"The Buchenwald Report" on tattooed skin, lampshades, shrunken heads.

[Sergey Romanov]

Given that you have been exposed as a stubborn know-nothing once again, there's no reason to give you more info. You will have to be satisfied with the fact that according to Neander and the Buchenwald Museum the skin-table lamp is from Pister's office.

[Sergey Romanov]

Re: Ackermann: during the West German trial he testified that the lampshade could not be directly tied to Koch. Something that the prosecution would have liked to hear.

This may be the reason why he was not asked about this by the American prosecution during the Buchenwald trial (and without having been asked he couldn't have told his story).

Thus there doesn't seem to be evidence presented to put Ackermann's testimony on this into serious doubt.

[Gorque]

Sorry for butting in. I have a few questions: For what crime was Dr. Sigmund Rascher executed for and who is Joachim Neander, credentials etc?

[michael mills]

Given that you have been exposed as a stubborn know-nothing once again, there's no reason to give you more info. You will have to be satisfied with the fact that according to Neander and the Buchenwald Museum the skin-table lamp is from Pister's office.

Does the Buchenwald Museum say that the shade on that lamp was proved to be made of human skin? Does it have a record of tests having been carried out on it, and the results?

[Sergey Romanov]

It is extremely unlikely that the lampshade was made out of human skin.

[michael mills]

That's what I thought. Just wanted to check.

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Given that you have been exposed as a stubborn know-nothing once again, there's no reason to give you more info. You will have to be satisfied with the fact that according to Neander and the Buchenwald Museum the skin-table lamp is from Pister's office.

You're claiming to have exposed me as a "stubborn know-nothing" simply because I have an earlier draft of Neander's book than you do! That is crass, even for.

The fact that I have posted archival document on this thread that were previously unknown in field before I discovered them, e.g. Peter Schlöder's interrogation report, exposes the spuriousness of your most recent ad hominem attack on me.
viewtopic.php?p=1990178#p1990178

Re: Ackermann: during the West German trial he testified that the lampshade could not be directly tied to Koch. Something that the prosecution would have liked to hear.

What is your source for that claim?

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Affidavit of former Buchenwald prisoner Paul Dorn about his fellow prisoner Josef Ackermann:

"I am the same Paul Dorn who testified here as a witness on 5 and 6 June 1947 before Military Tribunal I.

"Josef Ackermann's affidavit Document 2631, Exhibit 522, has been shown to me. I know Josef Ackermann. I made his acquaintance in the concentration camp Buchenwald in 1941. I know the general reputation which Josef Ackermann enjoyed in the concentration camp Buchenwald. Josef Ackermann enjoyed among the prisoners in the concentration camp a very bad reputation.

I still remember for certainty that Josef Ackermann in about the year 1942 or 1943 betrayed a few prisoners who had stolen some food in the camp to the SS camp management--namely, to the head of the administrative custody camp, Schober. Among the prisoners whom Josef Ackermann denounced was included the former political prisoner Heinrich Bach, a medical student by profession, from Finsterwalde. The SS camp management then carried out exhaustive investigations of the persons denounced. Heinrich Bach was to be transferred to the quarry work detail, where he very probably would have died. It is only to be attributed to Dr. Hoven's intervention that the SS camp management could not carry out this plan. Dr. Hoven first accommodated Bach in Block 46 in order to withdraw him from the clutches of the SS camp command. I think it therefore quite possible that Ackermann had a disinclination toward Dr. Hoven because Hoven helped the prisoners whom Ackermann had denounced at that time.

"I state further Dr. Hoven never had a skull on his desk. This I know for certain. My statements here refer to the period from 1941 until his imprisonment in September 1943. I, therefore, consider it out of the question that Hoven asked Ackermann to give him a skull for his desk."

- Read into the NMT Doctors trial transcript, 2 July 1947, pp. 10,654-10,656

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Nuremberg Doctors trial testimony of former Buchenwald physician Waldemar Hoven [who was sentence to death by the SS but given a reprieve late in the war] about some of Ackerman's claims about the Buchenwald pathological department:

Q [Prosecutor Hardy].- Dr. Hoven, at any occasion during the course of your time at the Buchenwald concentration camp, did you request that a prisoner's head be placed on your desk?

A.- No, never.

Q.- Never did that?

A.- No.

Q.- You know a man named Josef Ackermann?

A.- Yes.

Q.- Who was Josef Ackermann?

A.- A political prisoner. I don't know what party he belonged to. I accommodated him in the pathological department. He was one of the prisoners who did not take an active part in the fight against the SS but who was being helped by me, the illegal camp management, and the political prisoners committee. He was to be sent away on a transport several times. The illegal camp management wanted him rescued and I helped do so.

Q.- Did you ever point out an inmate walking across the camp yard to Ackermann and tell him that you wanted that man killed?

A.- No, never.

Q.- Let us look at Document NO-2631. This will be offered as Prosecution Exhibit 522 for identification, your Honor, This is an affidavit by Josef Ackermann. I want you to turn to paragraph No. 2 and in paragraph No. 2 we go down to the 4th sentence beginning with the words "During the last years..." and the affidavit reads as follows. I quote: "During the last years my superior was the camp physician Dr. Waldemar Hoven. Every corpse of a. prisoner was brought into the mortuary of the pathological section. I had also to compose the so-called post-mortem findings on these prisoners who were shot on escape, which findings were distributed in numerous copies, among others also to the SS-Court in Dusseldorf."

Now we will turn to the next page - page 3 and on page 3 of the English, we will find on page 2 of the German - the last sentence on page 2 of the German, which is the sentence beginning just about the middle of page 3 of the English, above the words in parentheses (page 3 of original) the sentence beginning "Dr. Hoven stood once..." Do you have that?

A.- Yes.

Q.- And I quote therefrom: Dr. Hoven stood once together with me at the window of the pathological section and pointed to a prisoner, not known to me who crossed the place where the roll calls were held. Dr. Hoven told me: I want to see the skull of this prisoner on my writing desk until tomorrow evening. The prisoner was ordered to report to the medical section, after the physician had noted down the number of the prisoner. The corpse was delivered on the same day to the dissection room. The post-mortem examination showed that the prisoner had been killed by injections. The skull was prepared as ordered and delivered to Dr. Hoven."

Do you know anything about that doctor?

A.- This is the biggest lie I ever saw in my whole life.

Q.- You don't know anything about that?

A.- First of all, Mr. Hardy, there was never a skull on my desk.

I never interested myself in the pathological section. There was a doctor there from Berlin by the name of Miller [sic], and before him a Dr. Leve. Moreover I only visited once the pathological section. Ackermann usually stood at the door, used to greet me, and thank me for saving political prisoners and such things. But, never in my life did I have a prisoner killed and acquire his skull. I wasn't interested in skulls. This is an unmistakable lie.

- NMT Doctors trial transcript, 24 June 1947, pp. 9,954-9,956.

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Extracts of the NMT Pohl trial testimony of Josef Ackermann follows.

Not once in his lengthy testimony did Ackermann claim that a lampshade or any other items were ever made from human-skin in the Buchenwald pathology department.

He did claim that the heads of prisoners were shrunk or their skulls used as exhibit pieces, and that tattooed human skin was collected, and even implied that prisoners were killed for their tattooed skins [see text in red]

JOSEF ACKERMANN, a witness, took the stand and testified as follows:

THE PRESIDENT: Raise your hand and repeat after me: I swear by God, the Almighty and Omniscient, that I will speak the pure truth and will withhold and add nothing.

(The witness repeated the oath.)

THE PRESIDENT: You may be seated.

DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. ROBBINS:

Q. Witness, your name is Josef Ackermann?

A. Josef Ackermann, yes.

Q. Where and when were you born?

A. I was born on 31 January 1896 in Munich.

Q. You are presently a German citizen?

A. Yes, I am a German citizen.

Q. You are a journalist by profession?

A. Yes.

Q. How long have you followed that profession?

A. I have been a journalist and editor for thirty years.

Q. You are a student of political economy and history?

A. Yes.

Q. When were you first arrested?

A. I was arrested in 1933, at the beginning of September 1933, together with the British journalist Mr. Panther of the Daily Telegraph in Munich.

Q. On what charges?

A. I was charged with having committed treason and high treason, committed by publications in British papers about National Socialism.

Q. What did those statements consist of, generally?

A. The accusations were generally concerned with the fact that the National Socialist regime was aiming at starting a new world conflagration, a new war.

Q. Were you sent to a concentration camp at that time?

A. Yes, I was.

Q. Where were you sent?

A. After having spent some time in prison, I was sent to Dachau.

Q. How long were you in Dachau?

A. I was in Dachau from April to September, 1934.

Q. You were then released?

A. I was released in September, 1934.

Q. Were you again arrested in September, 1939?

A. From 1935 to 1938 I was arrested four times. I was for a time in the Wittelsbach-Palais in Munich, which was the Gestapo prison.

Q. What were the charges?

A. There were no real charges. It was purely a continuation of the first case.

Q. Then again in September 1939 you were taken into custody?

A. I was again taken into custody and after a few days in prison I was sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp.

Q. How long did you remain in Buchenwald?

A. I remained in Buchenwald up to 4 January 1944 when I was transferred to Dora, near Nordhausen, where I remained until the end of the war.

Q. Is Dora a branch camp of Buchenwald?

A. Dora up to the summer of 1944 was an outside camp of Buchenwald concentration camp and only in the summer of 1944 was it an independent camp.

Q. Do you know whether or not this was under Amtsgruppe D of the WVHA - Dora, that is?

A. All our letters which were sent to the medical department at Berlin were sent to the Group Office D-III to Oberstandartenfuehrer Lolling.

Q. How long did you stay in concentration camp Dora, Nordhausen?

A. In Dora, Nordhausen, I stayed from 4 January 1944 up to the Beginning of April of 1945 when the camp was evacuated Because the Americans approached.

Q. What kind of work were you assigned to do in Buchenwald when you were sent there in September 1939?

A. For some months I worked in the diggers company, and at the end of 1939 I was employed in the pathological department as a medical clerk and at Buchenwald I did this until 5 January 1944.

THE PRESIDENT: We will recess until 9:30 tomorrow morning.

THE MARSHAL: Tribunal II is in recess until 0930 hours tomorrow morning.

(The Tribunal adjourned until 24 April 1947 at 0930 hours.)

[above 23 April 1947, pp. 929-932]

JOSEF ACKERMANN - Resumed DIRECT EXAMINATION (Continued) BY MR. ROBBINS:

Q. Herr Ackermann, you understand that you are still under oath to tell the truth?

A. Yes.

Q. You were committed to Buchenwald Concentration Camp in September, 1939?

A. Yes.

Q. Will you tell the Court again what the charges against you were at that time?

In the year 1939 no charges were raised against me at all, but I was only arrested and I was sent to the concentration camp without ever having been interrogated or without having been given a trial. For this reason I never found out why I was arrested in the year 1939.

Q. But you had been previously arrested in 1933 for articles you had published in England?

Yes. I had to assume that my arrest in the year 1939 was the automatic result of my previous confinement, because I was not considered politically loyal.

Q. What kind of work were you given to do in Buchenwald when you were confined there?

A. During the first few months I had to perform manual work with the pit command, and I had to work with various other detachments, and then towards the end of 1939 I was sent to work to the pathological department as clerk of the physician there.

Q. And what kind of work did you do in the pathological section as a physician's clerk?

A. With every autopsy of prisoners' bodies I had to be present, and I had to make a record there about the autopsy, and I also had to write it down.

Q. You made the post mortem reports, in other words?

A. Yes. Furthermore I also had to keep a list of the people who had died, and I had to carry out the other correspondence work of the pathological section.

Q. Who was your superior in that work?

A. I had a whole number of superiors, physicians.

Q. Can you give us the names of some of the doctors who supervised your work?

A. The first of them was an SS-Untersturmfuehrer, Dr. Gutacker. He was succeeded by Dr. Victor Lewe, Untersturmfuehrer. Then later on Obersturmfuehrer Dr. Mueller came, and later Hauptsturmfuehrer Dr. Blaza took over the direction of the pathological section. De. Hoven, besides his activity as a camp physician, also was in charge of the pathological section for some period of time.

THE PRESIDENT: May I interrupt just a minute to note for the record that all the defendants are present in court, including the Defendant Fanslau, this morning.

Q. (By Mr. Robbins) Is that Dr. Waldemar Hoven that you referred to?

A. Dr. Waldemar Hoven, yes. He is a defendant in the medical trial.

Q. Do you have any knowledge of the extraction of gold teeth from the bodies of the extraction of gold teeth from the bodies of the deceased inmates?

A. We had an order from the camp physician according to which the gold teeth were to be removed from all dead prisoners, and they were to be turned over to the administrative leader, Barnewald. In every case the gold was weighed. Then it was put into a bag and turned over to Hauptsturmfuehrer Barnewald, and he issued a receipt for it which I kept in my files in the pathological section.

Q. Do you know where this order that you just referred to came from?

A. I cannot tell you that because I did not see the original order at Buchenwald. Contrary to Dora, where I was also the clerk of the camp physician, where I also saw all orders, even the secret orders where I kept them in my files, in Buchenwald I only heard of these orders by way of the camp physician.

Q. Do you know where the gold was sent?

A. We turned the gold over to Barnewald, and we assumed that he turned it over to his superior agency, which would be the WVHA. However, we did not discover any more details about that.

Q. In your work as physician's clerk in the pathological section, was it also a part of your duties to compose post mortem findings on the prisoners who were shot on escape?

A. All prisoners, if they had died of a natural death or if they died by force automatically came to me. They were sent there. Usually I also received all the corpses of people who had been beaten to death in the bunker, and also people who had been shot while trying to escape. It was my task to first of all make a record as to their condition, and I had to state where the bullets entered the body and where they left it, and I had to determine the inner wounds and the causes of death.

Q. Herr Ackermann, can you give us some idea of how many prisoners were beaten to death and shot on escape per day or per week, per month?

A. It was very difficult to give a general figure because the numbers varied. There were times when as a result of the readjustment of the camp leaders, the so-called shootings while trying to escape or the other killings which took place increased enormously, and they were carried out at times. It is impossible to give any average figure, but there were days when until ten-thirty in the morning approximately twelve, thirteen, and fourteen shootings while trying to escape took place.

Q. Is it true that on some occasions that the names of the prisoners who would be shot during escape was known in the pathological section the day before they were actually shot?

A. We usually knew already on the evening before who would be shot while trying to escape the following day, and almost the entire camp knew of that, including the person concerned, because Case 4, Court II the Scharfuehrer on the day before proclaimed that in a certain way, and they would tell the man, "You will be shot tomorrow while trying to escape."

In many cases the individual prisoner was given the advice, "Go voluntarily into the chain of guards tomorrow, because your death has already been decided upon, and it is better if you die from a bullet than if you are finished off in the bunker."

Q. Do you know if the Austrian Konsul, Dr. Steidler, received such a fate?

A. The Austrian Konsul-General, Dr. Steidler, was located in my block, and every evening I had political and philosophical discussions with him. On the evening before he died he informed me that on the following day he would be shot while trying to escape, and he told me in addition it was extremely difficult for him because he was a faithful Catholic and because he condemned suicide and refuted it from the standpoint of his religion. However, Oberscharfuehrer Blank had informed him that his death had already been decided upon for the files and he was giving him the advice to run into the chain of guards voluntarily, because his death in the bunker would probably be more painful than a bullet from the guard.

A. That his death was decided upon in advance is also shown by the fact that one day prior to his death his son, Dr. Steidle, Jr., who was located in the same camp and in the same block, was sent to a transport to Dachau without reason whatsoever. It was generally assumed that this was still a gesture of humanity, at least, not to let the son see in the same camp how his father was being shot.

Q .And was he shot while trying to escape on the morning following your conversation with him?

A. He was shot while trying to escape. That is to say, he went into the chain of guards and the guard aimed his rifle at him and shot him down. Two hours after, I had seen him for the last time; I had him on my table where I performed the autopsy, and he was dead.

THE PRESIDENT: Can we have the name of the Austrian Counsel-General spelled?

MR. ROBBINS: That is Dr. S-t-e-i-d-l-e.

THE WITNESS: His name is S-t-e-i-d-l-e.

BY MR. ROBBINS:

Q. Where were these post-mortem report sent?

A The post-mortem reports were kept in the Pathological Section in the closet which I had in my office.

Q And were copies sent to anyone?

A. At the beginning, up to seven and eight copies were typed out, and a copy was made of all cases where people had died of a death which was not natural. That was sent to the SS court at Duesseldorf. Another copy automatically went to the physician in charge, with "The Inspectorate of Concentration Camp Oranienburg, Attention Standartenfuehrer Dr. Lolling." Another copy went to the political section of the camp, and to the camp administration. The records which had accumulated annually, prepared in the book bindery shop, I kept then with me. They must have been discovered when the camp was occupied.

In the big register of all the deaths which occurred, I also carefully listed the names of all persons who had died, Their place of birth and all the other dates in their lives were also listed. And this book also must have been found when the camp was occupied.

Q. Herr Ackermann, did you have conversations with Dr. Hoven concerning the collection of skulls?

A. Dr. Hoven, who was the director of the Pathological Section for a rather extended period of time, repeatedly asked us to furnish him with skulls - and not only skulls, but also skeletons. That was by order of the physician in charge of the concentration camp Oranienburg, Dr. Lolling. Frequently, he also turned over to me the correspondence from Dr. Lolling and in these letters it was stated, "I need immediately ton entire skeletons, one dozen skulls... or individual parts of a body," or, "we need some interesting bullet wounds," and pathological medicines were also requested. Every few weeks we sent to the SS Medical Academy at Graz large boxes with the pathological symptoms of diseases, of special drugs. That is to say, we sent parts of bodies which were to be exhibited to physicians who were being trained.

Q. Was Dr. Hoven a subordinate of Dr. Lolling?

A. Dr. Hoven was subordinated to Dr. Lolling, however, he was not subordinated to him to a great extent, because during his vacation he acted as deputy to Dr. Lolling on many occasions. On one occasion he represented him for three or four months, and during that period of time he stayed at Oranienburg, and he took care of all the official business of Dr. Lolling. During this period of time he he communicated with me through teletype, and at that time he ordered me to carry on the correspondence with the dean of the medical faculty of the University of Freiburg with regard to his work which was carried out by the prisoners and which was not mentioned at all.

That was a doctor's thesis which he only saw after it had already been put in the form of a book - and even then he did not read it. At the period of time when I was negotiating with the dean, Dr. Hoven still did not have the slightest idea what was contained in the book.

Q. Herr Ackermann, do you know of any instances in which Dr. Hoven pointed out an inmate and said, "I want his skull in my collection"?

A. Yes, I can remember the day when he came to me when a prisoner walked past. I did not know this prisoner personally, however, apparently, Dr. Hoven knew him. And he told me, "Ackermann, I would like to have this skull on my desk tomorrow." Then he came to me with a note and he apparently had jotted down a number on it. The very same evening, the prisoner was ordered to report to the hospital and on the next day he was on my autopsy table and the skull was taken apart, and it was turned over to Dr. Hoven.

I believe that I can state and assume that this was a prisoner who perhaps had been named to him by the illegal camp administration.

Q. Herr Ackermann, you know of instances where the tatoos on the skin of inmates were collected?

A Yes, that was a speciality of the pathological section in Buchenwald already at a very early period: to take off the skin of prisoners and to tan it. Production was carried out by two ways: either it was put into a transparent form, or it was tanned so that the skin became tough, like leather.

The order was issued for the first time by the chief of the Pathological Section; I believe it was Dr. Gutacker or Dr. Lewe. But the order originated by Dr. Lolling and Dr. Lolling said that the frequency of tatoos being found on prisoners was very significant, and that a very interesting collection could be made here. And the order was given that every prisoner who had a tatoo would have his skin taken off after his death. Tatoos were then kept in the Pathological Section, and they were constantly turned over to Berlin, to Dr. Lolling.

Q. Do you know whether it was considered among the inmates to be a rather dangerous thing, to have an interesting tatoo on one's body?

A Yes, Dr. Eisele was given the order that every prisoner had to report to the hospital. That is to say, every prisoner who had a tatoo at any place on his body. These tatoos were registered and, in the case of prisoners who had newly arrived, it was stated in the files what tatoos they had and where they were located on his body.

Q. Do you know whether any of these tatoos were sent to Amtsgruppe D in Berlin?

A. They were sent to Amtsgruppe D-III, Attention of Dr. Lolling.

Q. Do you know of instances in which shrunken skulls were prepared and collected in Buchenwald?

A. I did not entirely understand the question (Question repeated by interpreter)

Q. A shrunken skull or a mummified skull?

A. Yes, we did not only prepare skeleton. But for the first time in Europe we did something which, until that period of time, was only known from the descriptions in the journals of South Africa. That is, the manufacture of shrunken skulls.

While the Indians took away the scalps of enemies who had died in battle, other natives cut off the heads of their enemies who had died in battle and brought them back to their priests. The priests then kept these heads as trophies, and they shrunk them. That is to say, by heating them, they were shrunk to such an extent that they only assumed the size of a big apple or a big pear.

From SS Obersturmfuehrer Dr. Mueller, we were given an order at the time to prepare such shrunken skulls for the first time in Europe and we had to do that through the descriptions of a traveller who had observed these ceremonies with the savage tribes. The preparation was carried out in such a manner that the back of the skull was cut open and all the soft parts, the muscle parts, were taken out so that actually only the loose skin was left there. The hairs remained intact and the eyebrows and towards the outside everything remained normal. Now the interior was filled with hot sand for a period of twenty-four hours so that the skin shrunk like leather and the skull became as small as the head of a doll. Then, afterwards, the skull was again sewed up on the back and it was put on a wooden pedestal. Then it was exhibited to members of the SS and the SS men liked to have these things on their writing desk in order to consider themselves important.

Q. Was the Dr. Mueller that you just mentioned subordinated to Dr. lolling?

A. Dr. Mueller, like every physician in the concentration camp was subordinated to Dr. Lolling.

Q Do you know if these shrunken heads were made at the order of Dr. Lolling?

A. I can not say that. In any case, I can say that he inspected these skulls and that he was very much in favor of it and that he recommended the manufacture of other shrunken skulls and that he immediately ordered a skeleton privately for himself and this was given to him.

Q. Herr Ackermann, do you know if frequent visits were made to the camp by various parties to inspect these shrunken skulls on exhibition?

A. We had regular visitors in the camp. These visitors came in large groups when any national meeting took place at Weimar and frequently the persons who attended the meeting were invited by the camp commanders to inspect the camp.

Q. Were these only SS men or did these parties include other people?

A. These groups included all possible people. On some occasion there was some sort of workers' meeting at Weimar and the workers arrived in buses. At least 150 people arrived and they went from Weimar to Buchenwald in three buses. These people were usually shown three things. The first was the so-called canteen, the post-exchange. The canteen for the prisoners had been established outside. It only had one fault and that is nothing could be bought there, except some shoe polish on occasions. The second station where visitors were lead to was the pathological section, because there we had established a big exhibition room. In this exhibition room we had many hundred of drugs on display and the skeletons were displayed there and on a table there were the shrunken heads and on another table there were hundreds of tattoos.

Q. Herr Ackermann, I believe the court wants to ask you a question.

BY THE PRESIDENT:

Q. You mentioned 150 people who came, I think, from Weimar to Buchenwald, and you called them editors or writers. We didn't get the translation of that word.

A. They were workers. They were craftsmen.

BY MR. ROBBINS:

Q. Herr Ackermann, were explanatory lectures made to these visitors, and, if so, who made them?

A. I was ordered to hold a lecture every time that visitors came.

Q. You, yourself, made these lectures?

A. I had to give these lectures by myself because no physician could ever be seen in my department in the morning.

Q. Herr Ackermann, can you give us some idea of the total number of people who witnessed these exhibits?

A That is very difficult to give an exact number, but there were months when such visitors almost arrived every day. In some cases individual people came and, above all, there were also members from Wehrmacht. Then there were Air Corps officers who had been awarded the Ritterkreuz, the Knight's Cross, and who, as a reward, were also being shown around the concentration camp.

Q. And were school children being brought there?

A. You can not say if they were school children, but people between the ages of 14 to 17 were brought into the camp and we assumed that this perhaps was one of the schools which was intended for the new generation.

BY THE PRESIDENT:

Q. You mentioned three places where the visitors were taken and you stopped at the second one, which was the exhibit. What was the third place?

A. The third place was the so-called operating room of the hospital. It had been newly established and it looked very imposing and the people were lead in there to see. Otherwise, they did not see anything at all of the camp.

- 23 April 1947, pp.933-945

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY DR. SIEDL (Attorney for the Defendant Oswald Pohl):

Q. Witness, before you answer my question, would you please make a short pause in order to enable the translator to finish translating my question?

A. Yes, indeed.

Q. Among other things you stated that the Buchenwald Camp frequently visited by people and three installations would be shown to them; one was the canteen of the camp. Apart from the fact that very few things could be bought there, what impression would visitors gain from that canteen?

A. Well, a naive visitor would feel it very nice, but he saw inmates near the canteen in their rags and in the immediate neighborhood of the canteen he would see inmates who had bleeding wounds.The purpose of the inspection was essentially to give the visitor completely false impressions, but who had eyes to see had to see that this beautiful canteen was purely for purposes of demonstrations. Once he reported to the Pathological Department and saw these skeletons and saw the collections of tattoes which was inspected by all visitors with a certain amount of curiosity and when he looked at the shrunken skulls and when, in particular, he listened to my lecture, even the most stupid visitor must get the real impression. I, myself, on purpose, would tell people "what you see here are a hundred different drugs, and the different parts of the human heart. One looks like the other and still there are 100 different diseases of the heart to be seen here. Workers who work heavily here suffer from heart diseases very soon. The aorta extends, the tissue would extend. If we had 50 deaths a day, at least 30 of them died of heart failure." I said that to open people's eyes, and once I listened through the key hole and heard how the camp commander told the visitors. He said, "We will visit the Pathological Department and Scientific Research," and we will see all the corpses." One man asked, "How many people died?" He said, "8 to 10 a day." "8 to 10 a day?" said the visitor. "0, Good Lord, no" the camp commander said. "8 to 10 a month." And then he come in the room with his visitors. I showed them the TB. I said, "Gentlemen, here you see all types of TB. You shall see these have been locked up, have been closed. Unfortunately, we have people who suffer from bad lungs and if we had them unlocked---"

And I took my book, and it was a large book and it had big letters and it had numbers, and you could see at once, you could see at one glance how many people had died and I told them to tell the people what you must have seen, what the living conditions here are and in some cases the people really would see what it was. In one case, the commandant went out first and the visitor crept up to me and asked me how many people are dead here and are they being, killed and what was taking place and I said tell the people outside that there are many dead, but don't quote me. They were interested in these tattoos and they wanted the tattoos, just the small tattoos and I was delighted to give it to them. We put it in their pockets, because we thought outside in their small circles people will tell their friends in the form of boasting or perhaps they will talk about it any way that people in concentration camps are being killed in that manner. In one case even, I told the member of the party and I told them the really interesting things are not here. We have a really interesting room which you must see, because at that time many inmates, had been hung in this cinema hall and in the evening cinemas would be shown for inmates which was quite good business for the SS. It was not only humane reasons for it. They were charged 20 Pfennigs for the cinemas and they made good business through these cinema shows. And I told them to go to the canteen, or, rather, to go to the cinema, and you can see something there, and when they were to be lead into the hospital one of the visitors said rather suddenly to the camp leader, "Let's see a cinema hall," and the commandant said, "It is nothing. We only show films there," and the visitor said, "I would like to see the cinema hall."

The camp commandant did not even know that people did hang there because Buchenwald was so large and he had not heard. There was something like 20 to 25 people would hang from there. They were particular that they would create a good impression. I believe the commandant never found out why the man insisted on seeing the cinema hall, that morning. People saw quite a lot. They did not see everything, but they must have seen that a concentration camp was not a recreation camp and they had to see what that meant to the public outside, what it meant with people who inspected a concentration camp because if had purely been a penal penitentiary, people would have been so frightened--

Q. So when visitors came to the camp the camp commandant would tend to show the better side of the camp to his visitors. They showed the operating theaters, for instance, which was very well equipped or other installations which you mentioned.

A. It was avoided to show the people the worst, but it was also intended at the same time to show the people that a concentration camp, as they put it, is a harsh school for those who are not sufficiently national. It was intended to impress the people. It was not intended overestimate the conditions where people worked, because all those people would try to get in the concentration camp, because it was not nice in war-time Germany. They wanted to show that everything was well organized, but they did not wish to give the impression that we lived in comfort, otherwise nobody would have been allowed to visit the camp. I think they approached the hospital at the end of the camp and the visitors would see the columns of inmates and they saw how jews were treated like horses.

They had to drag these heavy carts along. Nobody could avoid seeing these things, but, of course, they were not taken to places where they were being shot or were hanging down from trees, but they saw sufficiently and I think it was part of the purpose of these inspections to show people, how "we look after these people who aren't our friends." We don't treat them well," but of course, one did not want to speak of the fact that they were being murdered.

DR. SEIDL: I have no further questions.

24 April 1947, pp.963-967

[Cross-examination by Dr. Gawlik (for Defendants Volk and Bobermin)]

Q Now, another point: You told the Court that the camp doctor, Dr. Hoven, had stated, "That skull I would like to have on my desk." When did that happen?

A That happened in about 1943.

Q The beginning of 1943 or the end of 1943?

A I am unable to give you the date.

Q Where?

A In the pathological department.

Q You heard that expression, did you?

A Yes, he told me.

Q To you personally?

A Yes.

Q And the next day, you said, the man was dead?

A Yes.

Q What did you do after that one time that he told you this thing?

A I did nothing, because corpses were not my task. I was only the clerk.

Q But why did he tell you this?

A Only because quite often he talked to me.

Q But it was a desire which he expressed?

A Yes, a wish.

Q Why did he express this wish to you?

A So that I would make a note of it. I was a clerk, and as a clerk I had connections with the people in the autopsy room.

Q But they knew already that Dr. Hoven wished to have a skull.

A When I went in the autopsy room the next day the clerk, Roeder, knew that was the same man who gave Hoven the skull.

Q So it is correct, is it, witness, that Dr. Hoven expressed this wish to you so that you would pass on that wish. Can you answer that question yes or no?

A I can answer it neither with yes or no.

Q How would you answer it?

A I would answer it to the effect that either in his enthusiasm he just expressed his feelings, as a private communication, as it were; but I can also imagine that he wished to draw my attention to the fact that when this man comes along he wished to have the skull, and as a clerk I should give orders to the assistant, and therefore I went there next day and I said, "This is the inmate whose skull Hoven said he wanted." So probably he also expressed the wish to the assistant.

Q Now, how can you as a clerk give an order? What sort of an order should you give as a clerk to an assistant?

A I should draw his attention to the fact that Dr. Hoven had given orders that that skull must be set aside next day and handed over to him.

Q Before that happened, surely other orders had to be given?

A How do you mean that?

Q If Hoven expressed that wish, the man was still alive when the wish was expressed.

A Dr. Hoven, of course, was of the opinion that when the corpse comes along, "I wish to have the skull." I could hardly give him the skull before the man is dead. The killing was the task of the doctors.

Q Then you said, witness, that the illegal camp leadership has its hand in it.

A What I said was, "It might have been done." I am not sure of this. The illegal camp leadership might have told somebody that the liquidation of that man might be desirable.

Q Perhaps you could describe to us who was the illegal camp leadership.

A I must tell you here in Buchenwald I had nothing to do with the illegal camp leadership. I knew the illegal camp leadership in Dora; but in Buchenwald I remained very passive; I did my work as a clerk, and today I am not a member of a political party. I did not have the reputation of -- let's say -- toeing the line, which was demanded by the illegal camp leaders, and for that reason I was not taken into their confidence. I did not take part in their decisions or consultations, nor in their recommendations to the camp doctor.

Q But perhaps you can tell us very briefly who was the illegal camp leaders, what were their tasks, and if you don't know, tell us, "I don't know."

A I have not sufficient concrete information for me to make statements here. The camp leaders were surrounded by various figures. You can imagine this person might or might have been an illegal camp leader; otherwise he would not have been a kapo.

It was conceivable that several functions would be distributed, for instance, by the illegal camp leadership, but I wasn't informed on that. I was never invited by them.

Q Perhaps you can answer this question: There was a commission of inmates which opposed the SS leaders.

A It was a committee of inmates who not only opposed the SS leaders. We all opposed the SS leadership. They had put themselves a definite political aim and in particular that once the camp would be dissolved none of us thought that the camp would continue to exist, we believed that the war was lost and then the most critical moments of their lives would come. For that reason the illegal camp commission was meant as a preparatory commission so to speak. Their tasks was to prevent anything which might be disadvantageous to the inmates. And in the end they really saw to it that the committee of inmates could not by some trick or other of the SS be smashed to pieces, that on the contrary in that moment the illegal camp management should take over the management themselves.

Q Then you said the possibility existed that that inmate was killed through the illegal camp leadership.

A I can imagine that Dr. Hoven had received information on this particular innate and that the wish had been expressed to Dr. Hoven that this inmate, perhaps because he had relations with the SS or perhaps because there is some suspicion that he spied on the inmates, should be eliminated.

Q With this particular killing, therefore, the SS leadership had nothing to do.

A Well, the SS leadership had certainly nothing to do with it but the SS doctor did.

Q Then you said, Witness, regarding visits, when he gave lectures in the pathological department, then the camp commandant stayed outside the door -

THE PRESIDENT: Will there be other cross-examination?

(Response in the affirmative)

Then we will recess until one-thirty.

(A recess was taken to 1330 hours.)

AFTERNOON SESSION (The Tribunal reconvened at 1340 hours, 24 April 1947.)

THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.

CROSS EXAMINATION -- Continued JOSEF ACKERMANN -- Resumed BY DR. GAWLIK:

Q. Witness, is it then correct to say that the illegal camp administration was a secret organization of the prisoners?

A. Yes, that is correct.

Q. Did trustees of non-German nationalities also belong to this illegal administration?

A. Yes, non-German prisoners belonged to it.

Q. I now come to another point. In the course of the lectures which you gave in the pathological section, what SS leaders were present when you gave those lectures?

A. Usually either the first camp leader or the second camp leader was present.

Q. And did not these SS leaders have objections to the contents of your lectures?

A. They probably had certain misgivings. However, they never expressed these misgivings. Sometimes the camp leader seemed to be rather annoyed, but I always kept on, and he never took me to account for it.

Q. Not even when you actually made a liar out of him?

A. Not even then, because he could not know that I had listened at the door, and when I showed that previously he had told the people the camp had a mortality rate of eight or ten people a month, he could not accuse me of having made a liar out of him because he had not lied in my presence.

Q. Yes, but the listeners must have had the impression. Can you answer this question yes or no?

A. Yes.

Q. Therefore, it would have been easy to state that the number was not known to him.

Q. Therefore, it would have been easy to state that the number was not known him.

A. Yes, he had reason to say that. Yes, there would have been a reason for him to say that. He could have said that, but he didn't. He failed to do so. Apparently he did not want to make his lie any more public.

Q. Yes, but would it not have been easiest for him that he would have issued such instructions to you for the future? Can you answer me this question with yes or no?

A. If he had been an intelligent camp leader then he would have taken me aside and he probably would have said, "Well, this is none of the peoples' business so many people are dying here." But this camp leader was constantly drunk. He furthermore was extremely stupid. He was a former locksmith from Munich, and he did not get very excited about the whole matter. It was very embarrassing to him, but he did not refer to the matter any more afterwards.

Q. Was not the camp administration trying to keep conditions in the camp secret?

Can you answer me this question with yes or no?

A. That cannot be answered with yes or no. They wanted it to be known on the outside that things in the camp were handled very strictly, and it would be a punishment to be sent to the camp, because they wanted people outside to feel being sent to the camp was a punishment.

Q. Is it not correct that every prisoner upon his release had to sign a form where, under a threat of the most severe penalties, he was prohibited from saying anything about the conditions in the camp? Can you answer me this question with yes or no?

A. This also varied. I was released from Dachau, and I did not have to sign anything there whatsoever, but I was brought to the Gestapo in Munich. There I had to sign a certain form according to which I was not even to say I had been in protective custody, and less that I had been in a camp. I had to sign that I was obligating myself to state towards everybody that I had been sick throughout the period of time, and I pointed out to the Commissioner there that this excuse would be ridiculous in my case because my arrest had taken place in 1933, and when the German newspapers had brought an article about my arrest and it was a great success of the Gestapo that I had been arrested, together with an English journalist. In spite of this the commissioner told me that I was obligated to tell everybody that I had been sick, and he told me "If they find out you were in protective custody or were at Dachau you will immediately be brought back into the camp."

Q. Yes, but you will have to agree that you were also forced to refrain from saying anything about the conditions in the camp. Will you answer me this question with yes or no?

A. No, I was not forced to do that, but I was forced to do it in the form that I was not allowed to make any statement about it whatsoever.

Q. But there you were also forced not to say anything about conditions in the camp.

A. After my statement went to the effect that I could not say anything about the fact that I had been arrested, I certainly could not say anything about conditions in the camp.

Q. Is it also agreed you were forced not to say anything about the conditions in the camp?

THE PRESIDENT: He has answered that. He says yes.

THE WITNESS: Yes. May I say something in addition? In spite of this on the second day I went to the German National Socialist faction of the Bavarian Landtag, Dr. Guttmann, who at that time was General Director of the Bavarian State Library, and for two hours, I told him everything that had happened in Dachau, for two hours. I told him that I had been in chains. I told him about the murders I had witnessed, and I not only told Dr. Guttmann as Chairman of the Landtag --

Q. (By Dr. Gawlik) Excuse me, please, but this is not of any importance here. I only have the following question. After you have admitted that you were also forced not to say anything about conditions in the camp, I am now asking you the following question: In your testimony that you could tell all the visitors details about Court No. 11 - Case No. 4 conditions in the camp, I am now asking you the following question:

In your testimony that you could tell all the visitors details about conditions in the camp, does your testimony not contrast with that?

A. I have not told the people about conditions in the camp. I did not tell them that twelve people would be shot in the course of one morning, but I only told them indirectly that a large number of people were dying here. If I had said, "Gentlemen, today there is already six persons who have been shot," or also again, "In the autopsy room there is a corpse who was killed in the bunker," then that would have been what I would call telling about conditions in the camp. I could only point out the various diseases which occurred, and I could only give a hint to these people just how big our mortality rate was in the camp and just how people were being treated in the camp.

Q. Have I understood you correctly, you did not give any details?

A. I was unable to give any details.

DR. GAWLIK: No further questions.

BY DR. FROESCHMANN (For Defendant Mummenthey):

Q. Witness, you were asked this morning about the Actions 14 F 13. Do you still remember when the order was issued?

A. I cannot tell you that any more today, but it was in the year 1944.

Q. 1944?

A. Yes.

Q. Did you not hear anything about it before?

A. In Buchenwald I did not get any such orders into my hands because the pathology section was geographically separated from the hospital.

24 April 1947, pp.974-983

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Does the Buchenwald Museum say that the shade on that lamp was proved to be made of human skin? Does it have a record of tests having been carried out on it, and the results?

No, they don't. They have no idea what happened it. But the museum admits that a different lampshade, which was displayed in the museum for c.30, years turned out to be made of plastic when it was tested [details posted up thread].

- The lampshade you mean disappeared at the IMT.

- It was given to Assistant U.S. prosecutor William F. Walsh by the JAGO in late-1945 along with at least one shrunken-head and sample of tanned human-skin

- The lampshade was never presented as an exhibit at the IMT, a shrunken-head and human-skin samples were

- The lampshade was never presented as evidence at the 1947 Buchenwald trial of Ilse Koch et al, the prosecution didn't know where it was

- In 1948 a member of the US War Crimes Commission told the press that the lampshade was never given back to them by the US prosecutors at the IMT

- There were two tests carried out on the samples of human-skin found at Buchenwald one in America and one in the UK. In May 1945 Sir Bernard Henry Spilsbury's "tested" [meaning: looked at it with a microscope] a piece of tattooed human-skin he was told had been taken from a lampshade in Buchenwald.

[Sergey Romanov]

Um no, because you continued to insist on your claim after being corrected. That you have an earlier draft doesn't mean a thing. You could have asked about the details, clarifying an apparent contradiction, but you chose to stubbornly insist on your initial claim.

---

None of the Ackermann stuff means a thing. I had read all of it before writing what I wrote above. Re: skull it's a he said-she said. And it is hard to see how him not mentioning the lampshade earlier means much - it was but one freak event not even incriminating anyone, it was not necessary for him to mention it among other Buchenwald curiosities.

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Sorry for butting in. I have a few questions: For what crime was Dr. Sigmund Rascher executed for and who is Joachim Neander, credentials etc?

Joachim Neander received his Ph.D. in History from Göttingen and Bremen Universities. Now retired, Neander is an independent scholar living in Krakow, Poland. Recent publications include "Some Basic Problems in Implementing Holocaust Education" in The Holocaust and World War II: In History and In Memory (2012), "The Impact of 'Jewish Soap" and 'Lampshades' on Holocaust Remembrance" in Trajectories of Memory: Intergenerational Representations of the Holocaust in History and the Arts (2008), Remembrance Hat in Europa kein annaherndes Beispiel: Mittelbau-Dora, ein KZ fur Hitlers Krieg (2000), the 4th edition of Das Konzentrationslager Mittelbau in der Endphase der NS-Diktatur (2001). He was the Charles Revson Foundation Visiting Scholar at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. in 2002.

- N.E. Rupprecht & W. Koenig ( eds.) Global Perspectives on the Holocaust: History. Identity and Legacy, Cambridge Scholars Publishing. 2015, p.429.

He's recognised as an expert on the WW1 and WW2 claims that Germans used the fat or skin of humans in various ways. He's published on these topics and was, incidentally, mentioned in a recent BBC article on original "fake news", the WW1 German "corpse factory".
The corpse factory and the birth of fake news [17.02.17]
The Danzig Soap Case: Facts and Legends around "Professor Spanner" and the Danzig Anatomic Institute 1944-1945 [2006]
The German Corpse Factory :the master hoax of British propaganda in the First World War [2013]

For what crime was Dr. Sigmund Rascher executed for

Rascher wasn't officially executed because he never stood trial; Rascher was murdered on 26th April 1945, [probably by Theodor Bongartz] in the prison bunker of Dachau after the rest of the special prisoners held in the building had been evacuated from the camp.

The offence that really annoyed Himmler was Rascher's embezzlement, and other schemes involving prisoners he was suspected of. I understand Himmer had initially been prepared to mostly overlook the kidnapping of the four children and even permit the Raschers to adopt [some of?] them, but after his financial diddling was firmly established by investigators in c.Aug 1944 Himmler ordered the Raschers' arrest. In Feb 1945 Himmler threw Rascher out of the SS.

A theory as to why Dr. Rascher was never tried is that Himmler feared his role in the human experiments would come to light. On 28 April 1945, two days after Dr. Rascher was murdered, Himmler issued the following order to Gottlob Berger:

See to it that all records[,] offices and documents at Dachau camp are destroyed.[p.174]

Perhaps Himmler and his assistant Dr. Rudolf Brandt were concerned that the numerous letters they had written to Rascher regarding his human experiments were about to fall into Allied hands, along with the man himself. So, Himmler ordered his murder and the destruction of offices and documents in Dachau [which never actually happened]. Just a theory.

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Re: Ackermann: during the West German trial he testified that the lampshade could not be directly tied to Koch. Something that the prosecution would have liked to hear.

What is your source for that claim?

You choose not to answer that question evidently.

Your unsourced assertion about his testimony is diametrically opposed by this contemporary report:

Human Skin Exhibited at Trial of Ilse Koch; German Witnesses Testify Against Her

MUNICH (Nov. 29)

A piece of tattoced human skin was today introduced as evidence against Ilse Koch, notorious Nazi war criminal, at her trial at Augsburg for crimes against German and Austrian nationals.

The piece of tanned skin was presented following the Koch woman’s denial yesterday that she had ever ordered human skin made into lampshades or other ornaments. Her statement was contradicted in the German court today by Josef Ackermann, a newspaperman who served as an orderly in the “Pathological Research Institute” at the Buchenwald concentration camp, commanded by the Koch woman’s late husband.

Herr Ackermann told the court, which is trying Koch for 45 murders, that he and other orderlies were told to prepare sections of human skin for a lampshade to be given by Koch to her husband. The shade was mounted to a lamp constructed of human bones, he testified, but was later dismantled when the Gestapo investigated the camp.

- JTA, November 30, 1950

[Sergey Romanov]

You are of course wrong, as usual.

Funny thing is, the same is written in the Buchenwald Museum's take on the lampshades, where you should have read it in the first place.