NAZI “TATTOOING MACHINE”
(with documentary appendices)
BY CARLOS W. PORTER
(If the links don’t work paste the Internet addresses in the window of the browser . Some of the source articles are reproduced at the end, in a documentary appendix.)
This article is in 3 parts.
Part 2
Part 3
World's Record for Continuous Tattooing: 178 Simple Tattoos in 35 1/2 hours [!]
Translation of transcription of Document USSR-343, the ONLY tattoo-related document ever introduced at Nuremberg (translated by C.W. Porter)
Always note the number: in this case, 98288
INTRODUCTION:
Of all the multifarious “symbols of the Holocaust” (and EVERYTHING about the Holocaust is symbolic), probably no symbol is more powerful than the “Holocaust tattoos” of the “Holocaust survivors”. Wherever you find Jews, you find “survivors”; wherever you find “survivors”, you find “Holocaust tattoos”. One “survivor” at a public meeting of some sort has the same sort of effect on the audience as a shot of curare or displaying a crucifix in front of a vampire: the “tattoos” (and the sob-stories with which they are inevitably accompanied), have a paralyzing effect on almost everyone who sees them; yet, astonishingly enough, apart from the tattoos themselves, there is not the slightest proof that the National Socialists tattooed anyone, ever, at Auschwitz or anywhere else. Let us examine this matter dispassionately, in a bit more detail.
[Caution: the top photo has been reversed: same man, same number]
[Were children "gassed on arrival", or were they "tattooed"?]
[More "tattooed children"]
"Children of tender years were invariably exterminated since by reason of their youth they were unable to work.”
Auschwitz commandant, Rudolf Hoess, quoted in Shirer, p. 968, Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.
So which is it?
[Another obvious fake, drawn onto the photo.
I think I have seen this before -- minus "tattoo".
I think this pic was taken in the Ukraine, during the famous Communist "liquidation of the kulaks as a class". It may be from the Boer War or the Spanish concentration camps in Cuba during the Second Cuban War for Independence (1890s). There was an exhibition of these photographs in Barcelona about 10 years ago.
I am sure I have seen it.
Does anybody recognize it?]
---
[Note as well that no amount of human suffering is of any importance at all unless the victims are Jewish.]
[Better Photoshop job, but different number: the 23... [?] has now become a very legible (and far too dark) 25141]
EXHIBIT 1
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0241/black/php
Excerpts from Edwin Black, IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance between Nazi Germany and America’s Most Powerful Corporation; long description of the complexity of the registration number system, which allegedly included a reference to the inmate’s occupation, in case the Germans needed certain skills:
QUOTE: “ In August 1943, a timber merchant from Bendzin, Poland, arrived at Auschwitz. He was among a group of 400 inmates, mostly Jews. First, a doctor examined him briefly to determine his fitness for work. His physical information was noted on a medical record. Second, his full prisoner registration was completed with all personal details. Third his name was checked against the indices of the Political Section to see if he would be subjected to special punishment. Finally, he was registered in the Labor Assignment Office and assigned a characteristic five-digit IBM Hollerith number, 44673. The five-digit Hollerith number was part of a custom punch card system devised by IBM to track prisoners in Nazi concentration camps, including the slave labor at Auschwitz. The Polish timber merchant’s punch card number would follow him from labor assignment to labor assignment as Hollerith systems tracked him and his availability for work, and reported it to the central inmate file eventually kept at Department DII. Department DII of the SS Economics Administration in Oranienburg oversaw all camp salve labor assignments, utilizing elaborate IBM systems. Later in the summer of 1943, the Polish timber merchant’s same five-digit Hollerith number, 44673, was tattooed on his forearm.”
[COMMENT: In other words, the alleged tattoo reference number was of such importance that the tattooing could not be entrusted to a mere inmate. In addition to which, the whole system could be frustrated by the inmates at any time, simply by re-tattooing each other and altering the numbers on the tattoos. The fact that tattoos can always be altered or covered would render any tattooing system useless for identification purposes. Since the Holocaust tattoos we see are nearly always very crude, the alterations would be less noticeable, thus further defeating their alleged purpose.]
[You expect a tattoo to fade a bit, but this is very sloppy work, considering that the "tattoos" are alleged to have been of such crucial importance for identification and labour management purposes. Note as well that the location is not standardized: sometimes they appear on the inside of the arm, sometimes the outside. According to one yarn, the inmates were allowed to "choose" where they wanted their tattoos!
Since any tattoo can be covered by another tattoo, the location must be absolutely standardized if the tattoo is to serve for the possible identification of escaped inmates: that way, any person with a tattoo in that location would be suspect. Failing to put the tattoo in the same place each time would render it even more useless than ever. -C.P.]
[Above: inside left arm, 19957 - 4 (?)
Here: outside right arm, 98288]
EXHIBIT 2
http://www.chgs.edu/Educational_Resources/
Curriculum/Auschwitz/Tattooing/auschwitz/tattooing.html .
QUOTE: “The tattoos of the survivors have come to symbolize the utter brutality and of the concentration camps and the attempt of the Nazis to dehumanize their victims. The tattoos are also a testament to the resilience of those who bear them. Yet despite the importance of the tattoos, as testament, symbol and historical artifact, little scholarship has been devoted to the subject. There exist virtually no official period documents relating to the practice; what we know stems from anecdotal evidence contained in camp records and the accounts of those who were at the camps.”
[COMMENT: In other words, there is no evidence that it ever happened, except for the tens of thousands of “survivors” displaying their “Holocaust tattoos”, 55 years after the war. There are no documents, no tattooing equipment, nothing.]
[There is no uniformity in these things; this one is on the inside of the left arm, near the elbow, but upside down.
It is also very fresh looking, as if it were done yesterday -- perhaps it was.
Note European-style crossed"7". This is sometimes missing (see 2 photos up, 19957, second "7" minus cross) (or is that a "19951"?] .
[European-style 7, with cross. Used in hand-writing. If the style of numbering is not standardized, the "1"s will be confused with the "7"s, further defeating the purpose of the system.]
[Exterior, left arm, tattoo with crossed 7]
[Thus, from a visual examination of the so-called "tattoos", all one can say for certain is that
a)
these are not professional tattoos; and
b)
they were not performed in accordance with any centralized plan for any administrative purpose.]
Another question:
What is the point of tattooing the triangle without any colour?
I always thought that crossed yellow triangles in the form of a Cross of David were used for Jews; red triangles for political prisoners; purple triangles for Jehovah's Witnesses; pink triangles for homosexuals; black triangles for Roma (Gypsies) and "asocials"; and blue triangles for "emigrants" (whatever that meant), green for habitual criminals, etc. etc.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_concentration_camp_badges
ENTER THE RUBE GOLDBERG “HOLOCAUST TATTOOING MACHINE”
(continued from
http://www.chgs.umn.edu/Educational_Resources/Curriculum/
Auschwitz_Tattooing/auschwitz_tattooing.html )
QUOTE: “As the number of prisoners brought to the expanding Auschwitz complex rose, so did the death rate. But if a corpse were separated from its uniform, identification was rendered all but impossible .”
[COMMENT: If the Germans were busy murdering people by the millions, why the hell would they care about identifying them afterwards?]
QUOTE: “With often hundreds of prisoners dying per day, other methods of identification were needed. In Birkenau the method used to tattoo the Soviet prisoners of war was implemented for emaciated prisoners whose deaths were imminent ;
[COMMENT: What is the logic of this?]
“the tattoos were later made with pen and ink on the upper left forearm.”
[COMMENT: In this case we aren’t even talking about a “tattoo” at all. Perhaps this is the origin of the legend.]
QUOTE: “… After a month’s work the commission had singled out approximately 300 “fanatic communists”. [footnote 3: Danuta Czech, Auschwitz Chronicle 1939-1945, Henry Holt & Co., NY, 1990, p. 102]. Those designated as such were tattooed by means of a metal plate [!] with interchangeable needles attached to it [!] The plate was impressed into the flesh on the left side of their chests [!] and the dye was rubbed into the wound.”
[COMMENT: Another source for this fantastic yarn is Tadeusz Iwaszko, La deportazione al campo e la registrazione dei prigionieri, in: "Auschwitz. Il campo nazista della morte" [“Deportation to the Camp and Registration of the Prisoners”, in: “Auschwitz: The Nazi Death Camp”, by F. Piper and T. Swiebocka, Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum Publications, 1997, p. 54. The most amusing part (about how the machine proved “impractical” – like the height-measuring head-shot contraptions and other bizarre contraptions described by “survivors”) is usually deleted. Actually the whole passage is more or less a quotation from the “affidavit” of Tadeusz Iwaszko, naturally prepared following the Communist takeover of Poland. Remember, these are the same people who gave us the “quicklime trains”, “electrical chambers at Belzec” and the “steam chambers” and “vacuum chambers” at Treblinka. According to “Tadeusz Iwaszko” (whoever he was), the “interchangeable needles” were 1 cm long, 10 times the depth of an ordinary tattoo. In addition to causing a puncture wound, this would cause the ink to migrate beyond the intended location, blurring the tattoo, and, to some extent, defeating its intended purpose – legibility. Iwaszko’s affidavit reads, in part, as follows: “ A special metal stamp was employed, upon which the interchangeable figures were fixed, made up of needles approximately 1 cm long. By means of a heavy pressure of the stamp on the upper left part of the trunk, a tattoo of the entire number was obtained in one single motion by means of the intermixture of ink into the wound in the form of the numbers caused in this manner… [Deletion] Since use of the metal stamp proved rather impractical…” ]
I sometimes amuse myself by attempting to imagine how such a device – with “interchangeable needles” -- would actually work.
NAZI ‘TATTOOING MACHINE”, ALTERNATIVE DESIGN NO. 1: In other words, the Germans are alleged to have used a sort of stencil formed of needles, which could then be transformed at will into a stencil for any other number, rather like the light bulb displays which used to form the words “Merry Christmas” during so-called “End of Year Holidays” in the United States. The “metal plate” would probably require at least one hundred needles (see below) as well as an extremely complex mechanism permitting the formation of a different stencil for each five-digit number (i.e., needle 1 in position A1 would be moved laterally by a lever mechanism to position A9, for example), and so on for 100 needles, and, presumably, 100 levers (or perhaps it was computerized). All to save a few minutes tattoo work with one needle! Where are the plans, designs, specification sheets, patents, order forms, manufacturing reports, provisional and final acceptance forms, delivery vouchers, inventory reports, etc. for this Rube Goldberg device? No such “metal plate” has ever been found. No documents relating to it have ever been found. No tattooing needles or other equipment has ever been found. In practice, such a “plate” would probably cause a puncture wound followed by anaerobic infection, in addition to infecting the entire camp with hepatitis, syphilis, staph infections, possible septicaemia and even gangrene. And if the “plate” was to be autoclaved after each inmate, how many thousands of “metal plates” would they need? Where did they all disappear to? Either the needles were interchanged in position only, or new needles were inserted from the back. Which is it?
NAZI ‘TATTOOING MACHINE”, ALTERNATIVE DESIGN NO. 2: “Interchangeable needles” may mean that the needles were inserted from the rear of the plate after each use, either manually or by means of some mechanism. In this case, needle 1 in position A1 would be retracted through the back of the frame, and another needle inserted in, for example, position A9. Since tattooing needles normally place the tattoo between the second and third layer of skin, this means that the needles could only be about 1 millimeter long (unless the intent is to cause a puncture wound). In any case, the frame would be contaminated by blood and body fluids after the first use, thus contaminating the needles. And if the frame is to be autoclaved or disposed of after each use, what use is the frame?
NAZI ‘TATTOOING MACHINE”, ALTERNATIVE DESIGN NO. 3: A “tattooing machine” designed in the manner of a date stamp: 5 wheels, each with 10 surfaces, each surface equipped with perhaps 15 to 30 needles, all controlled by a crank for each wheel on the front and/or back of the device (exactly as with a date stamp).
In this case as well, the whole contraption would be contaminated after the first use, rendering it useless. Tattooing needles must be very sharp. In a device of this kind, intended for “mass production tattooing”, the needles would naturally be dulled after only a few tattoos, rendering them useless.
The operator would contaminate or infect himself while turning the wheels; the surface of the “date stamp” would probably fail to come into contact with the skin properly: tattoo stencils are flexible and curve to fit the body. The human body is not flat and hard, like a piece of paper on a writing desk.
It appears that, prior to the invention of the modern, electrical tattooing needle by an Irish-American named Samuel O’Reilly in 1891, only slightly modifying an invention by Thomas Edison, unskilled tattooists did, for a short while, experiment with “tattooing plates” inlaid with needles (see IDENTIFICATION OF THE LIVING, by Alphonse Bertillon, translated by Ralph W. Webster, M.D., LEGAL MEDICINE AND TOXICOLOGY BY MANY SPECIALISTS, edited by Peterson, Haines and Webster, W.B. Saunders Company, Philadelphia, 1901, 1904. 1907, revised 1923, volume p. 116: “There are, it seems, instruments which produce the entire design at one application by means of a sort of plate inlayed in relief with needles”; Bertillon’s system of “anthropometric identification” was adopted by the Paris Police Department in 1880.)
Note that the “tattooing plate” described by Bertillon does not involve “interchangeable needles”, i.e., it was still impossible to turn a tattoo of the Holy Virgin into a tattoo of Popeye the Sailor Man just by turning a crank or a wheel to re-arrange the position of the needles; so the mystery of the “tattooing plate with interchangeable needles” is far from solved.
One can only assume that these “tattooing plates” were abandoned as a failure, as well as representing a very serious health risk. Even today, tattoo stencils can spread disease if not sterilized after use, and are, today, ordinarily disposed of after each job, along with all needles, tubes, thimble-sized ink cups, rinsing and dilution goblets, wooden skin depressors, cotton swabs, razors and latex gloves. (In modern practice, plastic stencils have been replaced by special tracing paper.) Tattooists need to depress the skin as they work, like a man shaving himself; they need to feel the skin. A “tattooing” plate would obviously fail to do this.
The needles would either fail to penetrate properly or would have to be extremely long, causing a puncture wound. In view of the unsanitary conditions at Auschwitz, in my view it is the responsibility of Auschwitz “survivors”, not only to describe the tattooing process in terms that make sense, but to explain how they survived the inevitable staph infections and hepatitis caused by the “tattooing process” (hepatitis C causes cancer of the liver).
Why are tens of thousands of them still alive 55 years later? The modern electrical tattooing machine is such a simple device that it can be improvised out of junk; this is commonly done in prisons.
A fresh tattoo is a open wound, and is easily infected.
It is hard to see why the world’s most technologically advanced nation should install the very latest in computer technology (in the 1930s!), build highly complex disinfestation facilities using Zyklon, Argon, electrically heated hot air, steam, ultrasound and autoclaves (for clothing), if the intention is to infect 400,000 people with hepatitis B and C, syphilis, staph, septicaemia and gangrene in the “filth of Auschwitz”. (Tattooing has also been known to spread leprosy).
If the Germans had an autoclave to use on clothing, why not install an autoclave to use with ordinary tattooing equipment, like everyone else? Germany is a maritime nation, with some of the largest seaports in the world. There must have been dozens of German tattooists in every German port. Why would they need all these Rube Goldberg devices?
CONCLUSION: The Nazi “tattooing machine” probably belongs to the same category of hallucination as the “wire cage Zyklon introduction cages” which were supposedly fished up and down through a “hollow, perforated, sheet-metal column” connected to a “hole in the roof” at Auschwitz II, as described by “eyewitness” Hendryk Tauber, all of which never existed because the columns at Auschwitz are of solid reinforced concrete and there are no “holes in the roof”.
Tattooing occurs in all prisons (see, for example, http://www.convictsandcops.com/tattoo.htm .) and is usually a disciplinary offense, because it spreads disease (see also PRISON TATTOOS, by Douglas Kent Hall).
To get an idea of some of the problems involved in “jailhouse tattooing”, take a piece of paper and write a five-digit number on it with a pen, but using only dots. You will probably need between 15 and 30 dots per digit. Now imagine that the “pen” is a needle and that the “paper” is a person’s skin. You would spend at least half your time swabbing the blood away so that you could see what you were doing!
Any open cuts or sores on your hands would mean immediate infection by any blood-borne disease carried by the person being tattooed, while failure to sterilize your hands properly and use a new needle would infect all subsequent persons being tattooed with any blood-borne disease carried by the first person (or by yourself, at that stage). As one vendor of tattooing equipment http://www.etnj.com/tatshack/disclaimer.html says,
“ YOU AND ANYONE YOU TATTOO and/or PIERCE CAN & WILL CONTRACT LIFE-THREATENING DISEASE OR SUFFER PERSONAL INJURY IF PROPER PROCEDURES ARE NOT PRACTICED”.
If half a dozen jailbirds infect each other with hepatitis in an American prison, there is not much lost; but we are still far from the “industrialized tattooing on an assembly-line basis” alleged as the basis of all these Hoaxoco$t yarns.
It is only a guess, but it seems probable to me that the setup and disassembly time required for even one tattoo would probably amount to no less than 20 minutes. This does not include autoclaving and disposal. The needles must be soldered to the needle bar (the part that vibrates up and down), then broken off and autoclaved (or preferably disposed of) AFTER EVERY USE. This takes time.
Where are the plans, specifications, order forms, delivery vouchers, inventory receipts, etc. etc. for millions of tattooing needles, thousands of tattooing machines, related supplies, “tattooing plates” and all the rest of it? Where are the decisions, orders, and records relating to the persons tattooed? What is the point of tattooing some people and not others, if no record is made of the fact that a given person has been tattooed? Since a tattoo can be altered or covered at any time (all you need is another jailbird with a needle, cork, and some ink), this renders tattoos almost useless for purposes of identification.
For example, police “wanted” posters always mention tattoos, but do not usually describe them. They usually say: “Scar, right arm, tattoo, left shoulder”. Tattoo cover-up work is a very big part of the tattoo industry. Almost the only restriction is that pure white can only be applied over pure white, or over bare skin. Anything else can be covered, with anything.
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A “NAZI TATTOOING MACHINE”
To revisionists who say, “Show me or draw me a Nazi gas chamber”, but who accept the fairy tale of the “mass tattooings”, I say, “ Show me or draw me a Nazi tattooing machine”.
EXHIBIT 3
ANOTHER RIDICULOUS EXAMPLE OF GERMAN HOAXOCO$T “TATTOO TECHNOLOGY”
The Auschwitz Tattooist: Angie Fox, Australian Jewish News, December 19, 2003, posted on http://www.adelaideinstitute.org/Auschwitz/tattooist.htm (source website no longer carries the item)
QUOTE: “Lou Sokolov wears a permanent reminder of the three years he spent in Birkenau. Although it is faded, the number 32407 is still clearly legible on his left forearm. The tattoo which indelibly scars his tanned skin bears witness to his encounter with hell on earth.”
[Deletion]
“… From August 1942 to late 1944 he, along with assistants, tattooed the arms of 200,000 Jews from Holland, Belgium, Yugoslavia, Norway, Germany, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Austria and Hungary.
A piece of wood attached to two needles and a pot of ink [!] were the tools of his trade. Each tattoo, he says, took 30 seconds. ”
[COMMENT: This obviously impossible claim is made necessary by the claim that he tattooed 200,000 people. The intent is to hide the irrationality of the whole procedure by deceiving us into believing that if a 5-digit number can be tattooed in 30 seconds, then one person can tattoo 2 inmates per minute = 120 inmates per hour = 1200 inmates per 10-hour day, probably half the daily registration rate usually alleged at Auschwitz. This is like saying that if my car can go 100 miles an hour, New York and Los Angeles are 2000 miles apart, then I can drive coast to coast in 40 hours.]
“Yet those numbers have become long-lasting evidence of the most heinous crime in history.
… More than 400,000 tattoos were issued.”
[COMMENT: If you were going to tattoo 400,000 (or 200,000) people, wouldn’t you want an electric tattooing machine? The book IBM AND THE HOLOCAUST by Edwin Black describes the crucial information coded into Auschwitz inmate registration numbers -- information required to assign inmates to the right jobs. Would an inmate be entrusted with the job of tattooing this vital information with 2 needles [!] and a piece of wood? (The needles would presumably be very close together to make a thicker line.)
The obvious solution would be to assign a professional tattooist, a member of the German armed forces, and keep proper records to ensure that no duplicate or incorrect numbers were issued, etc. etc.
If the registration number says a man is a welder and it turns out he is a carpenter, you’ve lost at least a day’s work, all because of a careless error performed by a tattooist who is a prisoner and has no motivation to do proper work – a man whose only motivation was to sabotage the whole process as much as possible !]
[Note: another ridiculous tale is told by Rudolf Vrba on pp. 84-85 of I Cannot Forgive: Vrba claims the inmates were given a choice as to where they wanted to be tattooed. If a tattoo is intended for identification, its location must be standardized insofar as possible, for obvious reasons.]
”When Sokolov started the job in August 1942, the tattoo numbers commenced at 38,000. When they reached approximately 70,000, the tattoos commenced with the letter A.”
[COMMENT: This contradicts the description of the numbering system given by Edwin Black in his book IBM AND THE HOLOCAUST.]
“By that time, Sokolov had a number of assistants helping him cope with the transports, which were arriving day and night.
… Sokolov also used his skill to save a man who was scheduled to be hanged after a failed escape. He transformed the man’s tattoo into a picture of a snake”
[COMMENT:
FIRST ARGUMENT: This is only one of the many stories on the Internet about “miraculous escapes” brought about through the alteration of a tattoo. For this reason, it is extremely unlikely that the Germans ever tattooed anyone, and if they did, they would have made a record of it. The Auschwitz archives survived the war intact. J.-C. Pressac claims to have examined 80,000 documents at the Auschwitz State Museum, but there is no mention of “Holocaust” tattooing in any of his books. Also, wouldn’t the guy be in jail? Wouldn’t the Germans look for him someplace? If the Germans knew the man was tattooed, wouldn’t they look for a tattoo someplace? Wouldn’t the position of the snake be a dead give-away?
SECOND ARGUMENT: Since this amounts to an admission that any tattoo can be altered or covered at any time, why do the Holocaust survivors keep their tattoos if they hate them so much? Why don’t they just cover them up and forget about it? (Don’t tell me it is because tattoos are forbidden by Jewish law: Jews are fascinated by tattoos and are getting tattooed in large numbers.
Many of them, including a few non-Jewish idiots, all of them too young to be “survivors”, are getting “Holocaust tattoos” to “remember the Holocaust”, or are asking their rabbis whether such a thing would be permissible!
The Israeli Army is full of tattooed reservists. Tattooing is permitted in Israel although it is prohibited (at the time of writing) in South Carolina and Oklahoma except by medical personnel, (for example, registered nurses.)
The truth is that “survivors” want to be able to produce their “tattoos” every five minutes to “prove the Holocaust”, to attract attention, and demand money. “Jewish life has two elements: collecting money and protesting” (Nahum Goldman, THE JEWISH PARADOX, p. 52).
“ Holocaust survivors” are entitled to claim special DBs (presumably death or disability benefits) from the Federal Government of the United States. All they need do to “prove” that they are “survivors” is to show a tattoo, or even a scar resulting from tattoo removal! The financial and political motivation is obvious.
THIRD ARGUMENT: The ancient Romans and other ancient peoples, including the Japanese, tattooed criminals and slaves. Since escaped criminals and slaves covered their slave and/or prison tattoos with other tattoos as soon as they escaped, every person with a tattoo became suspect. This is why tattooed persons have always been viewed with suspicion.
FOURTH ARGUMENT: “How do we know that what we are looking at is a tattoo”? Since the tattoos almost invariably appear on the left forearm, and since most people are right-handed, all one need do is take a fountain pen, write a number on one’s left forearm, and presto! one is a “survivor”, and one’s “tattoo” “proves the Holocaust”! This question is also suggested by the extremely vague language used to describe the tattooing procedure itself (for example, “the tattoos were later made with pen and ink on the upper left forearm”, see above.)
There is no doubt that if the Germans had wished to tattoo 400,000 people they could have done so. (The Waffen-SS were tattooed with their blood type). But it would require proper procedures and proper equipment, voluminous documentation, and proper record-keeping. It is up to the Jews to prove where they got their tattoos, and to describe these matters in language that makes sense.
My personal belief is that the Germans considered the idea of tattooing inmates to facilitate recapture in the event of escape but abandoned the idea. There is probably no more than one single German document even mentioning it.
Robert Fausisson says he believes he saw it, many year ago, but is unable to provide any further information. Auschwitz was full of common criminals who, it may be surmised, tattooed each other in the camp (just as they do in any other prison) (see testimony of Fritz Schermuly, N.M.T. VI (I.G. FARBEN CASE), pp. 825-830. It is hard to understand Schermuly’s testimony unless this is what he means. Neither the defense nor the prosecution at Nuremberg appeared interested in finding out what he meant. The passage is as follows:
EXHIBIT 4
CROSS-EXAMINATION
MR. MINSKOFF: Mr. Witness, will you tell the court what your inmate number was that you have inscribed on your hand, on your arm?
A. 13955.It wasn't tattooed on my arm for one reason [?]. Only Jews and foreigners had their arms tattooed. That did not apply to Reich Germans.
Q. You mean that did not apply to Aryan Reich Germans?
A. Well, there were some Germans who had themselves tattooed voluntarily [?], but none of them were forced to do that at Monowitz.
[ SCHERMULY WAS A REICHS GERMAN. DOES THIS MEAN THAT THE INMATES TATTOOED EACH OTHER, OR THAT THEY APPROACHED THE GUARDS AND SAID, “HEY FRITZ, COULD YOU DO ME A FAVOUR AND TATTOO ME WITH MY INMATE NUMBER? I MIGHT FORGET IT.”
SINCE TATTOOING OCCURS IN ALL PRISONS, IT IS MY BELIEF THAT THE FIRST ALTERNATIVE IS THE MORE PROBABLE INTERPRETATION, AND THAT THE INMATES TATTOOED EACH OTHER. JUST AS AN EXAMPLE, 20% OF ALL INMATES OF THE SOVIET GULAGS OF THE 1930S WERE SAID TO BEAR “GULAG TATTOOS”, OFTEN CONSISTING OF ANTI-SOVIET SLOGANS.]
I believe that the Jews got the idea of tattooing each other from criminals and tattooed each other solely to blackmail the Germans, morally and financially. Another possibility is that the allegation is of Communist origin. Footnote 17 of L’Affaire Faurisson, interview with Storia Illustrata, states: (translation: “'The Polish communists themselves recognize that the tattooing was intended to render escape more difficult and to facilitate investigation as to the origins of captured fugitives'; see Contribution à l’histoire du KL-Auschwitz, publication of the Auschwitz Museum, 1968, pp. 16 and 99”). The fact remains that there is no evidence that anyone was actually tattooed.
I believe that the American authorities found it convenient to encourage the inmates to make these accusations, but knew that they were not true, and for that reason never made any effort to prove the truth of these accusations at any “war crimes” trial. It’s like the “gas chamber at Dachau” The Americans knew perfectly well that there was never any “gas chamber at Dachau” and never attempted to prove that there was, but it suited them to encourage others to say that there was (see, for example, my article THE GAS CHAMBER AT DACHAU – NOW YOU SEE IT, NOW YOU DON’T).
OBJECTION: “Would the Jews lie to us?” Answer: that is not the point. The point is an inversion of the burden of proof. If I go to court with a black eye and accuse someone of assaulting me, I will not be permitted to say, “Are you accusing me of lying? Do you think I gave myself this black eye?” Under our legal system, the court need not pronounce as to the origins of my black eye. The court is entitled to decide, on the basis of the evidence, that is there is insufficient evidence of an assault, in which case the defendant will be acquitted.
But since the question has been raised, the answer is, yes, the enemies of National Socialism (not just the Jews) do, in point of fact, not to put too fine a point on it, have a very poor record for truth and honesty. For example, in 1944, the OFFICIAL VERSION of the “Holocaust”, peddled to and by the World Jewish Congress, believed and repeated by Anthony Eden, President Roosevelt, and the international organizations in Geneva, was that the Germans were exterminating the Jews in TRAINS FILLED WITH QUICKLIME (STORY OF A SECRET STATE, by Jan Karski, 1944, available from www.alibris.com or www.abebooks.com for about 3 dollars, first edition). (Anybody who has ever put quicklime down an outhouse knows you can handle the stuff with your bare hands.)
The book contains no mention of any other methods of mass killing, and no mention of any “gas chambers”, and must be read all the way through to appreciate this simple fact. Karski survived the war by 50 years, became a professor at Georgetown University, hob-nobbed with several Presidents, but never renounced this lie.
Instead, he compounded it with other lies: that he had ATTEMPTED TO WARN THE WORLD OF THE “HOLOCAUST”, BUT WAS NOT BELIEVED. He is said to have adopted an air of great suffering, like a Polish Elie Wiesel. On his own account, he WAS believed.
Americans were asked to make “greater sacrifices” to save them from extermination by the Germans, not in gas chambers, but in “quicklime trains”! This is why the Americans went to war. Because of liars like Karski. The Internet is not reliable where Karsi is concerned. One must read the book.
So the matter stands as follows.
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “GAS CHAMBER”
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI "STEAM CHAMBER"
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “ELECTRICAL CHAMBER”
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “VACUUM CHAMBER”
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “STEAM CHAMBER”
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “PEDAL-DRIVEN BRAIN-BASHING MACHINE”
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “PORTABLE OVEN”
SHOW OR DRAW ME A NAZI “SPANKING MACHINE”
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “QUICKLIME TRAIN”
And, last but not least,
SHOW ME OR DRAW ME A NAZI “TATTOOING MACHINE”
CARLOS W. PORTER
FEBRUARY 2004
[Since the above was written, it has occurred to me that tattooing could be performed on an assembly-line basis, but only by an assembly line of tattooists and/or technicians: one to prepare the equipment, one to shave and disinfect the arm, one to perform the actual tattooing, one to dissemble and dispose of all used equipment (needles, tubes, ink pots, spatulas, latex gloves, cotton swabs, etc.), one to break off the needle bars and prepare them for autoclaving, one to operate the autoclave, and, finally, one to bandage all tattooed persons and instruct them in aftercare.
There would have to be an after-care service, consisting of perhaps a single person, and meticulous records would have to be kept. The autoclave would have to be tested periodically. The huge quantities of used tattooing equipment would presumably exist somewhere in medical containers at an Auschwitz rubbish dump. The forced tattooing of foreign citizens would almost certainly be in violation of various general clauses of international law.
Presumably after the war an investigation would have been conducted by the Poles, and, in addition to the hundreds of thousands of German documents, there would be huge quantities of physical evidence and tens or hundreds of thousands of affidavits by tattooed persons. Since the technicians would presumably work in shifts, the entire staff involved would probably amount to at least a dozen persons, all of whom would have to be examined medically at regular intervals, with related records.]
INTERNET SITES OF INTEREST:
French page with history of tattooing in various cultures:
www.tattoo-passion.com
How tattoos work:
http://doj.shef.ac.uk/student/web02/joa99nc/My%20Webs/how_tattoos_work.htm
Prison tattoo artists and prison tattoos:
http://www.convictsandcops.com/tattoo.htm
Very interesting example of tattoo cover-up work. Any tattoo can be covered with another tattoo. If the link doesn’t work, copy http://home.scarlet.be/rastamann/ into the window of your browser, look for ARTWORK, EN COURS, then click on YVES, lower right:
http://home.scarlet.be/rastamann/nouvellepage158.htm
Artist: Andy Nevil. Jailhouse or gang tattoos being covered by Oriental "sleeve" tattoo featuring carp and chrysanthemum.
Search youtube for "Preparing for a Tattoo", etc.
---
Most links probably defunct
Health aspects of tattooing. Disease prevention:
http://people.howstuffworks.com/tattoo9.htm
Invention, design and principle of the modern tattooing machine:
http://people.howstuffworks.com/tattoo5.htm
How to make your own tattooing machine (e-book for amateur and illegal tattooists):
http://www.tmbamall.com/hermitware/tattooing.htm
Home-made prison tattooing machines and history of tattooing:
http://www.nmm.ac.uk/site/request/setTemplate:singlecontent/contentTypeA/
conWebDoc/contentId/1293/viewPage/12
(Paste in everything up to TypeA/, then enter the rest of the URL manually or it does not work.)
Vendor of tattooing equipment issues serious health warning:
http://www.etnj.com/tatshack/disclaimer.html
Issues of legal and illegal tattooing:
http://www.luckyfish.com/laregs.html
Danger of reusing needle tubes, grips and needle bars:
http://www.piercing.org/tattoo/
Hoaxoco$t tattoo sites (note the lack of detail relating to the tattoo process):
http://www.bernardoffen.org/
http://www.chgs.umn.edu/Histories__Narratives__Documen/
Henry_Oertelt_-_An_Unbroken_Ch/Auschwitz_Tattoo/auschwitz_tattoo.html
http://www.us-israel.org/jsource/Holocaust/Tattoos.html
http://isurvived.org/StoryAlive_Holocaust.html
http://www.moravian.edu/news/releases/2002/022.htm
http://holocaust.hklaw.com/essays/1998/98GA1.htm
US Government offers financial motivation to obtain “Holocaust tattoos”:
http://policy.ssa.gov/poms.nsf/lnx/0200302335
Neurotic Jewish attitudes towards “Holocaust” tattooing and tattooing generally:
http://judaism.about.com/library/3_askrabbi_c/bl_tattoos_holocaust.htm
http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m0425/2_62/103415711/p3/article.jhtml?term =
http://www.babelguides.com/view/work/16773
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=19990712&c=2&s=wiener
Family of Jewish tattooists:
http://www.forward.com/issues/2003/03.09.19/living5.tatoo.html
The use of tattoos as a political weapon and “proof” of a “Holocaust”: http://isurvived.org/StoryAlive_Holocaust.html
(complete with the usual “miracle”).
European Union tattooing regulations:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/consumers/cons_safe/news/eis_tattoo_reg_052003_en.pdf
United States tattooing regulations – by state:
http://www.nbbs.com/statetattoo.html (very detailed -- click on state)
http://www.tattoobodypiercinginstitute.com/bloodborne/states.html
Tattooing in late antiquity:
http://www.ucpress.edu/scan/ca-e/161/gustafson.161.pdf
On tattooing generally:
http://www.tattoofinder.com (tattoo stencils) (MORE OR LESS DEFUNCT - TOO BAD)
Recommended artists:
Shane O'Neill -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9mCegS2ju4
George Bone
Big Bob Tyrell
Tom Renshaw
"Manu" (Chalon sur-Saône, France)
Sergey Bardadim (Vienna) (disappeared)
Edward Lee (if you can find out where he is)
Tattoo note
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