1947-01-08, #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 Nurnberg, Germany, on 8 January 1947, 0930, Justice Beals, presiding.

THE MARSHAL: The Honorable Judges of Military Tribunal 1.

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

There will be order in the courtroom.

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

THE MARSHAL: May it please your honors, the defendants are all present in the courtroom.

THE PRESIDENT: The Secretary-General will note for the record the presence of all the defendants in the court.

Counsel may proceed with the cross-examination.

DR. EUGEN KOGON (Resumed) CROSS-EXAMINATION (Continued)

BY MR. FLEMMING (Counsel for the defendant Mrugowsky):

Q: Witness, yesterday you had told us that Mrugowsky had been to Buchenwald twice or certainly no more than three times. Will you please tell this Tribunal how long these visits of Mrugowsky had lasted in each individual case?

A: May I first of all come back to what I said yesterday and state again that I have not said that Mrugowsky had been to Buchenwald two or three times but that I have seen him two or three times. These visits lasted from one to three hours in each individual case.

Q: What activities did Mrugowsky carry out during that time, did he inspect Block 50 or Block 40, or what?

A: On each one of these occasions when Mrugowsky visited Buchenwald, visits I experienced, Mrugowsky was announced.

He arrived at the commandants office. From there he went to Block 50 into the room of Dr. Ding. He inspected on one or two occasions the entire flight of rooms in Block 50 and he stayed in the orderly room for a brief period. That is where I was work ing. One one occasion he dictated in Dr. Ding's room a letter which I had to take down and on another occasion he dictated a teleprinted message. He had a brief consultation with Dr. Ding which I did not attend and then from the telephone in the library in Block 50 I had orders to get in touch with Block 46 and inform Block 46 that the visitors were on the way. Then the gentlemen went to Block 46 on such one individual occasion and after some time they returned, after at least half an hour from Block 46. On two occasions they returned to Block 50 and on one occasion they did not come back to Block 50, and on the occasions when they did come back to Block 50 breakfast was usually served to them in Dr. Ding's room, and after another brief conversation Mrugowsky went to his motor car near Block 50 in order to depart.

Q: Did Mrugowsky belong to any department of the concentration camps?

A: Not according to my knowledge, no.

Q: Did he have any sort of influence on the administration of concentration camps? Did you have any observation of that type?

A: He was a member of the department of the Reichs Physician SS, the chief Hygiene Department. This chief hygiene department was under the command, as far as I know, of the SS Chief Leadership Department and only in parts to the SS Chief Administrative Department in Berlin. The SS Chief Administrative Department was the central department of the entire administration of the SS. In this central department there was also Department D which was administering concentration camps. Mrugowsky did not to my knowledge have any influence directly on the administration of concentration camps.

Q: Did you make any observations to the effect that he had any influence upon the selection of detainees?

A: As long as the experimental subjects were selected in the actual camp at Buchenwald Mrugowsky did certainly not have any such an influence, neither because of his jurisdiction nor in fact, later on, when the experimental subjects went through the Reich Criminal Police Department or SS Gruppenfuehrer Nebe respectively, from where they were to be placed at our disposal, the applications in question went from Dr. Ding, that is to say applications referring to the number of persons who were needed, went from Dr. Ding to Mrugowsky who in turn would pass them on and Dr. Ding would then be informed by him to the effect that the experimental persons would be available.

Q: Witness, you have repeatedly to the Experimental Research Department Number 5. Where was that located?

A: Research Department Roman Numeral V was at Leipzig.

Q: What did the Research Department 5 have to do with the experiments at Buchenwald?

A: From this Research Department Roman Numeral V in Leipzig I only heard in connection with the two experiments, these phosphor kautchuk incendiary bombs, and also in connection, the experiments dealing with the transplantation of glands in Homosexual persons. A direct connection between that Experimental Department or Research Department 5 and Buchenwald did not actually exist. The channel of orders wont through Poppendick.

Q: Did you in connection with Department 5 ever hear the name "von Teenl"

A: No, never.

Q: Do you know that this IN search Department which you are always referring to as Department Roman Numeral V was not called Department Roman Numeral V, but that this "V" meant a large V for Victor and meant the name "von Tonel"?

A: No, I didn't know.

Q: On page 112 of your book, Mr. Witness, you mention a Dr. Neumann from the Hygiene Institute.

A: Yes.

Q: How do you know that Dr. Neumann was a member of the Hygiene Department?

A: Dr. Neumann was in the Department, in the Pathological Department in the concentration camp at Buchenwald where he worked. The cape there, Custave Vigora, told me that Dr. Neumann was a member of the Hygiene Department in Berlin.

Q: When was it that Neumann was working at the Pathological Institute?

A: According to my recollection before 1941.

Q: Before 1941. Thank you. Do you know Dr. Reichelt?

A: Yes, if you are referring to the Air Force Medical Officer, Dr. Reiche that is.

Q: I mean that Dr. Reichelt who was Dr. Ding's deputy in Block 50.

A: Yes. That is right.

Q: Do you know his present whereabouts?

A: He is living at Gaberndorf near Weimar.

Q: What is the name of the village?

A: Gaberndorf near Weimar.

Q: Thank you. What is your judgment of Dr. Ding's character, Witness?

A: As I have already said yesterday, Dr. Ding was a gifted, very reckless man without any moral principles, without religious convictions, without any metaphysical beliefs. To my knowledge, for reasons of ambition and a rapid career Dr. Ding went into the SS. His medical background and knowledge was comparatively small, but he had a certain conception for a fruitful problematical, a medical problematical therefor for which he would promise himself advantages for his own purpose. He wanted to become a well-learned man of repute amongst the medical public and particularly attached to a university. Apart from that, he tried to exploit every possibility in order to enlarge his own personal reputation.

During the period when Dr. Ding was Camp physician at Buchenwald Dr. Ding did a few very horrible things. On the other had, as Camp physician, he improved the hygiene conditions in the camp for the first the somewhat. It was due to him that an operating theatre was installed. When he was in contact with prisoners, then he was capable of producing a very kind and pleasant attitude, but I am, on the other had, perfectly sure that Dr. Ding would have sacrifice any man if his career would have been in jeopardy in any decisive point through that man. He was subject and accessible to certain persuasion and certain arguments. In Block 50 he felt somewhat at home because there were numerous scientists and university men there, and right from the word "go" he referred to Block 50 as some sort of scientific territory, the territory of science in the concentration camp, and he treated us, the inmates of Block 50 with considerable kindness.

For instance, something which is exorbitant for a concentration camp, he impressed us as a gentleman, Upon my suggestion he did almost everything which he could consider as reasonable; he did everything reasonable for us, but he was afraid of accepting any very serious responsibility for his actions. At the same time he maintained the closest possible contact with the capo of Block 46, who was an enemy of almost all of us, and from conversations with me, sometimes dealing with extremely deep subjects, he was capable of going straight to Capo Arthur Dietsch in Block 46 to talk to him in a manner which is only customary amongst criminals.

Dr. Ding loved his family, love his wife and loved his two children. He looked after them in the best possible manner, but he also had different relations, and, in my opinion, he would have been perfectly capable of leaving that family behind had the, possibility arisen for him personally to begin a new existence after the end of the war abroad. Dr. Ding had a character which was full of contradictions.

Q: Witness, what was your and the other prisoners' attitude in Block 50 regarding the production of vaccine?

A: May I request the Defense Counsel to be more precise with reference to the word "attitude"?

Q: Did you consider the production of vaccine something which was necessary in the interest of concentration camps and in the interests of the population and the troops as something desirable; that is to say, did you and the detainees in Block 50 do everything in order to advance this production of vaccine, or did you not?

A: We in Block 50 were given orders. We were told before this Block was opened up that we were concerned with the production of typhus vaccine for the fighting troops of the Waffen-SS at the front. We were perfectly aware right from the beginning that we were faced with a very awkward task. Dr. Ding told us during the first general meeting, "Gentlemen, if something crooked is happening here, if there is any kind of sabotage happening here, then you must be aware that before anything happens to me personally, you all will be put against the wall."

The first stage of the vaccine production was purely experimental. We had a method which was more or loss stolen from the Pasteur Institute at Paris, and we had to try that method in Block 50 for its effectiveness. Those experiments on animals lasted for about four months. We were continuously under pressure from Dr. Ding who was expecting tangible results very quickly. During these months some of us bacteriologists and the manager of this production, Marian Chiepiclowsky, with me collaborating decided that as quickly as possible some vaccine light production should be turned out which could ultimately claim to be a vaccine, but which must not do any harm.

May I point out to the Defense Counsel that the work with the cause of typhus, the Rickettsia Prowazeki, that is to say, the cause of the classical typhus, the typhus examthemicus, is very difficult. Science has not yet discovered the types of this cause for certain. There is a large table of the morphology of this Rickettsia. It is never quite certain and never quite ascertainable what is Rickettsia Prowazcki, that is to say, under the microscope. It is difficult to ascertain which shape would make certain that you are concerned with the cause -- with the germ of the Rickettsia typhus. This fact enabled us to go the way we went.

When Dr. Ludwig Fleck came to Block 50 at Buchenwald, he said in his capacity as a strict scientist after the first consultation with us when he saw the typhus germs which we and produce from rabbit lungs, these were not Rickettsia and that we were concerned with some other type of germ. We asked, him not to communicate this knowledge of ours to Dr. Ding under any circumstances but to make an experiment with us to try with us to get through this difficult matter in some bearable fashion. During the two years when Dr. Fleck worked with us right until the end Dr. Fleck kept that secret. Earlier when the Institute of the OKH in Krakow supplied us with infected lungs of mice and infectious material produced from the intestines of mice could it be ascertained definitely that Rickettsia Prowazeki were contained in our animal material after vaccination.

Following that we did produce a vaccine which beyond any doubt was most effective. It could only be produced in small quantities. Dr. Ding, on the other hand, demanded, putting himself under the pressure of the demands made on him from the Hygiene institute in Berlin, that we should produce large quantities of typhus vaccine for the lighting troops. From that moment we produced systematically two types of vaccine, one type which was perfectly harmless which would do no damage but had no value either. That was produced in large quantities, and that vaccine went to the front.

A second type was produced in very small quantities; it turned out to be highly effective. It was only used for special cases, and issued for very special cases. And, we, ourselves, used it sometimes at the Concentration Camp Buchenwald for the vaccination of our comrades who were working at dangerous places in the camp. We, too, in Block 50 were repeatedly vaccinated with that vaccine. Doctor Ding-Schuler never heard of these constellations; merely we were faced with critical phases, which, in the Serio-Bacteriological Department of Block 50, there were dead, as it happens during any such production. But, since he did not have any real bacteriological knowledge he did not have the possibility of discovering the deep secrets of this production. He was absolutely, and in everything, depending on the report which the experts from Block 50 gave to him. Apart from that, it was in keeping with his reckless manner that he should go by external visible success, and when he saw 30 or 40 liters of vaccine which he was able to send to Berlin he was happy. He was hardly concerned during the latter period with the vaccination of the SS troops, and that these people might, nevertheless, fall ill in Russia suffering not only from typhus, something which is always a possibility, but die, in spite of the vaccinations, in large numbers. The ineffectiveness of our vaccine, in other words, of the vaccine sent by us to the front might become apparent, and the outside experts such as might have been at the disposal of the SS right then be sent to Buchenwald. They might have investigated the affair, and they would then have ascertained that this vaccine had hardly been produced. I know no such development occurred, and until March 1945 the daring adventure continued.

Q: Yes, witness, you had described a certain affair in Sachrenhausen according to Doctor Ding's story, a Russian had attacked Dr. Mrugowsky with a knife. I did not quite understand the story. Would you mind repeating this story to the Tribunal?

A: Doctor Ding told me in connection with the secret poison experiment carried out on the four Russian prisoners of war in the crematorium at Buchenwald, that he together with Mrugowsky, had been at the Sachsendausen Concentration Camp outside Berlin, and had attended a poison experiment which had taken the following course:

Supposedly the Russians at the eastern front had used poison bullets. It had been impossible to find out what type of poison had been used. Now, it had been wished that various poisons should be tried out on the prisoners in the Concentration Camp in such a way that the prisoners should be shot with such bullets in order to ascertain the effects. During one such experiment or some similar experiment, and Doctor Ding did not speak very precisely in this subject, a Russian prisoner of war, one of the victims had succeeded in producing a weapon, a knife, which he had on him, and this prisoner had attempted to attack Mrugowsky, but after a certain amount of struggle he had been held down. The scene had been extremely exciting and he, Ding, did not wish ever again to be exposed to such an affair. It was my first thought when Ding told me this story that the SS had attempted to submit the possibility of poisoning infantry bullets, and that the story that the Russians had used such bullets was pure imagination.

Q: Witness, yesterday you spoke about during Doctor Ding's experiments at Sachsenhausen four persons had been employed; is that correct?

A: I can not remember having mentioned the figure four, nor can I state for certain that we were, in this case, concerned with four prisoners. Doctor Ding merely said that such an experiment or similar experiment had taken place in his presence at Sachsenhausen.

Q: I am not at the moment speaking of Sachsenhausen, I am speaking of Buchenwald.

A: Yes, in Buchenwald there were four prisoners.

Q: Witness, do you want to say that Doctor Ding told you that these experiments took place on Mjrugowsky's orders?

A: Yes, he said that.

Q: But, the diary says that "We were concerned with a special experiment on six persons, and the order came from the Reich Criminal Police Department and Mrugowsky."

Is that true? Can you remember that?

MR. McHANEY: I request the witness be shown the diary.

DR. FLEMMING: Will one of the defense counsel hand the witness the diary, please.

(The diary was handed to the witness.)

Q: On the 26th of October 1944. Have you got it?

A: No, I have not found it yet, will you tell me the page?

Q: In the German document book it is page 55; page 20 of the original diary.

MR. McHANEY: Page 31 of the English Document Book, your Honor.

A: Special experiment on six persons according to instructions of SS Oberfuehrer Dr. Mrugowsky and RKPA. It is a verbal report. The diary states that there were six people; then, my recollection that there were four is wrong. The instructions from Mrugowsky and the Reich Criminal Police Department does not contradict, in any way, what I have said; namely, that the instructions came from Mrugrowsky; direct instructions from the Reich Criminal Police Department to Doctor Ding did never take place. The instructions came through Mrugrowsky.

Q: Did Doctor Ding come directly from Sachsenhausen when he told you in great excitement that he had a receipt and gave it to you for filling up?

A: I do not believe that the experiments in Sachsenhausen had been completed before the experiments happened at Buchenwald. I believe I can remember that Doctor Ding had already previously given hints about the experiment at Sachsenhausen when the experiment at Buchenwald took place, and placed us under extreme secretiveness. For instance, Doctor Ding told me that he could not tell me the circumstances of the experiment that he was afraid to tell me. When this experiment took place, he once again referred to the affair at Sachsenhausen. Just from where he had this receipt for this poison is something I do not know.

Q: Do you know where this poison was produced?

A: No.

Q: According to your account Scholbert, Piester, and a fourth man were present during that experiment. Is that correct?

A: With reference to the Carp Cammandant SS Oberfueherer Piester, I am not certain. That the first camp leader SS Sturmbannfuehrer Max Schobert was present is something I never said because Dr. Ding in my presence called Schobert by telephone and told him, "Maxie, you've got to come down right away."

Q: Did Dr. Ding not tell you later what sort of poison you were concerned with?

A: No.

Q: Was there a report to the Reich Criminal Police Department about this experiment?

A: Not through my hands.

Q: You, Witness, stated yesterday that Mrugowsky had agreed to those experiments, to the experiments carried out by Varnet. From where did you have this knowledge?

A: Dr. Ding also reported to Mrugowksy about the experiments which were carried out at Buchenwald.

Q: In other words, you are merely drawing the conclusion from the fact that Ding reported to Mrugowsky that Mrugowsky was agreeable to these experiments?

A: It was Dr. Ding-Schuler's practice that every important matter should be reported to Mrugowsky. Because it was known to him that Mrugowsky very rarely could be got to put anything down in writing, Mrugowsky used to deal with almost everything verbally, orally; and on one occasion Dr. Ding told me that Mrugowsky had told him that it was perfectly enough if he, Ding, made reports to him in that matter, putting down on paper the progress of things or matters. If there were no objections, then there was normal progress, normal procedure. In this particular instance I therefore drew the conclusion from the report made to Mrugowsky that he was agreeable to that experiment. In addition to Mrugowsky as Dr. Ding's chief in that matter, Sturmbannfuehrer Dr. Vornet's experiment did not come under the jurisdiction of Dr. Ding either, and I cannot, therefore, state for certain that it came under the jurisdiction of Mrugowsky.

Mrugowsky's approval regarding Dr. Ding's participation, however, seemed given. It appeared to me that it had been given but that participation was merely assistance in the shape of a mere organizational type from the outside.

Q: Yesterday, Witness, you mentioned Dr. Ellenbeck who had worked in this laboratory. Would you please tell the Tribunal what the leading activities of Dr. Ellenbeck were in the guest laboratory?

A: Dr. Ellenbeck, SS Hauptsturmfuehrer and later SS Sturmbannfuehrer, was possibly oven more ambitious than Dr. Ding-Schuler. He was more conceited, more conceited to a very considerable degree than Dr. Schuler. Those two men, as far as the outside world was concerned, were friends. As it is in keeping with such ambitious SS typos, they wore fighting against each other, nevertheless, behind each other's back. It was Dr. Ding.'s concern and worry that gradually Ellenbeck might grab Block 50 for himself and that gradually he would achieve a better reputation with Mrugowsky than he, Dr. Ding, had at the time himself.

Therefore, he told me about the respective stages of Dr. Ellenbeck's work in Berlin as far as he, Ding, could judge it. The situation therefore appears to be this-- Ellenbeck came to Mrugowsky with a number of suggested changes of initiative, which Mrugowsky approved. The so-called guest laboratory in Block 50 was installed, not by any means the only place and activity for Sturmbannfuehrer Dr. Ellenbeck.

Q: Witness, I am merely interested in finding out what was the work, the main work, carried out by Ellenbeck in this guest laboratory which you already referred to yesterday.

A: Chemical research of blood. For instance, the ascertaining of the oxygen content of the blood of human beings, being subjected to various stages of exhaustion. For that purpose, for instance, prisoners from the quarry of Buchenwald were ordered to report to Ellenbeck. The way he used to put it was that he shouted:

Get me a few of those dopes of yours for blood supply.

Then after that heavy work in the quarry, these people were brought to him; and then they had to perform physical exercises in front of him until they wore exhausted, whereupon the blood was taken from them; and the oxygen content of that blood taken from persons with an exhausted condition was thus ascertained. That's one example, furthermore, Dr. Ellenbeck had to make time preparations necessary for the study of the cure of edemas. I heard through Dr. Ding that it was supposed that starvation edemas should be produced artificially, although there wasn't any actually necessity for this since they were in existence by the scores but apparently it was desired that the conditions under which they occurred should be isolated in order to be able to study them more efficiently, and Ellenbeck was then to produce cures for them, Furthermore, Ellenbeck dealt with convalescent serum. The blood of convalescent persons was taken from experimental-

Q: Yes, well, let me interrupt you. We dealt with that yesterday. Thank you very much. We don't have to come back to that. I was merely interested in hearing from you that research was carried out and was the main activity connected with this starvation edema.

Now, witness, yesterday you said that the order for these incendiary bomb experiments came from Dr. Mrugowsky. Did not Dr. Ding tell you that before these experiments he had been to see the Higher Police Leader von Woersch of Dresden? Have you got this document bock before you still? And may I ask you to open it to the last page of the working report.

A: I can remember without looking at this report that Dr. Ding-Schuler did talk to the Higher Police Loader von Woersch personally and was in contact with him. He reported to Mrugowsky at every stage of the development just as it was the habit at this time and just as it was his endeavor at that particular stage not to do anything without the knowledge of or, if possible, the approval of Mrugowsky.

Q: Yesterday, Witness, you referred to the vaccine produced at the Robert Koch Institute and you described to us the Cox-Gildemeister Haagen vaccine; it that correct?

A: Yes

Q: Where did you get the Cox-Gildemeister-Haagen designation from?

A: Right from the beginning it was called that in Block 50; and it was also contained in scientific publications. Again, as vaccine according to the process of Cox, Gildemeister and Haagen, it was reflected. The American Cox was named in that connection because he was the first man to transplant Rickettsia Prawazeki to the yolks of chicken eggs.

Q: You read Dr. Ding's report to the Military Medical Academy, didn't you, the report?

A: Yes. May I ask you which report you are talking about?

Q: The report which Dr. Ding made before the Military Medical Academy about his experiments.

A: No, I did not read that report, The third Military Medical conference with which we are here concerned took place, as far as I can recollect, during the first half of May, 1943, in Berlin. During the second half of the month of April, I was attached to Dr. Ding-Schuler as medical clerk; and my work with him began only on the 2nd or 6th of June, 1943 after Dr. Ding's return from Berlin. It was then that he told me during the very first days of my work for him about this conference; but I must say in that connection that between the time of Dr. Ding's return from Berlin and the beginning of my clerk's work for him, that is to say, between the end of May or the second half of May, and the 6th of June, I saw Dr. Ding quite frequently and had orders and instructions from him.

Q: In the report which Dr. Ding made during this Congress and which, of course, we have in writing, he always referred to this vaccine as being produced according to the Gildemeister-Haagen process, without the addition of the name of the American Cox. Is it known to you that, apart from that, Dr. Ding always referred to the Gildemeister-Haagen vaccine?

A: It is perfectly possible and perfectly explicable, considering Dr. Ding's habits, that he did describe it thus. It is quite possible that it was only through the scientists in Block 50 that the other designation became clear to him. In Block 50 at any rate the vaccine was always described as being produced according to the Cox-Gildemeister and Haagen process.

Q: Did Block 46, Mr. Witness, have an animal stable in which experimental animals were kept?

A: No.

Q: Would you please look at the diary entry for the 23rd of March 1943?

A: May I ask you to tell me the page? You mean German document Page 44?

Q: That is right.

MR. McHANEY: Page 44 in the English document book, Your Honors.

BY DR. FLEMING:

Q: Conference between SS Sturmbahnfuehrer Bernewald, SS Sturmbahnfuehrer Ding, and SS Hauptscharfuehrer Schlesinger, in the offices of Department W 5, W & V.H.A., Economic and Administrative Chief Department, about the rabbit and guinea pig and mice collection for experimental animal purposes for the experimental department. Did the keeping of such animals for the experimental department ever become known to you?

A: At the time mentioned conferences did take place about the question of keeping animals for the two departments dealing with typhus and virus research -- that is the clerical department and the vaccine production -- that such animal stations should be installed, who didn't wish that prisoners from Block 40 and Block 50 be removed from his jurisdiction to a considerable extent, as it were, should be in position to dispose of rabbits. He knew the conditions in the camp very intimately and he knew that we would just eat these rabbits. There was a considerable fight between the administrative chiefs and those SS men who were under our influence and who also were interested in getting rabbits which were meant to be experimental animals into the frying pan. I must add that we were living under conditions which got us to the point where we were even eating infected animals. In the course of these negotiations it was finally decided that this experimental animal department would only be attached to Block 50 because 46 did not offer any facilities for a control through the administrative department of the concentration camp at Buchenwald.

Q: How do you know about these negotiations so intimately, in such detail? It was on the 23rd of March 1943 that they took place and you didn't get there until much later; you didn't join Dr. Ding until much later.

A: May I point out to the defense counsel that in a concentration comp nothing was more intensely dealt with, more thoroughly talked about than matters relating to food. The negotiations concerning these rabbits went on for a full six months, After the beginning of my work with Dr, Ding I took part in these negotiations in a very vivid manner, because when the prisoners considered that an extraordinarily good proposition right from the beginning of increasing our food supplies. As an aside, you might be able to ** from this what circumstances interfered with the scientific value of experiments carried out in a concentration camp. There was no stage during these negotiations which I didn't trace back right to the very beginning of it.

Q: You therefore know the negotiations, regarding the beginning of the negotiations, only by hearsay?

A: From the conversations of all persons concerned with the exception of Sturmbahnfuehrer Bernewald.

Q: Yesterday, Mr. Witness, you had talked about the letterhead, which you described as the "bloated head". It was Reich Medical Officer SS Chief Hygiene Officer, Hygiene Institute of the Waffen SS, Chief Professor Dr. Joachim Mrugowsky. This letterhead, was that used by Ding or were you then referring to arriving letters which had such letter heading as that?

A: Yesterday I didn't express myself too accurately, When I 'was speaking I was noticing that I had used the word "letterhead" but I didn't want to correct myself in such a comparatively immaterial affair. I am talking about the address. Left top there was the letterhead; that was three lines long and it was "Department for Typhus and Virus Research in the Hygiene Institute of the Waffen SS, Weimar/Buchenwald." On the right hand side there was the date; then followed underneath the address, which ran up to seven lines, so that in the case of full foolscap sheets I had only one single line left for the text of the letter after I had written the date and the address. The actual address was also very slightly different than as I described it yesterday. In particular, Mrugowsky was not "Professor" but "Docent Lecturer"; but on the other hand, his double doctor title was quoted quite frequently in its entirety. He was a Dr. of Botany and a Dr. of Medicine.

Q: Do you also know the letter heading used by Mrugowsky himself and what did they look like?

A: They changed. It depended upon the function in which Mrugowsky was writing to Dr. Ding. You see, Dr. Ding also had the functions of a hygienist for the prohibited territory "B" of the Waffen SS under Hirt. When Mrugowsky, as Chief Hygienist, wrote to Dr. Ding, then, as far as I can recollect, the letterhead read as follows: Chief Hygienist of the SS. If, on the other hand, he wrote in his capacity of Chief of the Hygiene Institute, then he was referred to as such; the signature was quite frequently "Mrugowsky, Department Chief".

Q: This question of seven lines, that was therefore an invention which Dr. Ding was employing, wasn't it? In Mrugowsky's own letterheads it was never used; is that correct?

A: No; but then I don't see why it should have been an invention of Dr. Ding's.

Q: Well, after all, that is unimportant.

DR. FLEMMING: I have no further questions.

DR. MERKEL: Attorney Merkel for Defendant Genzken.

BY DR. MERKEL:

Q: Witness, according to your testimony it has become certain that there were two different types of typhus stations operating at Buchenwald: a) the experimental station or clinical station at Block 46, and b) the production station in Block 50. Is that correct?

A: The vaccine production station in Block 50, yes, that is quite right.

Q: Do you know since when the experimental station at Block 46 existed?

A: The beginning of this experiment 1 station at Block 46 goes back to the last months of the year 1941. The preparations and the very first experiments took place in the stone blocks Nos. 44 and 49. According to my memory, it was at the beginning of 1942, after appropriate installations had been made in Block 46, that the entire operational level of the experiments and the apparatus was transferred to Block 46.

Q: And the production plant at Block 50, when did that begin its activities?

A: August 15, 1943.

Q: It was at that time that production started there I take it?

A: It was at that point that those operations were started which I have described earlier. That is to say, the part preparation for production.

Q: These two blocks were entirely separate plants. Apparently this was only the personal union in the shape of a joint chief, Ding-Schuler, and in the shape of the joint offices; is that correct?

A: As fay as the physical situation was concerned, both blocks were separated, yes. Each one of those stone blocks stood on a different side of the camp there in the same row. These two departments had no joint personnel, for instance, That is to say, the prisoners who worked in Block 46 had no business whatever in Block 50, and prisoners working in Block 50 had no business in Block 46. The joint chief was Dr. Ding-Schuler. Any collaboration only developed because of various circumstances. There was no joint office. The office which has been talked about here was in Block 50 and it had on its part nothing to do with Block 46. The collaboration between the two blocks consisted, from case to case, in the fresh blood of typhus patients to the extent of two cubic centimeters would be taken to Block 50 by Cape Arthur Dietsch and there transplanted or vaccinated on to guinea pigs. Secondly, that instructions which Dr. Ding-Schuler would give to the office in Block 50, as far as they concerned Block 46 from the point of view of organizational or technical matters, were passed on iron the office to Block 46 by means of a field telephone.

Q: If you were to look at the document book, Witness -- and I am talking about Page 41 -- that is Page 6 of Ding's diary -- then you will find an entry of January 9, 1943, and there it says that the name of the experimental station was changed from Typhus Experimental Station, Buchenwald, to Department for Typhus and Virus Research. You yourself admittedly didn't get there until April 1943 but, nevertheless, are you able to tell us and confirm to ***** this entry is correct and that that alteration had actually taken place as early as January, 1943?

A: According to all the information which I had available in the camp that entry is correct. I can by no means state that the 9th of January is correct but I can confirm that it was in January 1943 that this happened.

Q: Can you confirm from the files of the office at Block 50 what the letterhead of these two might have read before January 1943 and what it might have read after January 1943?

A: Just what it read before is something I cannot confirm. I cannot now remember that. At that time correspondence was handler by Dr. Ding in the office of Block 46. The correspondence was mostly kept there, too, unless it was later on transferred to Block 50, but I really can not now remember the letterhead. After the beginning of my work I often wrote, as I earlier told you, following Dr. Ding's instructions, quite regularly: "Department for Typhus and Virus Research," sometimes "Attached to the Hygiene Institute, Waffen-SS" or sometimes only "Hygiene Institute, Waffen-SS, Berlin" and underneath that, "Weimar/Buchenwald,"

Q: Do you know anything about the question in connection with other experiments, namely experiments with poison, phosphorous, incendiary bombs, to. ************* Genzken was over mentioned?

A: It was never mentioned.

Q: These experiments did not start until the late autumn of 1943, if I understood you correctly?

Q: One last question. You stated in your testimony that you can not say for certain whether the Defendant Genzken or Reichs Medical Office Grawitz, had been to Buchenwald, Defendant Genzken states, and is most Emphasize about it, that he has neither visited Block 46 nor-Block 50 nor the Concentration Camp Buchenwald at all or at any time during the war. What do you think you can base your assumption on that Genzken had been present in the Typhus Station at Buchenwald?

A: Merely upon the repeated written invitations which Dr. Dingw-Schule sent to his former chief and, as he used to put it, "Fatherly Friend Genzken" to look at the "workshop" at Buchenwald, I want to remark in this connection that the "officer tone" was frequently employed by Dr. Ding, even in less serious matters.

I can not confirm to you that Gruppenfuehrer Genzken actually followed any of those invitations in reality.

Q: Thank you very much. I have no further questions.

DR. DUERR (Assistant for Defendant Poppendick's defense counsel):

Q: Witness, did you see Defendant Poppendick in the camp during your stay at Concentration Camp Buchenwald at any time?

A: No.

Q: Did you know him personally?

A: No.

Q: Yesterday you were talking about typhus experiments. Did reports about typhus experiments go to Defendant Poppendick?

A: No. At least not from Dr. Ding-Schuler.

Q: I see. Then with reference to the subject to Dr. Varnet. Yesterday you were talking about experiments on homosexuals made by Dr. Varnet and you were talking in that connection about 2 fatalities. Is it correct that the cause for the deaths of these 2 experimental persons was on one occasion a phlegmon infection and on the second occasion general body weakness?

A: That is perfectly possible. The case of deaths did not happen in my sphere of work, in that sphere, I mean, which I could survey personally. From the prisoners' sick-bay I heard that 2 experimental persons had died. It is possible that these occurred in connection with experiments or partially from other causes.

Q: But you state in your book, "The SS State" and I am sure you remember this, that the matter was different.

A: What do you mean, I state in my book?

Q: That one death was due to phlegmon and the other death to general body weakness in connection with these experiments of Dr. Varnet.

A: May I ask you whether, in this cross-examination here, I am being examined about the correctness of my past published statements in the book "The SS State" or the correctness of my statements before this Military Tribunal?

Q: In other words, in your statement you are not referring to your book any more. You have heard that statement from some other person?

A: I am not saying that I am basing myself here on the statements made in my book or that I am not basing myself on it. I can say at this moment that what I said at this particular place on that tremendous subject I had to deal with, what I actually said was on the strength of what details are now at my disposal. If, therefore, we are concerned with the statements in my book, I would have to go home and look at my documents before I could give you a clear and reasonable answer to your question. In this particular case, therefore, I am not under any circumstances basing myself here in this courtroom on that book, which I have written.

Q: Witness, did the correspondence pass through your hands addressed to the Experimental Department at Leipzig?

A: The correspondence always went either to Poppendick or to Obersturmbannfuehrer, Dr. Klicherty or to the Higher Police and SS Leader von Woersch, I cannot remember having carried on a correspondence with the Experimental Station V, or, as we were calling it, (Roman Numeral Five) V, or ever having bean directly in touch with it, in fact? Otherwise I would very probably know the exact address.

Q: Do you know whether Defendant Poppendick was merely in contact with that experimental station or whether he was its responsible head?

A: That I do not know. I assumed that he was under the jurisdiction of the Reichs Medical Officer-SS and that he was the expert concerned.

Q: How do you know that Dr. Varnet actually belonged to this Experimental Department V?

A: In correspondence the description recurred quite often.

Q: But this experimental station was never described any more clearly? It was either called Department V or Department V (Roman Numeral Five).

A: Yes.

Q: Thank you. I have no further questions.

JUDGE BEALS: The Tribunal will recess for fifteen minutes.

(A recess was taken.)