1947-01-07, #1: Doctors' Trial (early morning)

Official transcript of the American Military Tribunal in the matter of the United States of America against Karl Brandt, et al, defendants, sitting at Nuernberg, Germany, on 7 January 1947, 0930, Justice Beals, presiding.

THE MARSHAL: The Honorable Judges of Military Tribunal 1.

Military Tribunal 1 is now in session.

God save the United States of America and this Honorable Tribunal.

There will be order in the courtroom.

THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Marshal, will you ascertain if the defendants are all present in the court.

THE MARSHAL: May it please Your Honors, the defendants are all present in the courtroom.

THE PRESIDENT: The Secretary-General will note on the minutes the defendants are all present in the court.

DR. EUGEN KOGON Resumed DIRECT EXAMINATION (continued)

THE PRESIDENT: The witness on the stand is reminded that he is still under oath.

MR. McHANEY: May it please the Tribunal, the prosecution will continue with the examination of the witness Kogon.

BY MR. McHANEY:

Q: Mr. Kogon, at the conclusion of yesterday's session you had explained to us the manner in which experimental subjects were selected for the medical experiments in the Buchenwald camp. Will you tell the Tribunal whether any non-German nationals were experimented on.

A: Amongst the experimental subjects who had been selected for Block 46, there were not only Germans but also Poles, Russians and Frenchmen, particularly during the last years.

Q: Were there any prisoners of war experimented on in Block 46 to your knowledge?

A: Yes.

Q: Now, will you please explain to the Tribunal in your own words exactly how these typhus experiments were carried out.

A: After 40 to 60 people, sometimes up to 120, had been detailed for a series of experiments, one-third of them were separated, two-thirds of them were either vaccinated with a protective treatment or otherwise treated with it if it was a subject. Those people who were protected against typhus remained in Block 46 for several weeks until the Rickettsia, the cause of the classic typhus, was used to infect them. Together with them, the first selection, that is to say, the first third, was also infected. They served as so-called control persons with the help of whom it was possible to ascertain whether the infection was taking, what course the disease would take in their cases, so that the course could be compared with that which had appeared with those who had been vaccinated who had also been infected. Infection was carried in different ways. Either typhus was transferred through fresh blood, which was injected intravenously or it was injected intramuscularly. At the beginning even by lacerating the skin by means of a cut into the arm. In the initial stages two cubic centimeters of fresh blood infected with typhus were used for infection unless one was concerned with an infection with an infectious solution. Two cubic centimeters of fresh blood which contained typhus was then, therefore, usually injected into the veins. Later on that dosage was reduced to l/20th of 1 cubic centimeter because the large quantity of 2 cubic centimeters would prevent any security, penetrate any security achieved by protective vaccination. Even l/20th of a cubic centimeter of typhus containing fresh blood was usually enough if it was injected into the the veins to produce typhus to a very high degree. In the course of years the typhus cultures which were used at Buchenwald had been cultivated from man to man and they had increased their strength, their virility to a very considerable degree, so that the smaller quantity was perfect enough. A suggestion which I had made in 1944 to Sturmbannfuehrer Dr. Ding, namely, that in order to increase the scientific control he should reduce the quantity of these injections to the extreme minimum so that the so-called swelling value should be ascertained -- in other words, so that the artificial infection should be most like the artificial infection through life.

That suggestion was turned down by him since he believed that in that case no convincing proof would exist for the effectiveness of the protective means which were being used. A third category of the experimental persons was used to maintain the typhus cultures, those were the so-called passage persons, amounting to three to five persons per month. They were only infected for the purpose of making sure that typhus containing fresh blood would always be available at all times. Very nearly all of those persons died and I do not think that I am exaggerating if I say that 95% of these cases were fatal.

Q: Witness, do you mean to say that they deliberately infected three to five persons a month with typhus just to have the viruses alive and available in blood?

A: Just for that particular purpose.

Q: Can you tell the Tribunal approximately how many of those persons died who were injected just to keep the viruses alive?

A: Of the so-called passage persons, there was, as I have already said, three to five per month who were used, that is to say, during the period when I was working for Pr. Ding-Schuler so many every month until the end of the Buchenwald Concentration Camp. That is to say, beginning with April 1943 until March 1945. Before that, as far as the previous period is concerned, I only know that passage persons had also been used but I do not know the figures.

Q: Now, witness, were experimented persons also infected with lice?

A: As far as is known to me, there was one single instance when an experiment took place in Buchenwald where an original infection with typhus was carried out with lice. The contagious lice had been brought from the Institute of the OKH of Krakow, by a courier. They were taken to Block 46. They were kept in small cages which were applied to the thigh of the experimental persons and a number of persons, the number of whom I do not know, was infected. Some of our comrades were allowing a few lice to escape in a room of Block 46 but they did keep these lice under control and they reported to the Capo that Fleckfieber, typhus carrying lice, had escaped from this cage.

Capo Arthur Dietsch immediately reported this to the camp physician, Dr. Hoven, who was at that time representing, taking the place of Dr. Ding -Schuler, and Dr. Hoven, following Dietsch's advice, ordered the destruction of these infected lice. A second dispatch from Krakow was also burnt because one did not wish that such experiments should lead to high endangerment for the camp and should be continued.

Q: And you say that these typhus infected lice came from the typhus and virus research Institute of the OKH at Cracow?

A: Yes.

Q: And do you know the name of the Director of that Institute?

A: From the correspondence between Dr. Ding and the Institute for Typhus and Virus Research in Cracow, I know that this was Dr. Eyer.

Q: Now, going back for a moment to the persons who were infected with typhus cirus in order to keep the cirus alive, can you state whether the persons who died as a result of that action are included in the diary kept by Dr. Ding?

A: The passage persons, as far as I can recollect, are not listed in the diary. They were, shall we say, a matter of course.

Q: Can you tell the Tribunal where the typhus virus came from which was used in the camp?

A: The virus was obtained from various sources. At the beginning from the Behring Works and the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin. These first cultures which had been produced according to the Gildemeister and Haagen process turned out to be, however, insufficiently virile. In other words, infection didn't take. Thus the new method of infection which I have described was adopted, that is, intravenous injection of fresh blood infected with typhus, and the cultures required from these passage persons were obtained when they had lost their effectiveness, and sometimes these cultures would die down and were obtained from the OKH at Cracow, from the Typhus Institute, that is, of the OKH at Cracow.

Q: I believe you have probably told us something about where the typhus vaccines came from but would you be good enough to go over that matter again for us?

A: The various vaccines which were to be tried out came first of all from the Behring Works, secondly, from the I.G.Farben Works, and were mostly concerned with chemo-therapeuticals. In these series of experiments, menthylene blue and rutenol, percicol and nitro acridine was experimented with. Furthermore, there came from the State Institute at Copenhagen a vaccine that was made from the liver of mice, and there was an Italian vaccine made from the lungs of mice, and lastly a vaccine made from the lungs of dogs, according to the Cantacucene system developed at Bucharest.

Q: Did you obtain a vaccine from Eyer's Institute at Cracow?

A: And then there was the Weigel vaccine developed at the OKH Institute at Cracow. This was also in fact used continuously because it was considered the best of the lot, since in every series of experiments a few persons usually were treated with the Weigel vaccine made from the intestines of lice.

Q: And did you ever obtain any vaccines from the Robert Koch Institute?

A: The Robert Koch Institute, as far as I can recollect, supplied vaccine at the beginning, together with the Behring Works, or they supplied infecting substance. There I am not quite sure.

Q: Can you tell the Tribunal whether these experimental subjects suffered to any appreciable extent during the course of these typhus experiments?

A: There we must be careful and draw a dividing line between the general psychic condition of the souls of these experimental persons and the physical condition, which they experienced through this disease. Every man in the camp knew that Block 46 was a dreadful place, and the fewest people in the camp had an exact idea regarding what was going on in Block 46. A dreadful horror would fall upon any one who would be brought into any sort of connection with this block. As persons were selected and taken to Block 46 through the sick bay then they knew that they were concerned with a lethal or fatal affair. The horror which was attached to this block was what made things even worse for them. Apart from that it was generally known in the camp that in Block 46 this Capo Arthur Dietsch was exercising iron discipline. There the cat of nine tails really ruled supreme. Everyone, therefore, who went to Block 46, as experimental persons then looked for the expected death and under certain circumstances a very long, drawn out and frightful death, which he was imagining all of the time, and he would also have to expect torture and complete removal of the last remainder of personal freedom. It was in that psychological condition that these experimental persons were waiting in the sick bays for a period of time, the length of which they did not know.

They were waiting for the day or for the night when something would be done to them, something of which they did not know what it might be, but of which they expected they would have some frightful form of death in store for them. The infection was so thorough that there was always the most horrible form of typhus, and it happened quite often there were frightful scenes which the Capo Arthur Dietsch would keep down with iron discipline, because the patients were afraid they were given lethal injections. After a certain period when the actual illness had set in after the infection, ordinary symptoms of typhus would appear, which, of course, as is known, is one of the most frightful illnesses. The infection, as I have already described to you, and particularly during the last two and a half years got so that there were almost always the most horrible symptoms of typhus. In some cases there were outbreaks of insanity, delirium, people would refuse to eat and a large percentage of them would die. Those who went through that disease in a lighter form lived because their constitution was strong, and because the vaccine was effective, but they were forced to observe the death struggle of the others at all times, and they were living in an atmosphere which it is hardly possible to imagine and just what happened to those people who survived the typhus was something which they did not know during the period of convalescence. Would they remain in Block 46 to be used for other purposes? Would they be used as assistants? Would they be used as surviving witnesses of the special experiments and would they have to fear death because of that. All of that was something which they did not know and which aggravated the conditions of these experiments.

Q: Now, Mr. Kogan, do you know whether Dr. Ding ever made a report on these typhus experiments which you have described to the Military Medical Academy?

A: Every experiment carried out in Block 46 in Buchenwald was put down in accurate minutes. On the strength of the notes made in Block 46, temperature diagrams and reports and final results served for the compiling of a report to the Chief SS Hauptsturmbannfuehrer of the SS and was sent to him together with the copy.

Those copies were also destined for any other department which was also interested in the experiments. In other words, if we were concerned with an experiment which was carried out in collaboration with the Behring Works or in collaboration with the Military Academy or the Reich Ministry of the Interior, then that department would be contained in the distribution chart of the original report.

Q: When you say that the reports were sent to the Chief Hygienist of the SS; whom do you mean?

A: The Chief Hygienist of the SS was SS-Oberfuehrer Professor Doctor Mrugowsky.

Q: You said the original of these reports together with copies; did Ding attach distribution lists to the copies noting to whom they should be sent?

A: In practice, this changed. At the beginning of my activities as Dr. Ding-Schuler's clerk, he took these reports to Berlin personally. And they were distributed from there; without my knowing details as to where they went. Later on, on frequent occasions, these reports together with the corresponding number of carbon copies for each individual were sent off. For instance it would state on the distribution chart, "To Reichs Medical Officer of the SS, To the Chief of Department 16, SS-Oberfuehrer Professor Doctor Mrugowsky." Then came one original and four carbon copies. There were even copies for Ministerial Director Dr. Christensen, Reichsminister of the Interior, Professor Lockemann and the Behring works.

Or in other cases, if we were concerned with the experimental Department V at Leipzig, and reports went to Oberfuehrer Poppendick, it would say for Messrs. Firm of Maddaus, or Sturmbannfuehrer Doctor Werner.

Q: Can you remember any instance in which a written report on the typhus experiments was in fact noted for distribution to the Military Medical Academy?

A: The contact with the Military Academy in Berlin is known to me from two or three instances. In the first case, we were actually concerned with a meeting. It was the third Military-Medical Session or Meeting in Berlin. During this meeting, Dr. Ding was making a report about typhus experiments. I do not know whether he actually openly mentioned during that meeting that there were experiments going on in a concentration camp. I expect I guessed from subsequent events, however; at least, it was apparent by means of suspicion since Dr. Ding told me in June, 1943, that professor Rose spoke against these experiments and objected against these experiments quite openly before the entire Congress.

He described these experiments as superfluous. And Dr, Ding, as he told me later in June, 1943, and the Congress had been in May, had rather a difficult position against Professor Rose because the German scientists who were assembled there must have been quite clearly aware of the facts since at the end, Dr. Ding found only one way out--that of hiding behind the secrecy of the Reich.

The two other cases only concerned typhus. In one instance--no, I beg your pardon, I must correct myself--in both cases we were not really concerned with typhus. We were concerned with the production of blood plasma and the examination of the old blood plasma which the Military Academy at Berlin had entrusted to the Concentration Camp in Buchenwald in order to have it examined in Block 36.

Q: Witness, I think we will hold the explanation of the blood plasma experiments until a little later on in the examination. Right now, I would like to go back again to this meeting of the Military Medical Academy at which said Dr. Ding made a report on the typhus experiments. I will ask you if Dr. Ding was rather excited at the objections interposed by Professor Rose at this meeting?

A: Dr. Ding had been in a condition of considerable excitement for a number of days. During the first weeks of my own work with him, I had not actually formed any close relationship to Dr.Ding. In spite of that, he told me on three or four occasions, again and again, and then under considerable excitement, using curses, what he thought of Professor Rose, and that professor Rose had dared turn against the experiments carried out by Ding on human beings in public. I should not like to repeat some of the expressions which he used.

Q: And you say that after Rose had made his objections that Ding would only say to the meeting that the experiments were top secret?

A: Dr. Ding told me that he had no way out at the end, but to tell this Professor, using corresponding expressions on that occasion, that there are certain spheres which even a professor would have to respect; there fore, he would be compelled to keep certain matters secret.

Q: And when do you recall that this meeting of the Military Medical Academy took place at which Ding made his report?

A: To my recollection, this was in May, 1943.

Q: Now, Witness, can you tell from the remarks made by Dr. Ding after this meeting whether professor Rose's objections were interposed on moral grounds or shall we say on scientific grounds? Was he objecting to the scientific value of these experiments?

A: I can only repeat my own impressions based on the statements made by Dr. Ding. Perhaps some would be inclined in my position as a prisoner to overestimate from a human point of view, the resistance put up by Professor Rose. It was my impression that it was both for scientific as well as human reasons that he objected. After Ding's statement, Professor Rose said that animal experiments with typhus had produced clear-cut results and that the human experiments which had been made, did not in any individual point exceed he results of animal experiments. Therefore, from the scientific point of view, they had to be superfulous; in fact, even otherwise. And this is what Ding had been saying had been unnecessary. This also was interpreted by me as being from the human point of view.

Q: Now, Witness, I am going to ask you if anything happened after this meeting which made you change your mind about the humanitarian motives of Professor Rose on the occasion of his speech?

A: Approximately one year later or maybe nine months later, Dr. Ding was showing no triumphantly an order from Professor Mrugowsky dealing with a new series of experiments which were to be carried out in Block 26, this time with the so-called Ibsen-vaccine obtained from Copenhagen which had been produced from the liver of mice. This vaccine had been supplied for the very purpose of experiments in the concentration camp at Buchenwald by Professor Rose. He had made a corresponding application to Mrugowsky. Dr. Ding thought and said laughingly, "you see Kogon, now he too has given in."

I must say quite openly, I was flabbergasted because Professor Rose's resistance put up in May, 1943, had been considered by me a symptom of the survival of the ethics of German scientists and medical men.

This experiment with the Ibsen vaccine, did in fact, afterwards take place and an explanation of this contradiction in Rose's attitude adopted in the Third Medical Congress in Berlin is one I cannot comprehend. In my book, "The SS State," I left this question open although I mentioned it.

Q: Do you recall whether any of the experimental subjects died during the course of the series of experiments requested by Rose?

A: That is something which I cannot ascertain today according to memory. I believe that there was one person, but I am really not sure. It would have to be ascertained from the diary.

Q: But he suggested, that is Rose suggested, using a Copenhagen vaccine made from the liver of mice in 1944; is that correct?

A: Yes; I think it was in January or February of 1944.

Q: Now, witness, you have mentioned a book and since you brought the point up; is it true that you have written a book on your experiences and your observations in the Buchenwald Concentration camp?

A: Not in that form, no. I have written a book, called "The SS State" concerning the system in German concentration camps, but that does not deal with my personal experiences. It describes the structure of the camps and in this connection Buchenwald, where I myself have lived through and which I have survived, was always used as a proper example.

Q: And did you deal in this book with the typhus experiments at Buchenwald at some length?

A: Yes.

Q: Do you know whether this book has become available to defense counsel in this case?

A: The book has been for sale now for a few weeks and it is perfectly possible that the defense counsel may have read it.

Q: Now, in connection with the typhus experiments in Block 46, I wish that you would tell the Tribunal what connection the defendant Hoven had with these experiments?

A: As I already mentioned yesterday, Dr. Hoven was Dr. Ding's deputy. Dr. Ding was absent from Buchenwald quite frequently. Dr. Hoven could not start any series of experiments on his own initiative as Dr. Ding was the only one authorized to start such experiments and he was under Dr. Mrugowsky's orders. Dr. Hoven was responsible for the supervision of the carrying out of these experiments, the visits to patients, the reports by means of temperature curves, diary notes and report sheets; in other words to secure an orderly record of those experiments. Secondly, Dr. Hoven was indirectly connected with typhus experiments insofar as the request for selectees, as this was sometimes, as I already emphasized, made through the camp physician.

Q: Now, I want to come back for a moment to the experiments with the Copenhagen vaccine, requested by Professor Rose and I will ask you to look at page 23 of the Ding diary, which is Prosecution Exhibit 287, and see whether this refreshes your recollection as to whether any of the experimental subjects died. If it please the Tribunal, the corresponding translation of the English text is on page 49 of the Document book and at the bottom and top of page 50.

(Page 23 of the Ding Diary is shown to the witness.)

Will you now state, after refreshing your recollection with the Ding diary, whether any of the experimental subjects died during the course of this Copenhagen vaccine experiments?

A: Now I can remember the following circumstances. After the end of this series of experiments and after the result of many serious illnesses in that series of experiments, I say six fatalities among thirty, which meant twenty six in practice because four dropped out early because of other diseases. After this result, as I was saying, had become known to us in Block 50, I, together with a number of my comrades, doctors and scientists discussed this affair at great length. It now becomes clear to me and I now recollect that there were more fatalities and that we were most depressed about this fact, particularly connected with so important and significant a scientist as Professor Rose.

Q: Now, witness, will you mention for the record the names of a few of these scientists, who were working with you in Block 50?

A: I will mention Lecturer Dr. Ludwig Fleck, Lemberg; specialist in the field of research and the combating of typhus; Dr. Karl Makswitschka, Prague, Bacteriologist; Prof. Dr. Alfred Walachawsky the Pasteur Institute; Prof. Dr. Etienne Suare; Prof. Dr. Waitz, of the University of Strassburg; Prof. von Linzen, Amsterdam; and Dr. Marianne Viopilowski of Karlsruhe.

Q: Now, to go back to the typhus experiments; can you tell the Tribunal approximately the total number of inmates experimented on with typhus?

A: The total number of experimental subjects, who went through Block 46, including the so-called passage persons, totalled nearly one thousand persons. Of these more than half were passage persons used for typhus experiments.

Q: And can you tell the Tribunal approximately how many people died from the typhus experiments, as distinguised from the so-called passage experiments.

A: That varied from case to case, it varied very much. There was one series of experiments with a unique therapeutical preparation from I.G, Farben and a series of experiments in which among the persons, who were immunized, nearly as many died as among the so-called control persons; in a concrete case there were 56.5% among the control persons. Among the immunized persons, who had been treated with this agent, before they were injected and since it was a chemical therapeutical agent, after the injection 53.3% or 53.4%. If there were twenty persons in each series, twenty more immunized control persons, twenty who were treated with this agent and twenty persons who were vaccinated with another agent, so that a comparison could be made, then in each group of twenty people, more than ten died.

Q: Would you say that the total number of persons who died as a result of the typhus experiments would exceed one hundred?

A: As far as I can recall the total number of deaths from typhus experiments in Buchenwald, not including the passage persons, was between 150 and 160.

Q: Now, let's pass on to some of the other experiments at Buchenwald. What can you tell us of the para-typhoid A & B experiments?

A: The experiments with para-typhoid A and B took place at a time, as far as I can recall, I had just entered the pathology section in Buchenwald, but I am not quite sure of the time but in any case I was not yet so directly informed by documents as was later the case. I know of one example when para-typhoid A bacilli were given to prisoners in Block 46 in potato salad and the effects of this food were observed. As far as I can recall, the report was sent to Professor Lechmann in Berlin, I believe, of the Robert Koch Institute. Details about the experiments with yellow fever, smallpox, para-typhoid A and B, typhoid fever, and a few others I cannot give because, as I have already said, I did not have direct information from my own activity in Block 50 and our entire attention at that time was directed to the typhus experiments in Block 46.

Q: Can you state whether or not any experimental subjects died as a result of any of these other disease experiments, that is, ether than typhus?

A: A number of persons, a comparatively small number, died as a result of other experiments. A very large scale series of experiments, for example, was introduced with yellow fever, but the infection did not take and these experiments, which as far as I recall, included over 140 persons, were discontinued. The number of deaths, of course, depended on the nature and the manner of execution in each individual experiment. There was an experiment which affected only four persons and all four might die -- did die in this case -- and other experiments with 40 or 50 persons where there are only two or three dead. The total number of deaths in all experiments, with the exception of typhus experiments, according to my recollection, was considerably less than the number of deaths from typhus and from the transfer of typhus cultures through passage persons.

Q: Do you know anything about experiments with poisons in the Buchenwald Concentration Camp?

A: I know of two such cases. In the one case it was about the turn of the year 1943-44 or in the late fall of 1943, and the second case was probably in the summer of 1944. In each case Russian prisoners of war were used for these experiments. In the first case various preparations of the so-called alkaloid series were put in noodle soup, and 40 of these prisoners of war who were in Block 46, who of course had not idea what was going on, this noodle soup was given to the. Two of these prisoners became so sick they vomited, one was unconscious, the fourth showed no symptoms at all. Thereupon, all four were strangled in the crematory. They were dissected and the contents of their stomachs and other effects were ascertained. The experiment was occasioned by the -- was ordered by the SS Court, by the SS investigating judge, Sturmbannfuehrer Dr. Morgan. It was carried out in the presence of Dr. Ding, Dr. Morgan, Dr. Wehnert, SS Hauptsturmfuehrer and SS judge, and one of the three camp leaders, I do not know whether it was Sturmbannfuehrer SS Schubert or SS leader Florstedt. The second experiments --

Q: Witness, before continuing with the second experiment, I wonder if you could tell the Tribunal the reason for carrying out this poison experiment which you have just mentioned?

A: In the summer of 1943 there was a trial going on under the SS court in Berlin against the former commandant of Buchenwald and later commandant of Lublin, concentration camp in Poland, SS Handartenfuehrer Koch. It was reaching its climax. The investigation had lead to very serious charges against Koch, unless the remark that SS Obcrgruppenfuehrer Waldeck, then head of the SS Oberabschnitt Fulda--Werra, was personally combatting Koch, and that this personal antagonism of the two man had brought about the trial. A man by the name of Koehler, a Hauptscharfuehrer in Buchenwald, was arrested by Dr. Morgan and kept in custody in the Buchenwald Concentration Camp. This Hauptscharfuehrer seemed to have testified something against Koch. Two or three days later this Hauptscharfuehrer Koehler was found dead in his cell.

A: few hours before he had been quite healthy. He seemed to have taken poison. Dr. Morgan planned that Dr. Hoven, together with the guard, Hauptscharfuehrer Sommer, had killed Koehler in the presence of a scientist from Jena. Koehler was dissected in the dissecting room and two of my comrades were present at this autopsy. The head of the pathology section was there and in the stomach of the dead man drugs from the alkaloid series were found The amount and the specific type was not known. In order to determine the fatal dosage of poisons of this type the SS court ordered an experiment on four Russian prisoners of was, the experiment which I have just described in Block 46. On the 20th of September, 1943, Dr. Hoven was arrested at Dr. Morgan's orders and remained under the custody of the SS court until the end of March 1945. I knew the date exactly because on that day, which was a Saturday afternoon, Dr. Hoven came to Block 50 on his motorcycle, asked me about Dr. Ding Schuler, who was not there, and went away again quite depressed and half an hour later I learned from the hospital, the prisoners' hospital, that Dr. Hoven was expected to be arrested himself.

Q: In other words, Hoven was suspected by Morgan of having done away with the witness against Koch, is that right?

A: Yes.

Q: Now, will you explain to the Tribunal about this second poison experiment?

A: In the summer of 1944 -- I am not quite sure about the time -- Dr. Ding, whose name was already Schuler, at that time came from Berlin and told me he had a very unpleasant task to carry out. It was extremely secret he said, and after a few hours without my having asked, he told me in his room; he told me details about it.

I must point out that at this time there was really nothing any longer, whatever it might be, private or official, that Dr. Schuler would not have told me in order to get my advice. He realized quite clearly that the cause of National Socialism was lost. He was only looking for safety.

He said, "Kogen, do you see any way to get me out of this business? I am supposed to test a poison here on Russian prisoners of war. I must report on it immediately. It is a direct order from Mrugowsky. I don't know how I can get out of it."

He gave me the prescription, the chemical formula of this poison, and I was to put this prescription in an envelope and sort while he watched. In the haste I was not able to read it. It had a code name. I put the prescription in the envelope. We were interrupted in this talk. I said to him only, "You know my point of view." I must add here that in long conversations at night I had tried to make clear to him that there was no other way for him than to do as much as possible far the political prisoners, but that as a human being, if there was a serious case he must refuse to carry out immoral orders.

He laughed at me when I said that and said, "I know your religious and moral ideas. You know that I don't believe in anything; that this is out of the question for me; that I can only collaborate with the political prisoners."

In this case, this case of the poison, he went in great haste and excitement to the camp leader, Sturmbannfuehrer Schubert, whom he had informed beforehand by telephone, and the commandant, Oberfuehrer Pistor, had been informed, and in the presence of a fourth person -- I don't know whether it was the camp physician -- they went to the crematory, not to Block 46. The Russian prisoners of war again, four people ha been taken there in the collar in which were the 46 books on the walls on which the people were strangled. These four people, these four Russians, were administered this poison.

I do not know how it was administered. As Ding-Schuler later told me, they died in a very short time. They were dissected and burned. A written report on this matter Dr. Ding did not send to Berlin. He told me he bad to report this to Mrugowsky orally. Ding was not only excited about this matter, but afterwards he was very secretive about it. He did not want me to talk about it anymore. From hints and indications in his conversation I learned that there were experiments -- that there was same connection with experiments in the Concentration Camp Sachsenhausen near Oranienburg which Mrugewsky had carried out in Ding's presence. Prisoners must have been shot with prisoned bullets there because Ding said that a Russian prisoner of war had succeeded in having a knife, I think it was, and attacking Mrugowsky, but that the prisoner had been subdued immediately.

In any case Ding did not want to have anything more to do with the matter even in my presence. A short time later the prescription and the sealed envelope were burned in my presence by Ding. He held it over a candle in my presence and burned it. I could not learn the contents.

Q: Do you know anything about experiments in Buchenwald with incendiary bombs?

THE PRESIDENT: Before opening a new subject in the examination of this witness, the Court will recess.

(Recess was taken.)