Whose officer' s child was lost at Auschwitz?

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Helly Angel
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Re: Whose officer' s child was lost at Auschwitz?

#16

Post by Helly Angel » 04 Aug 2011, 21:15

I agree totally with Mr. Mills,

Tilman, the Schwarzhuber´s son died in the Gas Chamber?

Best,

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Volksch
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Re: Whose officer' s child was lost at Auschwitz?

#17

Post by Volksch » 05 Aug 2011, 05:52

In the Frankfurt courtroom Baretzki described a scene that no one could have imagined. When he asked whether children of SS men were permitted inside the camp, he answered in his clipped and harsh speaking style: "What's meant by children of members of the SS in the camp? A child is a child and children, that's many children. There was Schwarzhuber's boy, he was six years old, and when he went to the camp to look for his father, he had a sign around his neck that said he was the son of the SS camp leader Schwarzhuber so they wouldn't grab him and send him to the gas chamber. He was only looking for his father. " When i referred to this episode in a conversation with Baretzki in the prison, he explained why the child wore the sign. Once Schwarzhuber's son disappeared, and since he frequently came into the camp, they frantically looked for him there: "Because no transport had arrived on that day," said Baretzki, "he could not be in the gas chamber." After the roll call the boy came running along. From that time on, he wore the sign whenever he came into the camp.
People in Auschwitz By Hermann Langbein


michael mills
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Re: Whose officer' s child was lost at Auschwitz?

#18

Post by michael mills » 05 Aug 2011, 07:51

What Baretzki stated in evidence given at the Auschwitz Trial was that all children sent to Auschwitz as prisoners were automatically killed.

To emphasise that point, he claimed that a child of a member of the camp staff who walked through the camp to meet his father had to wear a special sign, otherwise any guard seeing him would immediately grab him and throw him into the oven.

All very dramatic, but Baretzki was probably grossly exaggerating in order to emphasis the point he was making.

In reality, any family member of the camp staff who had a reason for entering the grounds of either the Auschwitz main camp or the Birkenau camp would have been escorted. Of course camp guards did not throw the children of other camp guards into ovens.

Baretzki's claim needs to be assessed in the context of the defence that he and the other accused were making, namely to portray Auschwitz as a place of total insanity and mindless violence, where even the children of guards might suddenly been thrown into the ovens, so that they themselves were in constant danger and had no choice but to obey orders. Also that the prisoners in the camp were all under an automatic sentence of death, over which they, the former guards now on trial, had no control, such that their own actions made no difference.

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Helly Angel
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Re: Whose officer' s child was lost at Auschwitz?

#19

Post by Helly Angel » 06 Aug 2011, 06:05

Very interesting!

bohemian_scientist
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Re: Whose officer' s child was lost at Auschwitz?

#20

Post by bohemian_scientist » 22 Aug 2011, 17:55

Thank you very much for all the replies. Yes, i think it was indeed Schwarzhuber the guy they were talking about.

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