Voices from the Holocaust

by Jon E. Lewis

  6 copies – 4th copy

  Chief A/Pr./B.

  Journ. No. 050/42 secr.

  VS 96/42

  26 September 1942

  To the Chief of the SS Garrison Administration Lublin

  To the Chief of Administration Concentration Camp Auschwitz

  Subject: Utilization of property on the occasion of settlement and evacuation of Jews.

  Without taking into account the overall regulations which are expected to be issued during October, pertaining to the utilization of mobile and immobile property of the evacuated Jews, the following procedure has to be followed with regard to the property carried by them – property, which will in all orders in the future be called goods originating from thefts, receiving of stolen goods, and hoarded goods:

  1 a. Cash money in German Reich Bank notes have to be paid into the account: Economic and Administrative Main Office 158/1488 with the Reich Bank in Berlin-Schoeneberg.

  b. Foreign exchange (coined or uncoined), rare metals, jewellery, precious and semi-precious stones, pearls, gold from teeth and scrap gold have to be delivered to the SS Economic and Administrative Main Office. The latter is responsible for the immediate delivery to the German Reich Bank.

  c. Watches and clocks of all kinds, alarm clocks, fountain pens, mechanical pencils, hand and electrical razors, pocketknives, scissors, flashlights, wallets, and purses are to be repaired by the Economic and Administrative Main Office in special repair shops, cleaned, and evaluated; and have to be delivered quickly to frontline troops. Delivery to the troops is on a cash basis through the post exchanges. Three-fourth price grades are to be set and it has to be made sure that each officer and man cannot buy more than one watch. Exempt from sale are the gold watches, the utilization of which rests with me. The proceeds go to the Reich.

  d. Men’s underwear and men’s clothing including footwear has to be sorted and valued. After covering the needs of the concentration camp inmates and in exceptions for the troops they are to be handed over to the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle. The proceeds go to the Reich in all cases.

  e. Women’s clothing and women’s underwear, including footwear; children’s clothing and children’s underwear, including footwear, have to be handed over to the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle against payment. Underwear of pure silk is to be handed over to the Reich Ministry of Economics according to orders by the SS Economic and Administrative Main Office. This order refers also to underwear.

  f. Featherbeds, quilts, woollen blankets, cloth for suits, shawls, umbrellas, walking sticks, thermos flasks, ear flaps, baby carriages, combs, handbags, leather belts, shopping baskets, tobacco pipes, sun glasses, mirrors, table knives, forks and spoons, knapsacks, and suitcases made from leather or artificial material are to be delivered to the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle. The question of payment will be decided later.

  The needs in quilts, woollen blankets, thermos flasks, ear flaps, combs, table knives, forks and spoons, and knapsacks can be furnished from Lublin and Auschwitz from these stocks against payment from budget funds.

  g. Linen, such as bed sheets, bed linen, pillows, towels, wiping cloths, and tablecloths are to be handed over to the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle against payment. Bed sheets, bed linen, towels, wiping cloths, and table cloths can be furnished for the needs of troops from these stocks against payment from budget funds.

  h. Spectacles and eyeglasses of every kind are to be handed in to the medical office for utilization. (Spectacles with golden frames have to be handed in without glasses together with the rare metals.) A settlement of accounts for the spectacles and eyeglasses need not take place with regard to their low value and their limited use.

  i. Valuable furs of all kinds, raw and cured, are to be delivered to the SS WVHA.

  j. Ordinary furs (lamb, hare, and rabbit skins) are to be reported to the SS WVHA, Amt B II, and are to be delivered to the clothing plant of the Waffen SS, Ravensbrück near Fuerstenbern (Mecklenburg).

  k. All items mentioned under the letters d, e, and f, which have only one-fifth or two-fifths of the full value, or are useless altogether will be delivered via the SS WVHA to the Reich Ministry for Economics for utilization.

  For the decision on items which are not mentioned under the letters b-k, application for a decision as to their utilization should be made to the chief of the WVHA.

  2 The SS WVHA will establish all prices under observation of the legally controlled prices. This estimation, however, can be made later on. Petty evaluations which only waste time and personnel may be eliminated. Average prices for single items have to be established in general. For instance, one pair of used men’s trousers 3.00 RM, one woollen blanket 6.00 RM, etc. For the delivery of useless items to the Reich Ministry for Economics, average Kilo prices will have to be established.

  It has to be strictly observed, that the Jewish Star is removed from all garments and outer garments which are to be delivered. Furthermore, items which are to be delivered have to be searched for hidden and sewed-in values; this should be carried out with the greatest possible care.

  ACTING FOR

  [Signed] FRANK

  SS-Brigadeführer and Brigadier General of the Waffen-SS

  SS Execution Squad in Action, Volhynia, Ukraine, 5 October 1942

  HERMANN GRAEBE

  Graebe was a manager with a German engineering firm Jung AG in occupied Ukraine, where he tried to prevent the deportation of Jewish workers from his factory. Below is his testimony, delivered to the post-War International Military Tribunal, concerning the round-up and execution of the Jews from the Röwne (Rovno) ghetto.

  On the evening of this day, I drove to Röwne and posted myself with Fritz Einsporn in front of the house in the Bahnhofstrasse in which the Jewish workers of my firm slept.

  Shortly after 2200 the ghetto was encircled by a large SS detachment and about three times as many members of the Ukrainian militia. Then the electric arc-lights which had been erected in and around the ghetto were switched on.

  SS and militia squads of four to six men entered or at least tried to enter the houses. Where the doors and windows were closed and the inhabitants did not open at the knocking, the SS men and militia broke the windows, forced the doors with beams and crowbars, and entered the houses.

  The people living there were driven on the street just as they were, regardless of whether they were dressed or in bed. Since the Jews in most cases refused to leave their houses and resisted, the SS and militia applied force. They finally succeeded, with strokes of the whip, kicks and blows, and rifle-butts, in clearing the houses.

  The people were driven out of their houses in such haste that small children in bed had been left behind in several instances. In the streets women cried out for their children and children for their parents.

  That did not prevent the SS from driving the people along the road at running pace, and hitting them, until they reached a waiting freight train. Carriage after carriage was filled and the screaming of women and children and the cracking of whips and rifle shots resounded unceasingly.

  Since several families or groups had barricaded themselves in especially strong buildings and the doors could not be forced with crowbars or beams, the doors were now blown open with hand grenades.

  Since the ghetto was near the railroad tracks in Rowne, the younger people tried to get across the tracks and over a small river to get away from the ghetto area. As this stretch of country was beyond the range of the electric lights, it was illuminated by signal rockets. All through the night these beaten, hounded, and wounded people moved along the lighted streets. Women carried their dead children in their arms, children pulled and dragged their dead parents by their arms and legs down the road towards the train. Again and again the cries ‘Open the door! Open the door!’ echoed through the ghetto.

  About 6 o’clock in the morning I went away for a moment, leaving behind Einsporn and several other German workers who had returned in the meantime. I thought the greatest danger was past and that I could risk
it. Shortly after I left, Ukrainian militia men forced their way into 5 Bahnhofstrasse and brought seven Jews out and took them to a collecting point inside the ghetto. On my return I was able to prevent further Jews from being taken out. I went to the collecting point to save these seven men. I saw dozens of corpses of all ages and both sexes in the streets I had to walk along. The doors of the houses stood open, windows were smashed. Pieces of clothing, shoes, stockings, jackets, caps, hats, coats, etc., were lying in the street. At the corner of a house lay a baby, less than a year old with his skull crushed. Blood and brains were spattered over the house wall and covered the area immediately around the child. The child was dressed only in a little skirt.

  * * *

  On 5 October 1942, when I visited the building office at Dubno, my foreman told me that in the vicinity of the site Jews from Dubno had been shot in three large pits, each about thirty metres long and three metres deep. About 1,500 persons had been killed daily. All were liquidated. As the shootings had taken place in his presence he was still very upset.

  Moennikes and I went straight to the pits. Nobody prevented us. I heard a quick succession of shots from behind one of the mounds of earth. The people who had got off the lorries – men, women and children of all ages – had to undress upon the order of an SS man, who carried a riding or a dog whip. They had to put their clothes on separate piles of shoes, top clothing, and underclothing.

  I saw a heap of shoes that must have contained 800 to 1,000 pairs, great piles of clothes and undergarments. Without screaming or weeping these people undressed, stood in family groups, kissed each other, said their farewells, and waited for a sign from another SS man, who stood near the pit, also with a whip in his hand.

  During the fifteen minutes that I stood near the pit, I did not hear anyone complain or beg for mercy. I watched a family of about eight, a man and a woman, both about fifty, with their children, aged about one, eight and ten, and two grown-up daughters of about twenty to twenty-four.

  An old woman with snow-white hair was holding the one-year-old child in her arms, singing something to it and tickling it. The child was crowing with delight. The man and wife were looking on with tears in their eyes.

  The father was holding the hand of a boy about ten, speaking to him softly. The boy was fighting back his tears. The father pointed to the sky, stroked the boy’s head and seemed to explain something to him.

  At that moment the SS man at the pit shouted something to his comrade, who separated off about twenty persons and ordered them to go behind the mound of earth. Among them was the family I have mentioned.

  I still clearly remember a dark-haired, slim girl who pointed to herself as she passed close to me and said, ‘Twenty-three.’ I walked to the other side of the mound and found myself standing before an enormous grave. The people lay so closely packed, one on top of the other, that only their heads were visible.

  Nearly all had blood running over their shoulders from their heads. Some of them were still moving. Some lifted an arm and turned a head to show that they were still alive.

  The pit was already two-thirds full. I estimated that it already contained about 1,000 people. I looked round for the man who had shot them. He was an SS man who was sitting on the edge of the narrow end of the pit, his legs dangling into it. He had a sub-machine gun across his knees and was smoking a cigarette.

  The people, completely naked, went down some steps which had been cut in the clay wall of the pit and climbed over the heads of those already lying there, to the place indicated by the SS man. They lay down in front of the dead or injured people. Some of them caressed those who were still alive and spoke to them softly.

  Then I heard a series of shots. I looked into the pit and saw that the bodies were twitching or that the heads lay motionless on top of the bodies which lay before them. Blood was pouring from their necks.

  I was surprised I was not ordered away, but saw there were also two or three uniformed policemen standing nearby. The next batch was already approaching. They climbed into the pit, lined up against the previous victims and were shot. When I walked back round the mound I noticed another lorry-load of people which had just arrived.

  This time it included sick and infirm people. A very thin old woman, with terribly thin legs, was undressed by others who were already naked, while two people supported her. The woman appeared to be paralyzed. The naked people carried the woman around the mound. I left with Moennikes and drove back to Dubno in the car.

  On the morning of the next day, when I visited the site, I saw about thirty naked people lying near the pit – about thirty to fifty metres away from it. Some of them were still alive; they looked straight in front of them with a fixed stare and seemed to notice neither the chilliness of the morning nor the workers of my firm who stood around.

  A girl of about twenty spoke to me and asked me to give her clothes and help her escape. At that moment we heard a fast car approach and I noticed it was an SS detail. I moved away to my site. Ten minutes later we heard shots from the vicinity of the pit. Those Jews who were still alive had been ordered to throw the corpses into the pit, then they themselves had to lie down in the pit, to be shot in the neck.

  Of the 7,000 Jews rounded up from the Röwne ghetto, 5,000 were shot by the SS.

  Parents Ordered to Give Up Their Children, Zdunska Wola Ghetto, August 1942

  RYVKA SALT

  In August 1942 the real nightmare started when early one morning we were woken up with shouts, ‘All Jews out! Into the streets!’ We had to get dressed quickly. We heard rumours that old people and children were being killed, so we took our grandparents and one young cousin of three years and hid them in the attic, thinking we would be back. We went out into the streets which were already crowded with people and followed one another until we came to a very big field. When we were all there, they ordered us all to sit down. Then, again, through loud-speakers, they ordered parents to give up their children under the age of eighteen years. Anyone who didn’t actually see the scene could not imagine the cries of the mothers, ‘Almighty God, help us!’ And you could see the little children running towards the officers, the bigger ones holding their little siblings in their hands. While all this was going on, my mother was trying to hide me on one side and my little sister on the other. Before long they got hold of my little sister and my mother got badly beaten up. My sister, then ten, said to the officer, ‘Please don’t hit her, that’s not my mother.’ And I was told that she was running away with tears running down her face.

  When they had taken all the children, we were lined up in fives and taken to the local (Jewish) cemetery where there was a selection: right to live, left to be taken away. That went on until it was dark. We were left sitting on those graves for three days and three nights. They installed electric lights around the cemetery and continued to make selections. People tried to make me look older: someone gave me a scarf to wear and powder to make me look more mature. But just before we left, I was spotted by a German officer; he pointed at me and said, ‘You, stand up! How old are you?’ I was so nervous, I couldn’t answer. My father said, ‘Oh, she’s eighteen, I know her.’ The officer stood there looking at me – I was twelve and looked about eight – he looked me up and down and he could see that I wasn’t eighteen years old. Finally, he said, ‘She can sit down.’ No one could believe it; it was God’s will. When we left that cemetery, there were only three children left, I was one of the three. I can never forget it: the guilty feeling that they got hold of my sister and not of me.

  ‘Like basalt pillars the dead stand inside, pressed together in the chambers’: Gassing with Diesel Fumes, Belzec, 18 August 1942

  SS-OBERSTURMFÜHRER KURT GERSTEIN

  Gerstein was a First Lieutenant in the Waffen-SS. As Head of Technical Disinfection Services of the SS he witnessed one of the first gassings of the Jews at Belzec.

  He was an unusual Nazi. A member of the NSDAP from 1933, he was imprisoned in a concentration camp by the self-same Party for ci
rculating anti-Nazi pamphlets. (He was a committed Christian.) By his own account he joined the Waffen-SS to discover the truth about ‘ovens and [gas] chambers’, circulating his eye-witness account of gassing at Belzec to ‘hundreds of personages’, including the Papal Nuncio in Berlin. Gerstein’s report was subsequently used in a number of high-profile war-crimes trials, including those of Göring and Eichmann.

  When I heard about the beginning of the killing of mentally ill persons at Grafeneck and Hadamar and other sites, I decided to make every effort to look into the matter of these ovens and chambers in order to learn what happened there. This was all the more relevant as a sister-in-law by marriage – Bertha Ebeling – was compulsorily killed in Hadamar. With two references from Gestapo officers who had worked on my case, I easily succeeded in joining the SS. The gentlemen took the view that my idealism, which they probably admired, must be of advantage to the Nazi cause. On 10 March 1941 I joined the SS. I received my basic training in Hamburg-Langenhorn, in Arnhem (Holland), and in Oranienburg. In Holland I immediately contacted the Dutch resistance movement (graduate engineer Ubbink, Doesburg). Because of my dual studies I was soon taken over by the technical-medical service and allotted to the SS-Führungshauptamt, Amtsgruppe D, Sanitätswesen der Waffen-SS Abteilung Hygiene. I completed the training in a course together with forty physicians. At the Hygienedienst I could determine my activities for myself. I constructed mobile and stationary disinfection facilities for the troops, for prisoner-of-war camps, and concentration camps. With this I had great success and was from then on undeservedly considered as a kind of technical genius. Indeed it turned out well at least to some extent, by getting the horrible epidemic typhus wave in 1941 in the camps under control. Because of my successes I soon became Leutnant and then Oberleutnant.

  At Christmas 1941 the court which had ordered my expulsion from the NSDAP was informed about my joining the SS in a leading position. The result was a severe witch hunt against me. But because of my great successes and my personality I was protected and kept in office. In January 1942 I became head of the Department of Health Engineering, and in addition in a double function for the same sector I was taken over by the Reichsarzt SS und Polizei. In this function I took over the whole technical disinfection service, including disinfection with highly toxic gases.