-62-

... Another ridiculous accusation ...

15 Feb 46

Seradsky, Professor of Forensic Medicine; Roman Longchamp de Berrier, Doctor of Juridical Science, together with his three sons, Professor Thaddeus Ostrovsky, Professor Jan Grek, and Professor of Surgery Heinrich Gilyarovich .... "

There follows a long list containing 31 names of outstanding in­tellectuals of the city of Lvov. I omit the enumeration of their names and continue quoting from the next paragraph:

"Groer, a professor of the Medical Institute at Lvov, who fortuitously escaped death, has told the Commission what follows:

'''When I was arrested at midnight of 3 July 1941 and placed in a truck, I met Professors Grek, Boi-Dhelensky, and others, We were taken to the hostel of the Abragamovitch Theological College, While we were led along the corridor the members of the Gestapo jeered at us, hitting us with rifle butts, pulling our hair, and hitting us over the head .... Later on I saw, from the hostel of the Abragamovitch Theological College, the Germans leading five professors under escort, four of whom were carrying the blood-bespattered body of the son of the famous surgeon Rouff, murdered by the Germans during his interrogation. Young Houff, too, had been a specialist. The entire group of professors were taken under escort to the Kadetsky Heights, and 15 to 20 minutes later I heard rifle fire from the direction in which the professors were taken.'''

In order to humiliate dignity, the Germans resorted to the most refined methods of torture and then shot their victims, Goldsman, an inhabitant of Lvov, has testified before the special commission that he personally saw how, in July 1941:

"Twenty people, including four professors, lawyers, and physicians, were brought by the S5 into the courtyard of House Number 8, on Artishevsky Street. One of them I know by name, Doctor of Juridical Science Krebs. Among them were five or six women. The SS forced them to wash the stairs leading from the seven entrances to the four-story house, with their tongues and lips. After those stairway were washed, the same people were forced to collect garbage in the courtyard with their lips. All garbage had to be transferred to one place in the courtyard ... ."

I omit the end of this paragraph and continue from the next paragraph:

"The fascist invaders carefully concealed the extermination of the intelligentsia. To repeated requests of relatives and friends concerning the 'fate of these men of science', the Germans replied, 'Nothing is known.'

IMT VII

481

-63-

...Another bizarre hallucination ...

17 Jan. 46

It appears to have been the plan, followed by the Nazis in the concentration camps, gradually to do away with the prisoners; but only after their working strength had been used to the advantage of the German war effort. .

The Tribunal has been told of the almost inconceivable treatment inflicted by ttle SS on the prisoners. We shall take the liberty of going into still further detail during the course of the statement of the French Prosecution, for it must be fully known to what extent of horrors the Germans, inspired by National Socialist doctrine, could stoop.

The most terrible aspect was perhaps the desire to create moral degradation and debasement in the prisoner until he lost, if possible, all semblance of a human individual.

The usual living conditions imposed on the deportees in the camps were sufficient to .ensure slow extermination through inadequate feeding, bad sanitation, cruelty of the guards, severity of discipline, strain of work out of proportion to the strength of the prisoner, and haphazard medical service. Moreover, you already know that many did not die a natural death, but were put to death by injections, gas chambers, or inoculations of fatal diseases. But more speedy extermination was often the case; it was often brought about by ill-treatment: communal ice-cold showers in winter in the open air, prisoners left naked in the snow, cudgelling, dog bites, hanging by the wrists.

Some figures will illustrate the result of these various methods of extermination. At Buchenwald, during the first 3 months of 1945, there were 13,000 deaths out of 40,000 internees. At Dachau, 13,000 to 15,000 died in the 3 months preceding the liberation. At Ausch­witz, a camp of systematic extermination, the number of murdered persons came to several millions.

As to the total number of those deported from France, the official figure is as follows: Of 250,000 deported only 35,000 returned.

The deportees served as guinea pigs for numerous medical, surgical, or other experiments which generally led to their death. At Auschwitz, at Struthof, in the prison at Cologne, at Ravensbrück, at Neuengamme, numerous men, women, and children were sterilized. At Auschwitz the most beautiful women were set apart,artificially fertilized, and then gassed. At Struthof a special barrack, isolated from the others by barbed wire, was used to inoculate men in groups of 40 with fatal illnesses. In the same camp women were gassed while German doctors observed their reactions through a peephole arranged for this purpose. Extermination was often directly effected by means of individual or collective

IMT V

403

-64-

... another example of German efficiency.

15 Feb. 46

"Some of the crimes of the German occupiers committed by them during the very first weeks of their piratical attack on the U.S.S.R., and their savage extermination of the civilian population of Bielorussla, the Ukraine, and the Baltic Soviet republics, have only now been documentarily established. Thus, when units of the Red Anny in the district of the town of Toropetz, in January 1942, smashed a German SS cavalry brigade, among the documents captured was found a report of the 1st Cavalry Regiment of this brigade concerning the 'pacification' by this unit of the Starobinsk district in Blelo­russia. The commander of the regiment reports that besides taking 239 prisoners a detachment of his regiment has also shot 6,504 peaceful civilians. The report further states that the detachment acted in pursuance of Order Number 42 issued to the regiment, dated 27 July 1941. The commander of the 2d Regiment of this brigade, Von Magill, states, in his 'Report Concerning the Execution of Repressive Operations on the River Pripet between 27 July and 11 August.' 19-11: the following:

'''We drove the women and children into the swamp but this did not produce the desired result since the swamp water was not deep enough for them to drown. One can usually feel bottom (possibly sand) at a depth o f 1 meter.'

"In the same headquarters a telegram, Number 37, was found. sent by the commander of the SS. Cavalry Brigade."

THE PRESIDENT: Shall we adjourn now for 10 minutes?

{A recess was taken.]

MARSHAL: May it please the Court, regarding the Defendant Hess, he will be absent until further notice on account of illness

MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: I continue the quotation:

"In the same headquarters there was discovered a telegram, Number 37, from the commander of the Cavalry Brigade, an SS-Standartenführer, to a cavalry unit of the above-mentioned 2d Cavalry Regiment, dated 2 August 1941. It mentioned that the Reichsführer of the SS and the Police, Himmler, considers the number of the exterminated peaceful civilians far too insignificant; and it points out that 'it is necessary to take radical measures' and 'the unit commanders' conduct the operations too mildly.' He also orders to report every day on the number of people shot."

In this connection we cannot abstain from mentioning the criminal activities of the Defendant Rosenberg in carrying out the

IMT VII

500