officer or other member of the SS discuss the extermination program with you or similar measures against the Jews?
A. No, and I have never received an order or a similar order to this effect for my sphere of command.
Q. Did the Defendant Oswald Pohl during the war ever discuss the extermination program with you?
A. No.
Q. Did Brigadefuehrer Gluecks, and later Gruppenfuehrer Gluecks ever discuss this program with you?
A. No.
Q. I now come to my final question. What reputation did the Defendant Oswald Pohl have within the SS leadership as a soldier and as a comrade?
A. One must perhaps differentiate here between two phases, the phase until the capitulation ad the phase afterwards. Up to the time of the capitulation, and until we heard something of these atrocities in the concentration camps, which naturally because of their organizational and schematic connection incriminated the Defendant Oswald Pohl to a very large extent, until that time Oswald Pohl had a very good reputation. He was highly esteemed everywhere, and because of his energy and his comradeship and his assistance he was well liked, and he was a very respected comrade. We know that money rules the world. He was the man who in this case had to distribute the funds, and at that time, at his best time, he was the chief, there might have been some people who bore a grudge against him if he was unable to satisfy every desire. However, up to the time of the capitulation I never heard any criticism worthy of mentioning against him, besides making fun about some little human weaknesses which he had like all other mortals. After the capitulation, of course, the opinion and the readiness of his old comrades to intervene in his behalf and to expose themselves in public unfortunately disappeared to a very large extent, and I would like you to consider that point also when you ask the questions.
Q. You have previously stated that this schematic organizational connection apparently incriminated him. What do you mean by that?
A. After the attacks which appeared in the German press and the world press, and which described Pohl as the worst criminal after the Fuehrer, the Reichsfuehrer-SS, this already means a very bad incrimination because the outsider will assume that the press will not write anything of that sort without having a sufficient basis for that, and therefore after so many other horrible facts and atrocities were stated afterwards, everything seems to have turned against Oswald Pohl.
However, I, as I have already described to the Tribunal before, knew him since 1934, and I know him very closely indeed, and since I have seen what mental difficulties he had to undergo before he carried out his first divorce, and beyond that in how decent and honorable a manner he carried this through, I am still convinced today that Pohl did not issue any order for the killing of any human being and that it was not the intention of Pohl, the intentional purpose of Pohl, to work somebody to death. It is his misfortune to be connected upon orders organizationally with the most terrible problem of all centuries.
And that he seems to have been brought into connection with this, and to stand today before this Tribunal under the charge that the verdict of the IMT, has declared the SS, and with that all members of the SS from the very beginning as members of a criminal organization. And that already is a preliminary charge in itself. Of course this is a terrible handicap for Pohl, and it is also a severe incrimination which has also been placed on the hundreds of thousands of young, enthusiastic volunteers which has been thrown after them into the graves; who died without having had any idea about Auschwitz or Lublin, gladly gave their lives in fulfilling military service for their country in the belief that they had been members of the elite, the knights of the German people, and who today in their graves still are the victims of this verdict.
DR. SEIDL: I have no further questions.
BY DR. GAWLIK (Counsel for the defendants Dr. Volk and Dr. Bobermin):
Q. Witness, was it possible for a member of the SS, about after the year 1934, to honorably be discharged from the SS?
A. Not in general. There were only a few persons, extraordinary cases, and these were extra-ordinary specialists where a discharge from the Order of the SS was possible, because the SS actually was an Order and one could not enter it and resign from it at random; and only in special cases was this resignation possible. These exceptions were if somebody in looking at his ancestral background discovered that according to his ancestors he was not up to the conditions for membership in the SS. Or in the case when a marriage was to take place which required the approval of the Race & Settlement Main Office of the SS, and contrary to the disapproval of the Race & Settlement Main Office, and he insisted on marrying this woman or girl. And the third possibility which I can recall at the moment, where an exception could take place was if he left the SS and was transferred from the SS to the Wehrmacht. However, these cases only occurred very rarely, which above all, the two last, required the approval of the Reichsfuehrer SS.
In the printed service lists of the SS, a printed black book, where all the personal data of the SS leaders were contained as far as I can remember, at the end of the book there was always a space left, and it included the SS leaders who, in the course of time up to the publication of the last list, had left the SS.
This list which can be controlled very easily, as far as I can remember, was never very large and it only contained one paragraph. I think it was not even one page. That is because the exceptions were so rare and they can be determined very easily by the Tribunal.
Q. And how about resignation from the Waffen SS during the war?
A. A resignation from the Waffen SS, during the war, was practically out of the question unless the person had been wounded so severely that he was unable to serve in the Armed forces anymore.
Q. Was it possible that a member of the Waffen SS just desired to resign from the Waffen SS?
A. I don't think there is a number of cases of which I might have received knowledge. However, in accordance with the oath which I had given I don't believe that I can deny here that I myself in the year 1943 requested the Reichfuehrer SS for my resignation from the Waffen SS, and that was disapproved. At the time I had fallen into disgrace with him, and he probably was also afraid that I had become too powerful, and I had too much influence with the Fuehrer because I had worked with the SS for more than a decade from all my heart and fully convinced to do the right thing.
Q. Witness, let us go away from your personal case which was different on account of your position. But how was it with simple members of the Waffen SS, or the Hauptsturmfuehrer, Sturmbannfuehrer, and so on?
A. That was out of the question. It would have been considered as desertion and the person in question would have had nothing but the worst danger and the utmost difficulties. And if he had done this in a responsible position or during a period of crisis, certainly a court martial would have been instituted against him. I previously only wanted to state that not even I, in my particularly high position, could achieve this although I wanted to go to Africa to join my old World War I regiment as officer of the reserve.
Q. Now another point, witness. Of what did the activity of the members of the leadship reserve of the Allgemeine SS consist, which was assigned to the SS Main Office or the Personal Staff?
A. The assignment of the so-called Fuehrer Reserve of the Allgemeine SS to some of the main offices was a formal procedure, and it meant that the person concerned did not perform any active service in a unit of the SS, but that, so to speak, was at the disposition of orders.
Q. Thank you witness. I have no further questions.
BY DR. FROESCHMANN (Counsel for the defendant Mummenthey):
Q. General, you have already previously testified and you have stated that you, as one of the survivors of the Waffen SS, consider it a blame to be considered a member of a criminal organization. Do you know of the verdict of the IMT insofar as it refers to the members of the Waffen SS?
A. As I am a prisoner I only see newspaper clippings, and one time I saw an excerpt of the verdict, a mimeographed copy. And since I was completely shut off from the outside world I was unable to receive any more information about it.
Q. According to the verdict of the IMT the charge of having been a member of a criminal organization -- refers to everybody who after the first of September 1939 who was still a member of the SS and remained a member of the SS, and knew that the SS was used for criminal purposes and aims. Previously you talked about the incidents at Auschwitz and Lublin where parts of the SS took such a regrettable part. In the concentration camps too such atrocities are alleged to have been performed, i.e. by members of the SS.
I now ask you witness, how do you explain the possibility that in contrast to the honorable manner of fighting of the Waffen SS, which you emphasized, members of this SS murdered innocent concentration camp prisoners, and ill-treated them?
A. I explained this fact in the following way; at the outbreak of the war the best parts of the concentration camp guards, the so-called Death Head Units or Death Head Standarts, which in general at that time were still organized in battalions, were withdrawn from concentration camps and were organized for combat service at the fromt -- for honorable combat at the fromt. For this purpose, of course, the best men were selected. The first organization to be established in this way was the Death Head Unit which as a motorized Division first fought in France and then participated in the Russian campaign. With the increasing losses gradually all the officers and non-commissioned officers of the Death Head Units who had gone through our war or officers' schools or who had received a regular orderly military basic training were sent to the front in order to replace casualties. Then, mostly, the worst eliments remained behind, those who had not received any regular education or professional training and so on. According to the confirmation which I gained afterwards from the press and from books they took the place of the expected or hoped for elite replacements but constituted exactly the contrary of them and became the greatest shame and burden for us.
THE PRESIDENT: We will recess until tomorrow morning.
THE MARSHAL: This Tribunal is in recess until 0930 tomorrow morning.
(The Tribunal adjourned until 4 June at 0930 hours.)
Official Transcript of the American Military Tribunal in the matter of the United States of America, against Oswald Pohl, et al., defendants, sitting at Nurnberg, Germany, on 4 June 1947, 0930-1630, Justice Robert M. Toms, presiding.
THE MARSHAL: Persons in the courtroom will please find their seats. The Honorable, the Judges of Military Tribunal II.
The Military Tribunal No. II is now in session. God save the United States of American and this Honorable Tribunal.
There will be order in the courtroom.
DR. FROESCHMANN: Dr. Froeschmann for the defendant Mummenthey.
DR. SCHMIDT-KLEVENOW, a witness, resumed the stand and testified as follows:
BY DR. FROESCHMANN:
Q. Witness, yesterday before the recess you answered my questions about the reasons which lead to inhuman atrocities on the part of the staff of the personnel in the concentration camps. You probably know that according to the verdict of the IMT the SS are charged also with inhuman acts at the front, and that the knowledge of that fact for the defendants, like my client Mummenthey, for instance, should have been sufficient cause to resign from the SS. I shall now ask you how strong was the contingent which consisted of SS men within the war?
A. The contingent of the Waffen-SS at the front varied at various periods in the war. In the so-called Polish campaign, for instance, in the organization of the Waffen-SS the so-called special task troops of the SS went out, and some battalions, and three Standarten of Deathhead Units. In France, there were already three divisions, and the number of divisions increased up to the end of the war to a total number approximately of thirty-six to forty.
Q. How many men were in the thirty-six divisions, approximately?
A. As far as I know, in the course of the war there were approximately one million men who went through the ranks of the Waffen-SS, including the 300,000 dead or badly wounded.
Q. Now, General, what was the proportion between the number of guards in concentration camps and the number of men in the war? Can you estimate the proportion between those two figures?
A. As I was in Italy in the last two years of the war, I had to rely on statements made by comrades who had fought the war at home or at some official agency and therefore had more knowledge than I had. As far as I know, the guard personnel at the end of the war consisted of probably about 35,000 men. Only 6,000 of them were SS members, whereas the balance of 29,000 consisted of members of the Wehrmacht, the Luftwaffe, and to a large extent of the Reich Association of Veterans, the so-called Kyffhäuser-Bund.
Q. Now, General, during your activities in the Fuehrer SS Headquarters, did you hear about incidents whereby the SS in the field was used for criminal activities, incidents, that is, from which the conclusion could be drawn that the SS was used at all for such purposes?
A. No, such orders never came from above; and I believe it would be stupid to deny that to a modest degree and extent there were certain offenses or violations of international law on the part of the Waffen SS. But that occurred to the same extent on the other side as well. I might perhaps recall here the so-called Malmedy trial, where, according to the Dachau sentence in July of last year, more than forty members of the Leibstandarte were sentenced to death, including the demanding officer of the tank regiment, Colonel Peiper. This trial furnished evidence for the sentence of the Waffen SS as a criminal organization. I believe it is generally known that trial is about to be reviewed again because after the things which have been found out meanwhile, it can no longer be maintained. I myself in July of last year at once protested very strongly against the sentence.
Q. General, you said just now that on the whole you do not know of any incidents which would allow the conclusion that the SS was used for criminal purposes in the war?
A. May I perhaps add something here breifly as I am under oath and must not withhold anything? I just remember that in the Polish campaign the Wehrmacht charged the SS with about eight-five incidents. These incidents were discussed in the Fuehrer's Headquarters, investigated most carefully for about five months; and it became clear that from these eighty-five incidents seven or eight had been justified. That is to say, violations against international law or criminal activities had occurred. Another seven cases were a bit dubious and could not be cleared up. The other seventy charged collapsed. People who were of themselves punishable were punished as far as I remember. There were negotiations and conferences between the Reich Fuehrer SS and the then Commander-in-chief of the Army Field Marshal von Brauchitsch; and the whole thing was cleared up.
Q. Did these things become known in a larger circle?
A. After the Polish campaign in certain cases these charges were used by the Wehrmacht up to a point in order to show that in most cases the charges had collapsed; and with the criminal proceedings taken, the matter was done with.
Q. Now, General, as counsel for Mummenthey, a rather lower leader in the SS, I had to put these questions to you. Now I should like to ask you, supposing Mummenthey knew of incidents in concentration camps, was it possible for him to reach the conclusion, or could anybody reach the conclusion that these were the effect of a system of the SS such as the IMT in its sentence found?
A. In my honest, personal conviction, to the best of my knowledge and belief, no, because I believe that an even more detailed investigation of the real facts of the case would lead to a clarification of the terrible incidents which both temporarily and factually all came together immediately after the German surrender, and it reached a logical conclusion which, in my solemn conviction, will not bear the examination of history.
Q. General, I discussed that point with you because under Count IV of the indictment this comes in. But I shall now want to discuss something else with you, please. Mummenthey was the chief of a number of enterprises which are being connected with the SS. Let me ask you a preliminary question first. Did you know Mummenthey personally during the war?
A. I believe I saw him once or twice.
Q. To continue, Mummenthey was chief or business manager of a number of these enterprises. I shall refer only to the Dest, which is the German Earth and Sone Works, and the Allach Porcelain Manufacturing Company. Now, I'm interested in this question. One has to ask oneself, what did the SS, especially in view of what you said yesterday, have to do with economic and industrial enterprises? I should like to ask you, General, in this connection to tell the Court whether you know the reasons which led to the establishment or acquisition of such works and enterprises. I should like to start with the Allach plant. Do you know, Witness, what reasons led to the acquisition of the Allach Works by the SS?
A. I know that very well. As the SS, as I described yesterday, was to be an elite and select group in all sorts of fields of life, the Reichsfurhrer SS wished, and ordered to extend these characteristics of the SS to wider fields. For those reasons he created this porcelain factory in Allach as a sort of advertisement for the cultural tendencies of the SS. There extremely valuable and highly artistic porcelain was manufactured which was so first rate that all the technical difficulties were overcome which are encountered in manufacturing a horse or horseman in porcelain which are only carried by the two slim legs of the horse, without all the usual allegorical supports of the horse, such as a tree, a bush or a flower or anything like that. Even all the other famous German manufacturing places such as Meissen, Nymphenburg, etc., never achieved that technical perfection. It was the Heichsfuehrer's wish to have the two SS insignia on every single figure manufactured in Allach to advertise thereby the origin and the select quality of the SS.
Q. General, I am interested merely in the question here whether the establishment of the Allach plant was connected at all with the labor allocation of inmates, or to put it in another way, according to your statements was it possible at all that such enterprises as Allach indiscriminately would use inmates, or were conditions different? I do not want to put a leading question to you.
A. Perhaps I might add that this porcelain plant, as I remember it, up to 1938 received and needed considerable financial subsidies. It therefore was not a profit-bearing enterprise, and for that purpose the money contributed by the circle of friends, of which I was a part, was used. Inmates, as long as I still had my office in Berlin, were not used for that. It was the highly skilled, carefully trained personnel, small in number, which worked on these things.
Q. Did similar standards apply to the Bohemia plant?
A. I remember that Bohemia was acquired after the incorporation of the Sudetenland into the Reich on the basis of the Munich agreement. At that time the Reichsfuehrer was interested to have, apart from the artistic porcelain, a very nice looking porcelain and give that to his SS leaders and SS men at a cheap price.
For that reason the Bohemia was taken over at the time, and as I recall, it used a large number of workers, including native workers, consisting of about five hundred or six hundred men.
Q. Witness, now do you know anything about the reason why DEST was established, the German Earth & Stone Works?
A. Now about DEST I regret to say I am unable to say anything very exact. I am unable to make a responsible statement.
DR. FROESCHMANN: That is most regrettable because I would like to have heard you about this point. I have no further questions now as the witness cannot answer that question.
BY DR. HOFFMANN (For Defendant Scheide):
Q. Witness, it is possible that this Tribunal might put to my client that three million Jews were exterminated, and that this was a logical consequence from the party program. What is your opinion of this?
THE PRESIDENT: Your question is too broad, "What is your opinion of this". Ask him something more specific, more restricted.
Q. (By Dr. Hoffmann) Witness, in the verdict against Milch, the Tribunal explained that one point of the party program was "Citizen can only be a German. No Jew can be a citizen." Also the Jewish legislation was referred to. My question to you is, as far as the party program is concerned, and the later laws against the Jews, are these things a logical--or rather is the later extermination program of the Jews, is that a necessary consequence of the party program?
A. It is my personal conviction that it isn't, because in the party program, and above all in the instructions and the ideological training of the SS, there was never any reference to extermination and annihilation of the Jews. No propaganda of that sort was ever made.
Q. What was the solution envisaged then?
A. As far as this problem reached the Reichsfuehrer-SS or the Fuehrer's headquarters for discussions or debates, I never heard the theory of the extermination, only the theory of resettlement, and that is that.
I also believe that practically speaking that after 1933 Jews were advised to emigrate. I know, for instance, that Jewish managers of the Dresdner Bank who had long-term contracts, were compensated with 35,000 marks or 50,000 marks, and then emigrated. I know that after the wave of arrests following the murder of the diplomat Von Rath in November, 1938, emigration of Jews on a large scale was worked on and sponsored, and the purpose and intention behind it was to give people a shock by temporary arrest.
Q. Witness, how can you explain this murder in that case?
A. Perhaps I may say first of all that you and I, Mr. Attorney did not prepare that sort of examination, and I am somewhat surprised at your question, and I am now faced with the very difficult task to improvise a judgment of a profound significance. May I just finish my sentence, please? I am one of the few survivors of the people who had knowledge of and participated in the highest German leadership circles, but having been imprisoned for two years, more than on year of which was spent in solitary confinement, I was completely cut off of all possibilities to inform myself on that subject, which was unknown to me and remained unknown to me, by talking to another few of the few other survivors, thereby to reach a historically correct, tenable and responsible conclusion about which I could make a statement.
Q. Witness, perhaps I can try and help you here as far as I am able to do so. The solution of the Jewish question surely must have been discussed in your circle since 1933, and what did you discuss; actually what was said?
A. All I can do is assure you that as far as we in the SS were concerned, this may sound fantastic the first moment, we did not put the Jewish problem in the foreground of propaganda campaigns, deliberations or conferences. Our training was to the effect to think of the greater Germany, to work for that purpose, to give out best for the incorporation of all those fellow Germans who, by the shortsightedness of the Versailles dictate, which was not in accordance with German cultural national and linguistic communities.
We wanted to have the countries like Austria, Sudetengau, Memel. We wanted to have all those areas back mainly, which in 1935 voted for this, 81 percent, for Germany. We wished to settle these things peacefully in the interest of a new, greater Germany and a new and greater Europe.
These broad ideas were the training which the SS received, and it was definitely regarded as bad taste to deal with political questions of the day and discuss these things.
Q. Do you mean to say, witness, that the individual SS man was not particularly interested in the Jewish question?
A. I must say truthfully that the attitude of the SS man, as far as a negative attitude was concerned, was quite clear towards Jewry, and obviously without the accent being on hatred -- with the overwhelming majority of the SS. So, therefore, one cannot say that there was any propaganda necessary for hatred or persecution. Perhaps I may recall what I said yesterday. It would not have been in accordance with the spirit of chivalry and fairness to do anything against Jews in normal times, to enrich oneself in those times. Is that sufficient for you?
Q. But why was it that Himmler still became a hangman?
A. Well, as I said before, I do not know. I would ask you, as far as the Tribunal does not wish that I should give here my improvised and personal opinion, not to insist on my answering that sort of question, because what I am telling here I believe will one day be of historical significance, and, therefore, I would like you to understand that I do not wish to make statements about delicate matters before I am in a position to form a really extensive and well-oriented conviction - which up to this time my imprisonment has prevented me from doing.
Q. Witness, one more question. If my client, defendant Scheide, will take the witness stand, and I would ask him whether he knew anything about the extermination program of the Jews, it is my conviction that he will be justified in saying no. That answer will be somewhat difficult because no one has been able to say anything about the fact at all how the extermination came about. And I would like to ask you once again whether you could not really help a little in enlightening us because the fact that nobody knew anything will speak, in my opinion, against all of them - not only defendants in this trial but it will reach deep down into the ranks of the SS.
A. I regret that I am unable to add anything to my former statements but I am quite willing to, as far as Scheide is concerned, who is a decent SS man of long standing and I know him personally, I am quite happy to testify here that, to the best of my belief and knowledge, and to my firm conviction, he knew as little as I did. And I don't think it would be justified to expect it of him, who worked on the fringes, rather than of me who worked in the highest leadership circles.
BY DR. FICHT (Counsel for the defendant Klein):
Q. Witness, do you know the defendant Horst Klein?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. Do you know what his activities were under defendant Pohl?
A. I remember first of all his construction tasks which he carried out for the Wewelsburg. But, as far as I can remember, that was the first personal contact which I had with Klein.
Q. Now, as you yourself mentioned Wewelsburg immediately, which is the subject I wanted to ask you about, I can therefore start on that. What sort of construction program was Wewelsburg?
A. Wewelsburg is an old castle situated near Paderborn in Westphalia and which was designated by the Reichsfuehrer SS to be renovated. He decided that it must be extended and that it should become a sort of parallel to the Marienburg in Western Prussia which, of course, was the center of the old teutonic order of knights in Western Prussia. The purpose, once it was completed, was that it was to be used as a suitable locality for conferences of the highest SS leaders, Gruppenfuehrers and Obergruppenfuehrers. Originally it was to admit only male members, but later on the wives were also permitted. This program, therefore, was one which concerned the Reichsfuehrer very personally. Certain ideals also were at the back of it and its extension in peacetime was taken care of in an honorary capacity by the Reich Labor Service.
Q. Now, who ordered this construction to be carried out?
A. The order came from the Reichsfuehrer SS. He ordered it.
Q. He ordered that personally?
A. Yes.
Q. Who was in charge of the construction program at Wewelsburg?
A. That was Bartels, an architect.
Q. What was Bartels' agency? Where did he work?
A. He came from-- As the Reichsfuehrer was so interested personally, Bartels was a member of Himmler's personal staff.
Q. What was his rank?
A. Sturmbannfuehrer, and Obersturmbannfuehrer up to 1943, I don't know what his rank was at the end of the war. I am unable to say for certain because I was in Italy.
Q. Did the defendant Klein have the right to issue orders to Bartels?
A. In no way at all.
Q. Who drew up the plans for Wewelsburg and who approved them?
A. The Reichsfuehrer SS approved them and he also ordered them.
Q. Who submitted the plans to the Reichsfuehrer; who reported about it?
A. Bartels, whenever the Reichsfuehrer SS visited Wewelsburg, reported to the Reichsfuehrer and whenever they inspected the castle from room to room he suggested improvements and corrections.
Q. Was Klein called in regularly to these conferences?
A. No, I recall only one occasion when Klein was present briefly at a conference, the subject being to find out whether Klein was in a position to provide the necessary funds for a certain idea of an extension which the Reichsfuehrer had developed.
Q. Do you know that Klein in the spring of 1943 suggested to Himmler that the construction be discontinued?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you know why Klein did this?
A. At that time, when the war situation became more difficult, a general limitation and stoppage of building programs had been declared officially. Klein had justifiable misgivings that the Reichsfuehrer SS on the one hand, being the chief of German Police, would punish anybody who violated that decree, but in his personal capacity as the highest sponsor of the Wewelsburg would claim it to be an exception in this connection.
Q. Who ordered this construction program to be financed?
A. The Reichsfuehrer SS.
Q. Did the defendant Pohl have any influence on the extent and the execution of the building program?
A. No, the Reichsfuehrer SS decided on the extent and the execution. Of course he would discuss it occasionally with Pohl or Klein whether, and at what time, the money necessary to pay the firms-
Q. Was there any possibility for Pohl to interfere with the building program, that this should be done in one way and that in another?
A. That did not exist at all.
Q. Do you know the connection between Klein and the actual building? What did he do? What were his activities?
A. As far as I can recall, he had to raise the money; he had to negotiate with the local firms and local inhabitants, as well as the representatives of the church - a clergyman called Pusch in Wewelsburg and the Bishop of Paderborn - about the selling and the compensation for the land necessary for the extension of Wewelsburg.
Q. Do you know whether that purchase of the land was done on a voluntary or on a forced basis?
A. Yes, I know that. As far as I know, they were all carried out on a voluntary basis.
Q. Do you know the case of von Mallingrod?
A. Yes, I recall that. The estate owner of Mallingrod at the beginning attempted to get the Reichsfuehrer SS interested in paying more money for his estate than was actually justified. I remember extremely wall that be asked 4,000,000 at the beginning and the Reichsfuehrer-SS was highly indignant about this excessive demand and he ordered first of all to choose the method of compulsory seizure on a legal basis. Legal pressure should be applied so that the estate would be sold more in accordance with its value.
Q. Do you know if this ever was carried out?
A. Yes, I know that thereupon Mallingrod lowered his price very considerably. I believe it was between 2,7 -- or I don't remember the details. I don't remember the details, but I think it was somewhere between 2.3 and 2.7 million which were handled by the Reichsfuehrer SS in a decent and generous manner. It was an entirely friendly agreement both between the Reichsfuehrer SS and Herr Von Mallingrod, as well as the Bishop of Paderborn
Q. Do you know anything, Witness, that the owners of land in that part of the world were dissatisfied by the prices they were paid?
A. What I recall otherwise is only the so-called Kallmeier Estate, and that problem, as far as I know, was solved to the satisfaction of the inhabitants because the Reichsfuehrer was not interested in building his favorite castle at a place where, for reasons of its, strong Catholic tendencies, he did not wish to have an unnecessary antagonism against himself as the new owner of the castle.