There was twelve of them; and the four that were living, the other eight, so far as Widing understood, died down there at Struthof.
Well, Widing told further on, "You see that man who sometimes walks through the camp together with some others?"
"Well, I have seen him," I said.
"That is Professor Hirtz from the German University in Strassbourg."
I am quite sure Widing said that this man is Hirt or Hirtz. He is coming here now nearly daily with a so-called Commission to see those who are coming back again from Struthof, to see the result. That is all I know about that so far.
Q HOW many Norwegians died at Grossrosen? know about forty persons who had been there, and I also know about ten who came back again. Grossrosen was a bad camp. The worst of it all was the evacuation of Grossrosen. I suppose it must have been in the middle of February, this year. The Russians came nearer and nearer to Breslau.
BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q You mean 1945?
A 1945 I mean; excuse me, 1945. One day we were placed upon a so-called "apellplatz". We were very feeble, all of us. We had hard work, little food, and all sort of ill treatment. Well, we were started to walk in parties of about two to three thousand. In the party I was with we were about 2500 to 2800, We heard so and so many when they took up the numbers.
They were very nervous and behaved as mad persons. We saw several were drunk.
Feeble as we were, we couldn't walk fast enough, and five of them,- and they said, "So geht es wenn man nicht"--"If you don't walk in an intelligent way see what will happen to you."
wasn't good to help them.
railway station. It was very cold, and we had only such striped prison clothes on and bad boots, naturally, but we said, "Oh, we are glad that we have come to a railway station.
It is better to stand in a cow track than to walk in the middle of winter."
It was very cold, 10 to 12 degrees, I suppose-very cold.
It was a long train with open tracks.
In Norway we call them sand tracks, and we were kicked at on those tracks, about 80 on each track.
We had to sit so together (indicating), and on this track we sat for about five days without food-cold-without water.
When it was snowing we made like this (indicating) just to get some water in We came there.
They kicked us down from the tracks, but many were dead.
The man who sat by me, he was dead, but I had no right to get away.
I had to sit with a dead man for the last day, and I didn't see the ciphers myself, naturally, but about half of us Well, from Dora I don't remember so much, because I was more or less dead.
I have always been a man of good humor and high I don't remember so much before, so I had a good chance, camps, and the few, comparatively few Norwegian "NN" prisoners who were living in very bad condition.
Many of my friends are still in the hospital in Norway.
Some died after coming home.
That's what happened to me and my comrades in the three and
QUESTIONS BY M. DUBOST:
Q For what reason had you been arrested?
called Hoestboehl. That is a sort of sanitarium where you go for
Q What had you done? What was held against you?
and naturally we, most of us, were against them by feelings; and also, as the Gestapo asked me I remember, "What do you think of Mr. Quisling?"
I only answered, "What would you have done if a 'Better forget the Mobilization Order'?" A man can't do that with they unaware of what went on in the camps?
A That is naturally very difficult to me to answer. But in about how the Germans treated their prisoners, at least.
And there working, I was in Dachau for that short time.
I had once to go with to seek for persons and forms and things like that.
I suppose that was the idea.
They never told us anything, but we knew what was on.
We were about a hundred persons, prisoners. We were looking like dead persons, all of us very bad looking.
We went through the dangerous and which should in some way help them.
Some of them were hollering to us, "It is your fault that we are bombed."
Q Were there any Chaplains in your camp? Did you have the right to pray?
A Well, we had in the "NN" prisoners in Natzweiler a priest from Norway.
He was, I suppose, what you call in English, Dean. He was quite a high rank.
In Norway we call it "Prost." From the west coast of Norway.
He was also brought to Natzweiler as an "NN" prisoner, and some of my comrades, they asked him if they couldn't meet sometimes so he could preach to them.
But he said, "No, I don't care to do it.
I had a bible. They have taken it from me and they joked about it and said, 'You dirty churchman.
'" If you show the bible and things like that, you know--therefore, we didn't do of religion at the time of their death?
Q Were the dead treated with decency?
Q Was there any religious service conducted?
M. DUBOST: I have no further questions to ask.
GENERAL RUDENKO: I have no questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Has the United States?
witness any questions?
QUESTIONS BY DR. MERKEL (Counsel for the Gestapo):
German Gestapo?
learned afterward, the so-called State Police. That was not the police in Norway.
They were working together with the Gestapo; in fact, it was the same.
But it was by them I was interrogated after the ten days.
But they, as I heard afterwards, usually did it in the Germans couldn't speak Norwegian.
Most of them couldn't. I call them Gestapo practically.
They let them handle the persons there were German or Norwegian officials present?
interpreter, but as I spoke the German language I can't with one policemen there.
It is difficult. But as Victoria Terrace was the to help them there.
But most of them were German.
Q Were these officials who interrogated you in uniform or not?
too. But when they tortured me they were most civil. So far as I remember, there was only one person in uniform during one of the torture interrogations.
Q You stated that you were then treated by a physician. Did this physician come of his own free will or was he summoned by the police?
A First time I asked for a doctor, but then I did'nt get any. But at the time when I came back to myself, when I was supposed perhaps to he dead, the guard possibly had been looking at me, because he was then running away, and afterwards they came with a doctor. an absolute prohibition against speaking about what went on in the camps, and what offenses against this prohibition were punished most strictly? less understood that it was more or less forbidden to talk about the tortures we had gone through, but naturally we in the camps, the Nacht and Nebel Camps where I was, the situation was so bad that even torture sometimes seemed to be better than dying slowly away like that, so the only thing we spoke about nearly was "when shall the war end; to help our comrades; and are we to get some food tonight or not."
DR. MERKEL: Thank you.
THE PRESIDENT : Does any other Defendant's Counsel wish to ask any questions? Mr. Dubost, have you anything you wish to ask?
M. DUBOST: I have nothing further to ask, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Then the witness may retire.
M. DUBOST: If the Tribunal will permit, we will now hear a witness, Roser, who will give a few details and the conditions under which they kept in reprisal camps French prisoners of war.
THE PRESIDENT (To the witness): What is your name?
THE WITNESS: Paul Roser.
THE PRESIDENT: You swear to speak without hate nor fear, to state truth, all the truth, only the truth? Raise your right hand and say "I swear."
(The witness raises his right hand and repeats the oath in French). QUESTIONS BY M. DUBOST:
Q Your name is Paul Roser, R-O-S-E-R?
Q You were born on the 8th of May, 1903? You are of French nationality?
Q You were born of French parents?
Q You were a prisoner of war?
Q You were taken prisoner in battle?
A Yes; I was.
Q In what year?
Q You sought to escape?
A Yes; several times.
Q How many times?
Q Five times. You were transferred finally to a disciplinary camp? Will you indicate the regime of such camp -- you will indicate your rank, and you will indicate the treatment to which you were exposed, to people of your rank in those disciplinary camps, and for what reasons?
A I was an aspirant in France: it is between a Top Sergeant and Second Lieutenant. I was in several disciplinary camps. The first was a small camp which the Germans called Strafkommando, in Lindberg, near Hanover. It was in 1941. There were thirty of us. to escape once again. We were recaptured by our guards at the very moment when we were leaving the camp. We were naturally unarmed. The first among us -
THE PRESIDENT: You are going too fast for us to follow you. Now continue more slowly, please.
A (continuing) Very well. make him reveal who the others were who also sought to escape. The man remained silent. The guards hurled themselves upon him, beating him with the butts of their pistols in the face and with bayonets - with the butts of their rifles. At that moment, not wishing to let our comrade be killed, several of us stepped forward and revealed that we sought to escape. I then received a beating with bayonets applied to my head and I fell into a swoon. When I recovered consciousness one of the Germans was kneeling on my leg and was continuing to strike me. Another one, raising his gun, was seeking to strike my head, I was saved on that occasion through the intervention of my comrades, who threw themselves between the Germans and myself. That night we were struck for three hours exactly with butts of rifles, with bayonet blows and with butts of pistols in the face. I lost consciousness three times.
The following morning we were taken to work, nevertheless. We were digging trenches for the draining of the marshes. It was a very hard sort of work, which started at 6.30 in the morning to be completed at 6 o'clock at night. We had two stops, each of a half hour. We had nothing to eat during the day. The soup was given to us when we came back at night with a piece of bread and a small piece of sausage or two cubic centimeters of margarine and that was all.
parcels which our families sent to us for a whole month. We could not write nor could we receive our mail. shipped to the regular Kommandos. I, personally, was quite ill at that time and I came back in Stalag 10 B at Sandbostel. an officer?
Q Had you accepted to work?
A No, not at all. Like all my comrades of the same rank and like most of the non-commissioned officers and like all Aspirants, I had refused to work, invoking the prescription of the Geneva Convention, which Germany had signed and which prescribed that non-commissioned officers who were prisoners cannot be forced to perform any labor without their own consent.
The German Army, into whose hands we had fallen, practically speaking, never respected that engagement taken by Germany. 10B? or Allied prisoners. Robin, who had prepared with some of his comrades and escape and for that purpose had dug a tunnel, was killed in the following manner. The Germans, having had knowledge of the tunnel which had been prepared, Captain Buchmann, who was a member of the Officers' Staff of the camp, watched for the exit of the would-be escapees with a few German guards. Lieutenant Robin, who was first to emerge, was killed with one shot while obviously he could not in any manner attack anyone whatsoever or defend himself.
Other cases of such character occurred. One of my friends, a French Lieutenant Ledoux, who was sent to Graudenz Fortress, where he was exposed to a detentionary regime, saw killed his best friend, a British Lieutenant Anthony Thompson, by Hauptfeldwebel Oesterreich with one shot of a pistol in the neck in their own cell. Lieutenant Thompson had just sought to escape and had been recaptured by the Germans on the airfield. Lieutenant Thompson belonged to the RAF. where I spent five months, several of our comrades
Q Would you tell us why you were at Ravaruska?
A In the course of the winter '41-'42, the Germans were seeking to intimidate the non-commissioned officers who were refractory labor; secondly, those who had sought to escape, and third, the men who were being employed in kommandos and who were caught in the act of performing sabotage. The Germans warned us that from 1 April, 191;2 onwards all these escapees who could be recaptured would be sent to a camp, a special camp called a "punishment camp" at Ravaruska in Poland.
It was following a French attempt to escape, that I was with about two thousand Frenchmen taken to Poland.
I was at Lindberg an der Lahn, Stalag 12A, where we were regrouped and placed in cars, railway cars. We were deloused -- no, I beg your pardon -- we were stripped of our clothes, of our shoes, of all the food which some of us could have kept. We were placed in cars, where the number varied from 53 to 56. The trip lasted six days. The cars were open generally for a few minutes in the course of a stop in the countryside. In six days we were given soup on two occasions only, once at Oppeln and the soup was not edible and another time at Jaruslow. We remained for thirty-six hours without anything to drink in the course of that trip and we had no receptacle with us and it was impossible to get a provision of water. French prisoners, most of them French, who had been there for several weeks, extremely discouraged, with a ration scale much inferior to anything that we had witnessed until then and for no one had any parcel from their families or from the International Red Cross been issued. camp. There was for that total number one single faucet which furnished for several hours a day undrinkable water. This situation lasted until the visit of two Swiss doctors, who came to the camp in September, I think. The billets consisted of four barracks. The small rooms contained as many as six hundred men in the room. We were stacked, so to speak, on tiers along the walls, three rows of them, thirty to forty centimeters for each of us. more than five hundred in six months. Several of our comrades were killed. Some were killed at the time when a guard would notice them. In spite of the sadness of such occurrences, no one of us contested the rights of our guards in such cases but several were murdered. In particular, on the 12th of August, 1942, in the Tarnopol Kommando, there is the case of soldier Lavest. He was found bearing several evidences of shots and several large wounds caused by bayonets.
On the 14th of August in the Werschinek Kommando, ninety-three Frenchmen, having succeeded in digging a tunnel, escaped the following morning.
Three of them, Konneaux, von dem Busch and Poutrelle, were caught by German soldiers, who were seeking them, who were searching for them. Two of them were sleeping. The third, Poutrelle, was not sleeping. The Germans, a corporal and two enlisted men, verified the identity of the three Frenchmen. Very calmly they told them: "Now we are going to kill you. We are obliged to kill you." The three wretched men invoked their families, begged for mercy. The German corporal gave the following- reply, which we heard only too often: "An order is an order", and they shot down immediately two of the French prisoners, von dem Busch and Konneaux. Poutrelle left like a madman and by sheer luck was not caught again. On the other hand, he was captured a few days later in the region of Dragout. He was then brought back to Ravaruska proper, where we saw him in a condition close to madness. of about twenty prisoners accompanied by several guards, were on their way to work.
Q Excuse me - you are talking about French prisoners of war? sometime was persecuting two of them, Perrel and Don Viella, took them into the woods. A few moments later the others heard shots. Perrel and Den Viella had just been killed. work under the supervision of German soldiers and of civilian gang leaders, they were German civilians. One of the Frenchmen succeeded in escaping, without waiting, the German non-commissioned officer selected two men. If my memory serves me, their name was Saladan and Dubeuf and he brought them down on the spot.
Incidents of this type occurred in other circumstances. The list of them would be long indeed. refractory non-commissioned officers, who were with you at camp, lived?
A The non-commissioned officers who refused to work were grouped together in one section of the camp, in two of the large stables, which were used for billeting prisoners.
They were subjected to a regime of oppression that was most severe; frequent roll-call for assembly; gymnastics up and down -- that type of gymnastics which after you performed it for a while leaves you quite exhausted. a French name for a German captain -- having refused to pick up a tool to work with, the German captain made one gesture and one of the German soldiers who were with him pierced this man through with his bayonet, that is Corbionne. He escaped death by a miracle indeed.
Q Hon many were their missing? the burial of sixty of cur friends who died from disease or who were killed in attempted escapes. But so far, 100 of those who were with us and who sought to escape there have not been found again,
Q Is this all that you have witnessed?
A No. I should say that our sojourn at the punishment camp Ravaruska involved one thing more awful than what we, as prisoners, have seen and endured. We were obsessed by what we knew was taking place all about us. The Germans had transformed the area of Lindberg Ravaruska into a sort of immense ghetto. In that area there had been brought, where the Israelites were already quite numerous, the Jews from all the countries in Europe, Every day for five months, except for an interruption of six weeks approximately, in August and September, 1942, we have seen passing about 150 meters from our camp, one, two and sometimes three trains made up of freight cars, in which there were crowded men, women and children. One day, a voice coming from one of these cars shouted: "I come from Paris. We are on cur way to the slaughter," tasks would find corpses along the railway track. We knew in a vague sort of way at that time that these trains stopped at Belsac, which was located about seventeen kilometers from our camp and at that point they carried out the execution of these wretched people by employing means of which I am ignorant.
the night. We heard moans and shouts of women and children. The following morning bands of German soldiers were going through the rye plantations on the very edge of cur camp with-their bayonets pointed downwards, seeking people in hiding in the fields. Those of our comrades who went out on that day to go to their tasks told us that they saw corpses everywhere in the town, in the gutters, in the barns, in the houses. Later some of our guards, who had participated in this operation, quite good-humoredly explained to us that two thousand Jews had been killed that night under the pretext that two SS had been murdered in the region. program which in Lemberg caused the death of thirty thousand Jews. I was not personally in Lemberg but several military French doctors, Major Bigaille of the French Medical Corps, Lieutenant Vegin of the French Medical Corps, related to me the events.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness appears to be not finishing and therefore I think we had better adjourn now until two o'clock.
(Whereupon at 1250 hours the Tribunal recessed until 1400 hours on the same day.)
Military Tribunal, in the matter of: The
MARSHAL OF THE COURT: I desire to announce that the defendant Kaltenbrunner will be absent from this afternoon's session on account of illness.
M. DUBOST: With the permission of the Tribunal, we will continue hearing the witness, Mr. Roser.
Mr. Roser explained to us this morning conditions in which he witnessed the pogroms.
(Further examination by M. Dubost) pogrom where you stated a German soldier, before you, made a statement which you related to us? of meeting with a French doctor, the chauffeur of the German physician in the infirmary where I was at that time. This soldier, whose name I have forgotten, said the following:
"In Poland-" in a city the name of which I have also forgotten-"a sergeant from our regiment went with a Jewish woman. A few hours later, they found her dead. Then," said the German soldier, "They called the whole battalion to come out. Half of the forces were put in a cordon around the Ghetto, and the other half-two companies, of which I was a member--went into the houses and threw out of the windows pellmell the furniture and the people who were living in those rooms." The German soldier completed the story by these words: "Ach, Mensch, Schrecklich war es." We said, "How could you do such a thing?" He replied, "Befehl ist Befehl." was given to the Russians,
A Yes. That is correct. The first French detachment which arrived at Ravaruska the 14th or 15th of April, 1942, came after a group of 400 Russian war prisoners, who were the survivors of a detachment of 6,000 men who had died of typhus. The few medicants which the French found when they arrived in Ravaruska came from the infirmary of the Russian prisoners. That included a few aspirin tablets and different medicines which were of no value in caring for typhus. The camp was not disinfected after the Russian typhus patients left and we came. asking the Tribunal for permission to describe the terrible picture which all the French prisoners saw in the stalags in Germany in the autumn of 1941, which we all saw when the first Russian prisoners arrived. which was like an hallucination. The Russians arrived in columns of five, holding each other up by the arm, for none of them was strong enough to stand up alone. The looked like walking skeletons. That is the only expression that I can use. We saw afterwards photographs of concentration camps and dead persons in them. Those unfortunate persons looked in 1941 like the people we saw Later in the pictures. The skin of their faces wasn't yellow; it was green. Almost all squinted, not having the strength to keep their optical equipment in proper order. guns. As it was Sunday afternoon, the French prisoners were allowed to walk around within the camp. Seeing that, all the French began to scream, and the Germans made us go into the barracks. number of 10,000 in thirteenth of November, and there were only 2,500 in the month of February.
These figures are certain. I have them from two sources, an official source and an unofficial source, which was from the cook in the camp, in the kitchens. There was a chart on which the Germans wrote out the rations which were to be given to the forces that were there. The number of Russians decreased each day by 80 or 100.
prisoners who entered the camp, and they had the figures. The figure of 2,500 of those who survived in February is the same as that which we found in the kitchen. parts of Germany. All those who were in the stalag in the camp at that time saw the same thing. The Russian prisoners were put in a common grave. Some of them were not even yet dead, Dead and dying were then simply dragged from the barracks and thrown into the common grave. the camp didn't find it agreeable to see French prisoners who could observe the Russian prisoners who died, they covered them subsequently.
Q Your accounts were then supervised by the German Army or by the SS?
A By the Wehrmacht. Only by the Army. I was never supervised by any except the German Army, prisoner of war camps in Germany?
Q In all of those camps, were you able to practice your religion?
Q What is your religion? Protestants and Catholics to practice their religion, but the work commandersFor instance, in the agricultural commando in my block, where there was a Catholic priest--there were about 60 of us in this commando--this Catholic priest could only say the mass. They did not permit him to.
Q Who prevented him?
Q German soldiers?
M. DUBOST: I have no more questions to ask, the witness.
THE PRESIDENT: Does the British Prosecutor wish to ask any questions?
THE BRITISH PROSECUTOR: No.
THE PRESIDENT: Or the United States?
THE AMERICAN PROSECUTOR: No.
THE PRESIDENT: Do any of the Defense Counsel wish to ask any questions?
(Cross examination, by Dr. Nelte, Counsel for the defendant Keitel.)
Q Witness, when were you imprisoned?
Q In which camp for prisoners of war were you put?
Q You were in a camp? regarding a possible escape?
A They notified us that they would shoot at us; that we must not try to escape. Geneva Convention? 2 D, Oflag 2 D. You said that there was an officer that fled the camp, and that this officer, because he was the first who escaped through the tunnel and gained his freedom, was shot, Is that right?
Q Were you with these officers who tried to escape? was then in Oflag 2 D before I arrived.
Q I understood that. I just wanted to ascertain that this officer, Robert, found his death in flight, in his escape.
A Yes, but here I would like tp point out two things. One thing: All the war prisoners who escaped knew they risked their lives. Each of us, when we made such an attempt to try to escape, knew that we were risking getting shot, but one thing: We might be killed in the barbed wire when we tried to cross it, but it is another thing to have than lie in ambush for you and murder you when you can do nothing, when we are at the mercy of a man and have no arm, and this Lieutenant, he was in a puddle, and a very low puddle.
He was flat on his stomach. He was crawling along, and he couldn't escape then. That wasn't international Law there when he was shot. war who tried to do his patriotic duty I would congratulate. Here in this case, where you were not present, I would like to make the point clear that the possibility certainly existed that this first brave officer who left the tunnel did not answer the calling of the guards and was shot as a result of that.
You gave a vivid description of the incident, but I believe that was a product of your imagination because, according to your own testimony, you were not present yourself; is that correct.
A. No, no. There, are not 36 different ways of coming out of a tunnel. You are flat on your stomach. You crawl, and when you are killed before you get out of the tunnel, then you must be killed flat on your stomach.
THE PRESIDENT: We don't want argument in cross examination.
The witness has already stated that he was not there and didn't see it, and he has explained the facts.
DR. NELTE: Thank you.
Q. The incident of Lt. Thompson is not entirely clear to me. In this case also, I believe you said that you were not personally informed, but informed through a friend. Is that correct?
A. I only repeat what I said a while ago, I related the story of a French Lieutenant, Ledoux, who told me that he was at Rausen, in the fortress.
This English officer, Thompson, escaped from the fortress. He was recaptured on the airfield, brought back to the fortress, put into the same cell as Lt. Ledoux, and Ledoux saw him killed by a revolver shot in the back of the neck. Ledoux gave me the names of the murderers, Hopfeldt and Leipzig. That is the story which was told by a witness.
Q. Did Hopfeldt-- Was he a guard at the camp; to what division did he belong?
A. I don't know. I can't answer that question.
Q. Do you know that you, as a prisoner of war, can make a claim?
A. Certainly, I knew personally the Geneva Convention.
Q. Did you know that you had the possibility of making a claim through the commandant? Did you make use of this privilege?
A. I tried, myself, without success.,
Q. May I ask what the name was of the commandant who did not hear your complaint?
A. That I don't know, but I can tell you what happened when I tried to escape.