Mass grave at Marienburg (Malbork)

[Sergey]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/eur ... 16,00.html

The Polish city of Malbork has found a mass grave with the remains of some 1,800 people, thought to be former German residents of the town. They apparently died as the Red Army marched through Poland -- and some of them appear to have been executed.

They are only supposition. But let's ask ourselves. Had the Soviet soldiers ever undressed dead bodies or/and remove false teeth? I'm unaware about even one such proven case. But the Germans did it.

All of them, furthermore, had been buried naked, "without shoes, without clothes, without personal items," he said. "The metal detectors used during the excavations found no metal, not even a false tooth."

It rather shows that the dead were victims of the German concentration camps.

[David Thompson]

Sergey -- I have some questions and comments about your explanation.

You wrote: (1)

They are only supposition. But let's ask ourselves. Had the Soviet soldiers ever undressed dead bodies or/and remove false teeth? I'm unaware about even one such proven case. But the Germans did it.

(a) There are scores of cases in which the Germans had their victims undress before killing them. However, I'm not aware of any cases in which Germans killed their victims and then undressed them. Do you have any sourced examples of the German authorities killing people and then removing their clothing?

(b) The bullet holes spoil the salvage value of the clothes, unless you intend to send them to a rag mill. In both cases, there's no point in burying the clothes, which apparently happened here. We don't have an explanation for that, nor do we know whether the buried clothes had bloodstains and bullet holes.

(c) I've also read of cases where Red Army troops would strip captured POWs of their clothes before executing them -- the siege of Budapest immediately comes to mind. However, the accounts do not state what happened to the clothes. Apparently Yugoslav partisans engaged in the same practice with their prisoners, judging from some of the recent foibe discoveries. We know those clothes were buried, because the investigators found the soles of military shoes which had been buried with the clothes.

(d) Troops and civilian marauders who remove gold teeth, etc. from corpses after death are commonplace events in war. Because the practice is so common, it doesn't provide a reliable indicator of who did it.

(2)

All of them, furthermore, had been buried naked, "without shoes, without clothes, without personal items," he said. "The metal detectors used during the excavations found no metal, not even a false tooth."

It rather shows that the dead were victims of the German concentration camps.

(a) What German executions with mass graves can you source that have no bullets or casings at the execution site or in the bodies?

(b) Which concentration camps did the victims come from? Do you have any documents to back up your supposition that the dead persons came from there?

(c) Since no bullets or shell casings were found in the mass grave, how were the victims killed?

(d) Do you think the Germans told the concentration camp victims to replace their striped concentration camp uniforms with their old civilian clothes (which the Germans had carefully preserved) before killing them?

(e) If "the dead were victims of the German concentration camps," what happened to the thousands of missing German civilian inhabitants from the city?

[Sergey]

Dear mr.Thompson,

I propose my version that doesn't contradict to known facts.

My version: it is possible that the dead were inmates of German concentration camps died (or killed) in these concentration camps (there was a lot of them around Marienburg). It answers many your questions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stutthof_c ... ation_camp

Stutthof was the first concentration camp built by the Nazi Germany regime outside of Germany.
…
More than 85,000 victims[1] died in the camp out of as many as 110,000 people deported there.

There are about 30km between the camp and Marienburg and there is a direct road that connects both places.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_su ... f_Stutthof

The following is a list of subcamps of Stutthof complex of Nazi concentration camps.
1. Bocień (Bottschin)
2. Brusy (Bruß)
3. Bydgoszcz (Bromberg)
4. Cieszyny
5. Elbląg (Elbing]
6. Garczyn
7. Gdańsk (Danzig)
8. Gdańsk-Nowy Port (Danzig-Neufahrwasser)
9. Gdynia (Gotenhafen)
10. Graniczna Wieś (Grenzdorf)
11. Grudziądz (Graudenz)
12. Kępiny Wielkie (Zeyerniederkampen)
13. Kokoszki (Kokoschken)
14. Lębork (Lauenburg/Pommern)
15. Maćki (Matzkau)
16. Malken Mierzynek
17. Niskie-Brodno
18. Pelplin
19. Police, Poland (Pölitz)
20. Pruszcz (Praust)
21. Przebrno (Pröbernau)
22. Rusocin (Russoschin)
23. Sępopol (Schippenbeil)
24. Skowarcz (Schönwarling)
25. Słupsk (Stolp)
26. Sophienwalde
27. Starogard Gdański (Preußisch Stargard)
28. Toruń (Thorn)

Some of these subcamps were quite near Marienburg.

(e) If "the dead were victims of the German concentration camps," what happened to the thousands of missing German civilian inhabitants from the city?

The civilians could flee and die on the route. There were 2 mass graves in this area founded previously.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/eur ... 31,00.html

In 1996, 178 corpses were discovered on the grounds of Malbork Castle. Nine years later, specialists exhumed the bones of 123 more…

By the way it is not claimed that the bodies in these graves were absolutely undressed. And there could be another mass graves.

I'm unable to prove my version but another version (that they were German civilians) hasn't firm proof as well. Let's read this document.

http://www.gfanet.de/media/files/Commen ... %20GfA.pdf

According to press reports, a mass grave was discovered in the fall of 2008 during the course of construction work in the city of Malbork, once known as the German Marienburg. The Volkbundes Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge (VDK), an organization dedicated to the protection and care of the remains and graves of German citizens who died or fell during wartime, indicated that 2116 skeletons belonging to 1001 women, 381 men, and 377 children, as well as another 300 individuals whose age and sex were no longer determinable were recovered. The remains of these people, most probably German civilians who lost their lives in 1945, were interred on August 14, 2009 at the German war cemetery Neumark near Stettin (Szczecin).

'Most probably' - means that it is the most probable version, no more.

Following a review of the available and somewhat contradictory reports regarding the examination of the finds, the Society for Anthropology (Gesellschaft für anthropologie, GfA) sees itself obliged to answer a number of posing questions that remain open. It remains unclear whether origin, and cause and time of death of the victims were addressed by those performing the examination, which was ordered by the Polish Institut für Nationales Gedenken (IPN). The reports, for example, do not indicate to what extent experts in the field of forensic science were involved in the examination process. The GfA, whose members include leading experts in the fields of osteology, archaeology, and forensic anthropology, has made an effort to make contact with the Polish authorities responsible for dealing with such situations and also the VDK, however, an exchange of information did not materialize.

It is interesting why German experts were not allowed to examine the bodies?

The GfA board is of the opinion that the examination of such finds should be conducted according to current and accepted scientific criteria as used in anthropology and related fields of inquiry. Anthropology as a discipline offers the necessary tools and knowledge requisite for working on such finds. In addition to standard information regarding age, sex and health status, experts in this field are also capable of providing evidence for cause and time of death. The GfA, which is a scientific society composed of anthropologists and researchers affiliated with universities throughout Europe, offers its cooperation for such cases in the future.

I have only one explanation. The Poles could find themselves that the dead were not Germans and for political reasons decided to close the investigation.

[Crazy_Ivan]

What was the outcome of Czeslaw Geborski's trial?

[Dutto1]

Another article on the 1800 bodies found in Malbork.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/ja ... german-war

[Annelie]

Is there any update to this story?

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/j ... german-war

A mass grave dating from the second world war and containing the bodies of at least 1,800 German men, women and children has been unearthed by construction workers in northern Poland.

The discovery was made in the town of Malbork, which was called Marienburg and was part of Germany during the second world war, by workers building a luxury hotel at the foot of the town's 13th-century fortress.

The bodies are believed to be German civilians who disappeared after the Soviet army captured the town as it marched on Berlin in 1945. Many skulls were found with bullet holes in them, suggesting executions had taken place, a local official said.

A small number of bodies were found in late October, and digging was halted to allow an investigation. After resuming work weeks later, the workers turned up the remains of dozens, and then hundreds, more people.

Polish and German experts have concluded they are the remains of German citizens still classified as missing, said town official Piotr Szwedowski. He said it was believed more bodies might yet be found.

Many of the millions who disappeared in the chaos of wartime Europe are still unaccounted for.

"Examination of the remains and the circumstances confirm that these are the missing German inhabitants of Malbork," Szwedowski said. "I have no doubt it is them."

The residents were ordered to evacuate as the Red Army advanced in 1945. Some refused, while others were prevented from doing so by the general chaos of the front.


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The Soviets shelled the city, forcing German troops to retreat. The remaining civilians found themselves at the mercy of Red Army troops. There were no known living witnesses of what happened, Szwedowski said.

The bodies were buried naked without any possessions, he said.

"We found no trace of any clothes, shoes, belts, glasses not even dentures or false teeth," he said.

Some 100 skulls, mostly of adults, had bullet holes in them.

"We don't know if these are direct or indirect victims of the artillery barrage, but the bullet holes suggest executions in some cases," he said.

More forensic tests would be carried out before the remains were laid to rest either in Malbork or a German military cemetery in Stary Czarnow, near the north-western city of Szczecin.

"These people died in such an inhuman way, were dumped so inhumanely, that we need to bury them in dignity and respect," Szwedowski said.

[seaburn]

Hi Annelie, I wonder if it would be better to change the title of the thread to the name of the town - Malbork/Marianburg - in order to catch the attention of members who might add to this story. What happened to these people would certainly look like a war crime - I saw an internet source which mentioned bodies located a various points in the town, one claimed a mass grave of females was discovered. I would doubt that there were no surviving witnesses to this alleged atrocity but due to the political climate post-war behind the Iron Curtain' any that may have managed to survive would have known better than to talk about it before 1990 at least . The evidence so far found should have warranted a further investigation by authorities in the town to uncover the fate of these people.

[Poot]

Just a few thoughts here:

-The people interviewed seem quite convinced that the victims were German civilians, but offer no real evidence.
-The manner of inhumation (no clothing, personal effects, dentures, et al.) is strongly reminiscent of the murder of Jewish civilians early in the Holocaust. Contrast this to the known footage of fully clothed German civilians that had been massacred by the Red Army in eastern Germany and the differences are quite obvious.
-One inhumation contained all-female bodies. This has numerous parallels in the Ukraine and Byelorussia early in the Holocaust. Babi Yar comes to mind here.

This sounds much more like a massacre from the relatively early stages of the Final Solution than a late war 'vengeance' massacre.

Pat

[Marcus]

(Merged two threads on the same topic)

[Marcus]

I posted the below earlier in the thread and it certainly suggests that the involved historians agreed that the victims were German civilians.

The remains of more than 2,000 people discovered in Poland's largest mass grave from World War II have been reburied in a military cemetery.
Polish and German officials presided over the ceremony at a cemetery for German soldiers in north-west Poland, near the border between the countries.
The victims are believed to be German civilians who died in the last months of the conflict, in early 1945.
The mass grave was discovered in the Polish city of Malbork last October.
Because no-one was prepared to pay for expensive DNA testing, the historians' best guess is that the victims were German civilians caught up in the Red Army's assault on the city.
At the time Malbork was Marienberg, a German city.
The first skeletons were unearthed by workmen digging the foundations of a new hotel near the city's medieval castle.
In the end, more than 2,000 skeletons were discovered, two-thirds of them belonging to women and children.
There were no accompanying documents, clothing or personal items except for one pair of child's spectacles.
Issues over the war have often divided Germany and Poland in the past, but not in this case.
Neither side voiced recriminations and they worked together to finally give the victims a dignified burial.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8202210.stm

/Marcus

[henryk]

http://wpolityce.pl/polityka/106109-ipn ... w-malborku
Google translation

IPN unraveled the mystery of a mass grave in Malbork.........
Published 4 October 2010 Updated 3 August 2011
When in December 2008, the media reported the discovery of a mass grave from the Second World War in Malbork, about the case, little was known. Portal http://www.malbork.naszemiasto.pl described the sad discovery:

From day to day growing estimates of the number of people who could be buried in a mass grave on the street Solna in Malbork. Among the excavated human remains found approximately 1,000 skulls.
Recall that encountered grave in October. during demolition and order in the area for construction of a 4-star hotel. The amount of debris is shocking today. I can still grow.

- Number of odkopywanych debris is changing rapidly - says Jarosław Kembłowski, Deputy District Attorney in Malbork. - Even last week found about 550 skulls, including perhaps they've even beyond 1000. I suppose that further work on the extraction of the remains, under the supervision of an archaeologist, can take up to mid-January.

The existence of such a large mass grave at this point raises a lot of questions, including the origin of the victims and the circumstances of their death. Before scientists, lovers of history Malbork is a difficult task to reach the answer. Case pervades not only the local historians. This appeared to have representatives of the Foundation Remembrance, which takes care of the graves of German soldiers who died on Polish territory.

There is a chance that the joint forces manage to solve another puzzle Malbork, and above all to honor the memory of the victims for many years forgotten.

Thanks also interested in German historians. And in January, the media, including "Legal Newspaper" reported the acquisition of an investigation by the Institute of National Remembrance:


According to the IPN in a mass grave in Malbork, in addition to the German inhabitants of the city, can be buried as refugees from East Prussia. From the ground has yet been recovered remains of about 1850 people, work is still in progress.
Today, the head of the branch of the Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Institute of National Remembrance in Gdansk, the prosecutor Maciej Schulz went to Malbork to see the mass grave and meet, among others, exhumation of supervisors.
"We agreed course of action for the next time, but the details do not want to talk," - said Schulz after the visit, adding that it was an organizational meeting, the first after the last Thursday of the IPN took over the investigation from the Prosecutor's Office in Malbork.

IPN prosecutors and historians have determined the origin of the tomb, which was announced in a detailed message:

Statement to discontinue the investigation into the murder in 1945. Approx. 2110 people whose remains are disclosed in 2008. In Malbork...

Gdynia, on 1 October 2010.

By order dated 1.10.2010. Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation in Gdansk discontinued the investigation into the event in March and April 1945. In Malbork violations of international law by allowing the murder of about 2,110 people - prisoners of war and civilians area where military operations were conducted, which revealed the remains of the date of 28.10.2008. during construction work at. Salt in Malbork, for lack of evidence justifying the suspicion of committing a crime - a crime against humanity.

In the course of the proceedings discloses that were buried in a mass grave probably the vast majority of German nationality civilians, mostly women and children, as well as animal remains. This was probably at the end of March and April 1945. Immediately after the occupation of the city by the Soviet army in the course of their "share" of his treatment of the corpses of the fallen and the dead by the commandant of the city, with the German prisoners of war. This was also to prevent the escalation of epidemic typhus. Causes of death of people buried there a way to specify, but probably died as a result of: hunger, disease, cold, or as a result of the war. Only in a few bones revealed damage that may be derived from gunshot wounds. The grave does not disclose personally identifiable objects of the dead or the circumstances of their death. The above disclosed on the basis of expert opinion, literature, history, archival materials, reports and testimonies. The completion of the investigation was made possible by the reply of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation on a request for legal assistance. It shows that in the Russian archives documents which may explain shoulder the circumstances of the mass grave at. Salt in Malbork.

chief
Commission for the Investigation of Crimes Branch
Against the Polish Nation
in Gdansk
prosecutor. Maciej Schulz

In August last year, the dead were buried with dignity. German Consulate in Gdansk informed:
Ambassador Michael H. Gerdts and Consul General Joachim Bleicker took on Friday, 14.08.2009, participated in a ceremonial burial of Malbork.

More than 2,100 dead, whose remains were exhumed from a mass grave in Malbork from October 2008. to April 2009., was buried in the German military cemetery in Old Czarnow k / Szczecin.

arr. kam

Photo None
author: APPENDIX HISTORICAL

Appendix historic site wPolityce.pl

[Annelie]

By order dated 1.10.2010. Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation in Gdansk discontinued the investigation into the event in March and April 1945. In Malbork violations of international law by allowing the murder of about 2,110 people - prisoners of war and civilians area where military operations were conducted, which revealed the remains of the date of 28.10.2008. during construction work at. Salt in Malbork, for lack of evidence justifying the suspicion of committing a crime - a crime against humanity.

Unbelievable...discontinued the investigation...where is the justice?
Germany has paid and will continue to pay for a long time, there shouldn't be any reason
why any other allies nation should not also answer to war crimes.

Lack of evidence? Shame on the Commission for Prosecution of Crimes against Polish Nation in Gdansk.

[seaburn]

I'm glad to see that the remains have been re-buried with dignity but not to conclude a proper forensic investigation will ensure that wild rumour and innuendo continue to flourish. It's painful to read that the only official conclusion to their identity was a 'best guess' which is hardly academic. From reading all the previous posts it appears that there could have been multiple reasons as to how these people ended up there and why.

Was there any effort made to locate survivor testimonies, I wonder. Certainly from details in previous posts it seems that some people from the town survived, their testimonies might have gone a long way to uncover what happened. The only positive here IMO is that the remains have been re-buried correctly, hopefully some time in the future they will be re-examined and a proper picture will emerge that will will give these victims their right to have their tragic story known.

[henryk]

Annelie

for lack of evidence justifying the suspicion of committing a crime - a crime against humanity.

This was also to prevent the escalation of epidemic typhus

Only in a few bones revealed damage that may be derived from gunshot wounds.

No crime against humanity. What do you want them to investigate? What more can they do?

[seaburn]

In the course of the proceedings discloses that were buried in a mass grave probably the vast majority of German nationality civilians, mostly women and children, as well as animal remains. This was probably at the end of March and April 1945. Immediately after the occupation of the city by the Soviet army in the course of their "share" of his treatment of the corpses of the fallen and the dead by the commandant of the city, with the German prisoners of war. This was also to prevent the escalation of epidemic typhus. Causes of death of people buried there a way to specify, but probably died as a result of: hunger, disease, cold, or as a result of the war. Only in a few bones revealed damage that may be derived from gunshot wounds. The grave does not disclose personally identifiable objects of the dead or the circumstances of their death. The above disclosed on the basis of expert opinion, literature, history, archival materials, reports and testimonies. The completion of the investigation was made possible by the reply of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation on a request for legal assistance. It shows that in the Russian archives documents which may explain shoulder the circumstances of the mass grave at. Salt in Malbork.

IMO there are too many 'probables' here for the assertion that....... 'The above disclosed on the basis of expert opinion, literature, history, archival materials, reports and testimonies' ..........even with the confusion of war - this event would still be in living memory and there should be more definite details known with so much apparent in-depth research as listed, instead the most fundamental facts as to the identity of these people, when this happened and how they died are still unanswered.

Do you know 'henryk' if that report was ever made public ?