Those who were sent there were selected through the medical examination, and those whom I saw were from selections carried out made especially by Schilowski, and of that man I already have spoken.
Q He was an SS Dictor?
A Yes, an SS Doctor. These prisoners were used for the hardest labor, which was in mining at Dora and Lohr; they worked in salt mines. For instance, the Commander of Gansleben, there they used to work in clearing up the debris after bombings. You must observe that the workers under the commanders were compelled to work under most difficult of conditions of bombing, and the guards became harsher and harsher. factories, and so forth. Here is a special case in Buchenwald. There were two factories at Muehlbau and Rusthof. They were armament factories, and I know they were erected by the workmen, and was carried out, this work, by non-military prisoners. In this special case there was a sort of rivalry between the SS, and the managers under the direction of the factory. The managers of the factory were concerned with the output and tried sometimes to get additional food for the prisoners, and the laborers then who worked there had certain advantages over the others, but they were kept in permanent quarters because these prisoners had no contact with the outside world.
Q You spoke of the military aspect. You spoke of the lack of military relation. These prisoners, however, they were ill treated, were they not?
A Yes, of course. You may hear of that in a moment. Final detail: the prisoners were utilized in more than one way. After their death the ashes Which came from the crematory were placed in the same ditch as the excrement, and this served to fertilize the fields around Buchenwald. I give this detail as it struck me very vividly when I was a prisoner. Finally I said, the work Whatever it was, it was for the prisoners. There was no chance to survive, and as soon as one way or the other they could no longer work they were lost.
Q Didn't they use the prisoners to supply blood?
A I'11 get to that point. I skipped that point. The prisoners who were assigned to light work, whose output was rather slight, were utilized as blood donors.
As a member of the Wehrmacht came in for blood occasionally or on several occasions, I saw at Buchenwald to obtain blood from these men, this blood was taken from them in room called No.2.
Q First, was this done because of their superior qualities?
A It might have been for no reason. It seems significant that these persons in camp had nothing to do with the administration of guard duty in the camp. They came from Schilowski. They belonged to the same division as the SS. Finally, they were utilized in a more recent time in their special way. In 1945, or in the first months of 1945, some who belonged as members of the Gestapo came to Buchenwald to get all the papers of the deaths, so that they could do away with the cross-identity, and to make out false papers. They admitted they were especially utilized to make a false picture, and for using the papers of the dea persons by other persons whom we didn't know. One of the persons disappeared, and I don't know what became of him. We never heard of him again, but this utilization of the items of papers was restricted to the dead. They called on a place which was called the Geldverwaltung with several hundred of the prisoners, who were subject to indications of a reversive nature concerning their identity, and concerning their connections, and under what circumstances they were shown such. Then it was pointed out that they could in no case receive any correspondence, and also of those who should not receive any packages. The contact with the outside world more normally was made less.
We were very concerned about our comrades. As soon as it came to happen, I only want to point out, what use was made of the prisoners who used these false identification cards -
Q What were the results of this sort of life?
why, there was but one result: the general human degradation. This human degradation was insured by the living conditions which I have just pointed out, It was rather a systematic method that there should be an implacable will to degrade these men, and to refuse them a common life, and to reduce them to the lowest possible human level. together, of all kinds of men, and we can see that all different categories of prisoners should be put together, such as, political prisoners and military prisoners, the racial elements, the criminals, the common criminals, criminals from all nations were put together with the compatriots, and all nations were placed together. That degraded the situation. It was dreadful. Then there was the question of hygienic conditions, of forcedlabor, and compulsive labor.
I shall cite for example: Pointing out the mixture of calling together of the different prisoners, and I saw in March 1944 but not since General Duval Geyer. He was in Paris with me. On that day in the evening he was completely exhausted, and not being able to stand, he died shortly after he returned. I saw General Vernaux, who died, and in room number six. Where he had died on a straw mattress there were excrement, and, concerning all dying persons, I saw several who died and one man I saw die -you were to mention? women. He died also on a straw mattress and it was covered with mud. He died from a tubercular malady. I also observed the death of a man named DeLipkowski, who during one time was a very brilliant soldier. He had received from the German Army a war army distinction. He was down in Paris, and anybody who went to Paris and knew this military colleague esteemed his career, and he died wretchedly during the winter of 1944. I still have another, a Belgian Minister Janson who was in a small camp in a condition He died wretchedly. Physically and morally he had reached the extreme condition and the report is, loss of his reason. I only cite special, extraordinary persons, such as generals.
insured, the prisoners were raised up against the other prisoners. you found your professor?
A Yes. Professor Leon Kindberg, my former professor. I was a pupil of this learned man in "Hotel Bijonne".
Q At Paris?
A Yes, at Paris. A man of very great culture and very brilliant intelligence. In January of 1945 I learned that he had just come from Monnawitz. I found him in Block fifty-eight, in the block where normally there should be three-hundred, men, and there were twelve-hundred, and hundreds died from cold, Russians, Czechs, considerable prisoners, and Jewish persons, in a horrible state of wretchedness. I didn't recognize Leon Kindberg when he resembled the ordinary type which you see in this block. His intelligence no longer existed. It was hard to find anything of the man that I had formerly known. We succeeded in getting him out of that block, but unfortunately his health was too impaired and he died shortly after his liberation. were committed towards the men?
A "L.B." after the Armistice was in Toulouse where he practiced physiology. He was a physiologist. I know from absolutely sure sources that he had absolutely taken part in no activity which existed against the Germans who had occupied France. In one way he was considered to be a Jew, and demanded to be a Jew he was arrested and deported. He came to Buchenwald after having gone through Auschwitz and one of the other camps. committed?
A I knew of his activity during occupation. All I can say though, it was nothing to do with the Germans.
Q Count DeLipkowski, what about him?
ordinarily imputed to those guilty of social crimes. The last means used to obtain that end was that all the prisoners should be completely degraded, so as to torture them, to ill treat them, to cause prisoners to ill treat other prisoners, I can give you an example: In Vanzleben, I will say, that is seventy miles from Buchenwald, Command A-6, there were prisoners of all nationalities there. There was there prisoners of France. I was there, and I had seen General Dubarry and Bebal, and -
Q Was he a Catholic?
A Yes, a Catholic. At Vansleben the hangings took place in public, and in the same hall of a factory belonging to the town, and the SS were present in uniform, in party uniform, in their uniform with decorations, and they were present at these hangings. The prisoners under threat of the most violent blows were forced to be present at these hangings. At the time when they hanged these unfortunate beings, the prisoners had to make a Hitler salute, There was worse than that:
One prisoner was selected to pull away the stool on which the person had been who was to be hanged. He could not but he had to carry out this order, as it was dangerous not to do it. Finally, the hanging was carried out, and the prisoners had to decide that they had to come and touch the body, and every exact detail carried out of looking into the eyes of the man who had been hanged. Thus I believe the men who had been forced to undergo this ceremony soon lost their humanitarian view and attitudes. camp, and all the executive work was given over to the prisoners, that work concerned the executions which were carried out by particular prisoners. The hangings were carried out by German prisoners assisted by other prisoners, and the police work was done by prisoners also. When some one in the camp was to be hanged, these other prisoners had to go and get it, and take it to where they were to be hanged. The commandos whom we knew well, were called; I'll say particularly in Dora and Lora, these were extermination camps. The prisoners who selected those to go over, was a selection made by the other prisoners. Thus they made prisoners descend to the lowest possible human level by forcing them to be executioners of their own brothers.
orders for the extraction of those who were incapable of work, and there was carried out these executions by men who were made by the other prisoners under the supervision or control of the SS, where this Block bore a very inhuman point of view of the greatest crime one saw committed, for men were forced to torture their fellow human beings so they never must come back to life, and their characters were profoundly mortified.
Q Who were those responsible. Who was responsible for these crimes? then I can tell. One thing that struck me particularly, that these methods which I observed in Buchenwald, I found them also in Auschwitz as almost exactly the same as found in all the camps. They were in a way the same in which the camps were run with uniformity; with a method which showed that there was a uniform superior order. In Buchenwald, the personnel , as hard as they might have been, would not have initiated such acts, and, moreover, Dr. Lolling, the SS doctor himself always alleged superior orders. Even the name most frequently used was that of Himmler. Other names were involved, or brought up for Block sixty-one, the extermination block. The name of the chief doctor of all camps, Dc. Lolling, was frequently brought up, especially by SS doctor of the camp, Dr. Vonkenser. Of other selections of infirmed prisoners and Jews who was sent over to Auschwitz, or Bergen-Belsen, for acts I remember the name of Pohl Polizei.
Q What were the functions of the POHL? German people as a whole, or could they come to their knowledge? the convoys, and at the time when our convoys arrived there in the camps in cars, in certain freight cars, the prisoners were naked, and others were clad, and the population who were at the station where they arrived were quite numerous, and they saw these convoys.
Some people were aroused, and some incited the soldiers and the SS to so utilize brutal methods, and there were others there in the population that could be informed. Then first of all, the commandos who work outside the camp at Buchenwald. There were work commandos who went to Weimar, some went to Erfurt, and some others went to Vena. They left in the morning and returned in the evening. Then during the day they were in places where this civilian population was present, and in the factories with the prisoners, or the supervisors, who were not military. During all day long the supervisors made the prisoners work in the same factory where there were civilian workers. That was the case in Weimar. insured by the civilian service. I have seen civilian trucks come into the camp, or wards. Those in charge of the railroads were forced to know about these things. The numerous trains which came every day and brought prisoners from one camp to another, and from France to Germany, where these trains were directed by German railroad men. In Buchenwald there was the regular railroad service which ended at the station of Buchenwald. This was the end of the line; then those in charge of the railroad could be informed about these convoys. could hardly fail to be informed of those things, also those working in the factories, and, I'll add that there was an extension where sometimes a German prisoner received a visitor. I know of a specific German case of a German who received visitors from his family, and he could hardly fail to inform them of what was going on. these camps, for all of these reasons.
Q What about the Army?
A The Army knew about these camps. At least, so far as I could tell you from being in Buchenwald. At least once there was a contest, or a mission, so a group of officers came to visit the camp. Among these officers there was the SS. I saw on very very many occasions members of the Wehrmacht, members of the Luftwaffe, who came and made these inspections, and sometimes we even were even able to identify these personages who visited the camp.
Really so far as I was concerned, 22 March 1945, General Bungrowski came to visit the camp, and stayed there a long time in Block sixty-one. He was on his inspection accompanied by General --- a general in the SS, and the Chief Doctor of the camp, Dr. Schilowski. Another point, and the very last time --
Q Excuse me for interrupting you. Will you tell us about Block 16. general debility who were so weak that they could no longer carry out any work whatsoever.
Q Is it from personal observation that you can tell us about Block 16?
Q And who was the general? General Bungrowski?
Q And a doctor and an SS general?
Q Were there any members in the camp from the university circles? doing this work that I speak of. We found ourselves faced with cases which a doctor would not be able to observe now. These cases have been described in recent times in manuals. These instructions were prepared and came particularly from the University of Jena. On the other hand, there were also some exhibits which were not truly anatomical and which came from the university.
Q You personally saw these tattooings prepared in the universities? How did they get these tattooing exhibits? Before our arrival, according to witnesses -- I am now speaking of people that know about it -- a man was killed and then he was to be tattooed. This was in Buchenwald. I am telling now what someone told me. I was not there at the time The commander of the camp, a certain Koch, executed men who had particularly interesting or artistic tattooing on their skins. The person who have me this information comes from Luxembourg. His name is Nicholas Simon, and he spent six years in Buchenwald, and under exceptional conditions he was able to observe very closely.
things.
THE PRESIDENT: We had better have an adjournment now.
(Whereupon a recess was taken from 1540 to 1550 hours.) BY M. DUBOST: stating to the Tribunal that Koch had been executed, not in punishment for the crimes that he had committed on the internees under his guard, but because of numerous small misdeeds that he had been guilty of in connection with his service.
Did I understand the explanation of the witness correctly? I did not specify the generalities of the accusation. I cannot affirm that he was exclusively accused of small misdemeanors, but I know that was part of the accusation.
Q Have you nothing to add?
A I can say that this information came from Dr. Owen who was arrested at the same time as he was, who was set free again, and who, in the latter period, that is, during the first months of 1945, was back in Buchenwald.
Q What was his nationality?
Q He was interned?
A He was an SS. He had been arrested, Koch and himself, at the same time. Owen was liberated and came back to Buchenwald with his rank and his functions in the beginning of 1945. He was quite willing to speak to the internees and the information that I have given comes from him.
M. DUBOST: I have no further question to ask of the witness.
THE PRESIDENT: Are there any further questions?
MEMBERS OF BRITISH PROSECUTION: No.
THE PRESIDENT: Does any member of the defense counsel wish to ask any questions?
BY DR. MERKER (Counsel for Gestapo): Buchenwald were not something specifically characteristic of the camp Buchenwald, but could be traced back to a general order that applied to all camps. You stated, as grounds for this, that you had seen similar methods applied in all other camps. How am I to understand this expression "in all other camps"?
A I spoke of the concentration camps. I emphasized specifically some of them, Mauthausen, Dachau, Sachsenhausen, kommandos like Dora, Lora, Estora, Vansleben, Ebensee, only to mention those.
Q Were you personally present in those camps?
A I personally went to Buchenwald. As for precise testimony as to the others, I collected it amongst my friends who had been in those camps Moreover, the figures of the dead were sufficiently eloquent to prove that in all those camps they exterminated people in the same manner.
BY DR. BABEL (Counsel for SS and SD):
Q. I should like to know which block you belonged to. Perhaps you can tell the Court how the prisoners were divided in the blocks. They were marked with certain exterior signs. Some of them had a red spot on their uniforms, and others a green spot, and so on.
A. As a matter of fact, there were a number of escutcheons or insignia of individuals who were all in the same kommandos. I am going to make this clear. In the kommando of the terrace where I was, I was working side by side with German common-law criminals. I was under the orders of German commonlaw criminals who had a green insignia. From the point of view of nationality in those kommandos, there were Russians, Czechs, Belgians, and French. The badges were different; the clothing was identical, and in this particular case we were even under the orders of common-law criminals.
Q. I didn't quite understand your answer. My question was whether the prisoners were divided into specific categories that were distinguished by some sort of sign or insignia, blue or yellow, or what not.
A. I said that in the camps there were different badges, triangular insignia, which were in principle assigned to different categories, but all these men were exposed to the same regime finally.
Q. I didn't ask anything about their treatment but about their distinguis ing insignia.
A. For the French -
Q. (Interpolating) I speak of all nationalities, bot only the French.
A. I answer for the French, whom I best knew. The red escutcheon, or badge, for political prisoners was given to all, including the attorneys, who had been interned for common-law crimes. I observed the same thing among the Czechs and the same thing also among the Russians. That there had been different badges planned for may be correct, but that it was effectively used is not so. I come back to my earlier statement: Even if they had different badges, they were all mixed together and exposed to the same treatment and to the same results.
Q. We have already heard that the prisoners of various nationalities were mixed together. That is not what my question was.
THE PRESIDENT: You are speaking too fast
DR. BABEL: Yes. Thank you. BY DR. BABEL:
Q. You were in the camp a long enough time to be able to answer my question. How were the prisoners divided? As far as I know, they were divided into criminal, political, and other groups, and each of these groups was characterized by specific insignia and their clothing was green colored or red or some other color?
A. There were different badges or insignia for different categories, but that had been merely provided for. These categories were mixed together. Those who belonged to the categories of common-law criminals were mixed with those who belonged to the political group. However, there were blocks where certain specific groups were distributed, but they were not specifically distributed according to their categories, their individualities, or external insignia.
Q. I have been told that political prisoners wore blue insignia and that the criminals wore red ones. Now, you have already said that the criminals wore a green sign and that other people wore other insignia. I want to know about all these different groups of prisoners and what insignia they wore.
A. It is correct to say that different insignia did exist. It is exact to say that there had been provided different categories, but to remain within the truth, it must be emphasized that the use of these insignia wasn't applied with respect to the French physically. They only had political insignia, which added to the confusion, because any one was considered as political prisoner, those who were common-law criminals. The insignia did exist. They were intend ed to separate the different categories, but they were not systematically employed. They didn't use them at all with respect to the French prisoners.
Q. If I have understood you correctly, you have stated that the French prisoners were all registered as political prisoners?
A. That is correct.
Q. Now, among these French prisoners you said that there were not only political prisoners but also common prisoners?
A. There were.
Q. Have I expressed your previous answer correct? Is that what you have said?
A. That is exactly what I said. I said that there were common-law criminals who had not merely green insignia, which they should have worn, but they wore the political insignia.
Q. What was your activity in the camp? You are a physician.
A. I arrived in January, and for three months I was assigned to the quarry and the terrace. Then I was assigned to the infirmary, that is to say, in the infirmary of the camp.
Q. What was your function there?
A. I was assigned to the service of ambulance for internal diseases.
Q. Were you able to act on your own? What sort of orders did you receive regarding the treatment of the patients in the infirmary?
A. We acted under the control of an SS doctor. We had a certain number of places to hospitalize some of the patients. In the proportion of one out of twenty, patients could be hospitalized. As far as medicines were concerned, we had practically nothing. I practised in the infirmary until the liberation.
Did you receive instructions regarding the treatment of the patients? Did you receive any sort of orders regarding the treatment of the prisoners or any orders to the effect that they should be allowed to die?
A. In this connection I received the order to select the patients who could not be cured and to send them to extermination. This order I have never executed.
Q. Were you told to choose those who were to be exterminated? I didn't understand. Will you please repeat your answer? I didn't understand.
A. As far as orders are concerned, I did receive the order to select the most serious cases of sickness to be sent to Block 61, where they were to be exterminated. It is the only order which I received concerning patients.
Q. Where they were to be exterminated? Were you told that they were to be chosen and selected for extermination? You said they were to be sent to Block 61.
Were you told what was to happen to them in Block 61?
A. Block 61 was under the control of a non-commissioned officer by the name of Wilhelm, who himself supervised the executions, and he gave the order to select the patients to be sent to that block. I suppose that the situation is sufficiently clear.
Q. That is the conclusion that you draw. You didn't receive specific instructions in this regard?
A. The statement that incurable patients were to be sent -
Q. (Interrupting) I am struck by the fact that you are not able to answer my question simply with yes or no.
Nothing more was added. All who were sent to Block 61 were executed.
Q That is something different. But you didn't observe that yourself? That you found out by hearsay? All you know is that those who were sent to Block 61 was under the control of an attorney by the name of Remisch. I was only the doctor who could enter there. I was able to remove a few of the patients; the others died, you would have nothing to do with it?
Q (Interrupting) If you received instructions to take people from your infirmary to Block 61 and know what was going to happen to those people, how is it that you participated in that?
Q I see. And if Germans had received such an order, what would have happened to them?
A What Germans are you speaking of? German internees? was employed there. If he received such instructions and had refused to follow them, what would have happened to him? order, it meant death. In fact, however, we could fail to carry out those orders. I insist upon the fact that I never sent any one to Block 61. in the camp. If one has never seen a camp it is difficult for one to imagine the actual conditions. Perhaps you could give the Tribunal a short description of how the camp was divided, how it was organized? tion of the camp. I should like to ask the President whether it is useful for me to return to this subject.
THE PRESIDENT: If you want to put any particular cross examination to him to show he is not telling the truth, you can, but not to ask him for a general description.
BY DR. BABEL: guarded. Within this camp there were barracks in which the prisoners were housed. How was this inner camp guarded?
THE PRESIDENT: Will you kindly put one question at a time? The question you just put involves throe or four matters. part of the camp separated from all the rest of the camp? and how is it guarded? the rest of the world by an electrified barbed wire network.
Q Where were the guards? the Camp and at the gate; and they had patrols within the camp itself.
Q Within the camp? Within the barbed wire enclosure?
A Obviously within the camp. And also within the barracks. They had the right to enter anywhere. supervision of one German SS and that within this enclosed inner camp there were no guards, that the Germans - who were there, were not for the purpose guarding, but just on general duties of keeping the place in order, and that these Germans within the enclosure were assisted by so-called Kapos who also aided them. It could be that the situation was somewhat different in Buchenwald. I had this information from Dachau. testimony, by indicating that the camps were under the direction of the SS in a manner sufficiently known, and moreover we know that the SS utilized the internees as intermediaries in many instances, as I suppose was the procedure in all of the other concentration camps. proceed - because I can see right away that I cannot get any clear answers. But I should like to ask one question:
described regarding the professor who belonged there, it was a block in which a hundred people were housed and then later that it was twelve hundred. Is that so?
A There were twelve hundred men in Block 58 when I found Dr. Kindberg there.
Q Yes. And as far as I can recall, and if I understood you correctly, you said that in this block there were not only French, but also Czechs, Jews, Russians, Poles and it was unpleasant to be there, not because so many people were there, but because people of so many different nationalities were packed in there, is that so? groups of different languages who were unable to understand each other - I didn't indicate that that was a crime, but it was one factor, and with all the other measures employed it brought about a human degradation amongst the internees. gether can constitute a degradation?
A I do not say that. The point of this question - the fact of the proximinity I know what they are. degrading. I did not either think or state such a thing, but the mixing together of groups entirely different from one another, by including differences of language, made living conditions that were already difficult, more difficult, in that this facilitated the application of other measures on which I have already spoken, and the purpose of which was to bring about the segregation of the internees. people whose languages happen to be different
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Babel, he has given his answer, that he considers it tended to degradation.
It doesn't matter whether you understand it or not.
DR. BABEL: Mr. President, the transmission through the earphones is in some cases so difficult that one has difficulty in understanding exactly what is said, and that is why I have occasionally had to have an answer repeated.
DR. DUBOST: I do not wish, gentlemen, that the Tribunal should consider my interventions as an interruption of the cross examination. However, I consider it necessary to emphasize criminals for the major part.
The witness answered the question as translated in French and not the original question in German.
I
DR. BABEL: I am very sorry-
THE PRESIDENT: Do you understand what Mr. Dubost said, Dr. Babel?
DR. BABEL: I believe that in general I did understand it;
that the translation was false in one particular. So far as that
THE PRESIDENT: I think the best course is to continue your Mr. Dubost can clear up the difficulty in re-examination.
(M. Dubost approached the lectern.)
What is the matter, Mr. Dubost? Why do you come forward again?
M. DUBOST: I repeat, Mr. President, that the question was
THE PRESIDENT: I have said that Dr. Babel can continue his cross-examination.
You may clear up this point about the translation
M. DUBOST: Thank you.
DR. BABEL: Mr. President, the Defense Counsel for Kaltenbrunner on what subjects the witness is to be heard.
The testimony given
THE PRESIDENT: I have already said what I have to say on
DR. BABEL: Mr. President, I believe that now is perhaps not trial.
I am greatly concerned that it should proceed rapidly.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Babel, I have already pointed out to you to state the conditions in concentration camps.
You must therefore
DR. BABEL: Very well. I thank you for these instructions, going to say, but only after I have heard him.
That a witness was to M. DUBOST: