1947-03-10, #1: Doctors' Trial (early afternoon)

[Note: As the tribunal had previously announced at the end of the day on March 6th, 1947, the Doctors’ Trial would not hold its regular morning session in order to accommodate the arraignments of the defendants in the 4th Nuremberg Trial, U.S.A. v. Pohl et al in the same courtroom. — ASH]

Official Transcript of the American Military Tribunal in the matter of the United States of America, against Karl Brandt, and al, defendants, sitting at Nurnberg, Germany, on 10 March 1947, 1330, Justice Beals presiding.

THE MARSHAL: Persons in the court room will please find their seats.

The Honorable, the 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, you ascertain that the defendants are all present in court.

THE MARSHAL: May it please your Honor, all defendants are present in court with the exception of the Defendant Oberhauser, who is absent due to illness.

THE RESIDENT: The Secretary-General will note for the record the presence of all the defendants in court save the Defendant Oberhauser, who is excused on account of illness, she being in the hospital.

Counsel may proceed.

KARL GEBHARDT — Resumed.

DR. SEIDL (Counsel for the Defendant Gebhardt): Mr. President, I have no further questions to put to this witness.

THE PRESIDENT: Any further examination of this witness by defense counsel on account of the questions asked him, recently after cross examination?

BY DR. WEISGRUBER (Counsel for the Defendant Sievers):

Q: Professor, in the cross examination you stated that the Ahnenerbe was under the Freundeskreis, circle of friends, and financed by it. Do you know the organization of the Ahnenerbe?

A: No, I can say nothing more about it, but I assumed that that was the case as I understood it.

Q: Than that is a pure assumption on your part? You have no concrete evidence for it?

A: I can only say that I was once asked to join the Freundeskreis. That was at the beginning of the war, and. I remember it was a combination of friends and Institutes were attached to it; and, as I said, I met professor Wuest at some meeting. I have no more concrete knowledge.

DR. WEISGRUBER: I have no other questions.

THE PRESIDENT: Any further cross-examination of this witness on the part of the prosecution?

MR. HARDY: The Prosecution has no further questions.

THE PRESIDENT: The Defendant Gebhardt will be excused from the stand as a witness and resume his place.

(The witness was excused.)

DR. SEIDL: (Counsel for the defendant Gebhardt): Mr. President, three witnesses have been approached for the Defendant Gebhardt. One of these witnesses has meanwhile arrived. This is Dr. Karl Brunner. In order to shorten the proceedings, I small dispense with examining this witness before the Tribunal, in agreement with the prosecution, I shall take the liberty of submitting an affidavit from this witness at a later period. The same is true of the other two witnesses, Professor Lothar Kreutz and Dr. Jaedicke. Here again I shall submit affidavits.

THE PRESIDENT: I understand from counsel for the Defendant Gebhardt this course is taken pursuant to an a agreement with the prosecution, is that right?

DR. SEIDL: Yes.

MR. McHANEY: If the Tribunal please, the course suggested by Dr. Seidl would be highly satisfactory because the prosecution feels that in this way we will be able to shorten the proceedings substantially. Of course, we are not advised in great detail as to what these gentlemen will state in their affidavits, but I think the chances are very good that we will not find it necessary to cross-examine them or to bring them here. In an exceptional case that might be necessary. On the other hand, we could probably secure a cross affidavit of some sort, so we are quite agreeable and pleased that Dr. Seidl is suggesting this course.

THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, where are the three witnesses you just named? Are they now in Nurnberg?

DR. SEIDL: One witness is in Nurnberg, that is Dr. Karl Brunner. The other two witnesses are in internment camps in the British Zone. It is doubtful whether they can be brought here at all in the near future.

THE PRESIDENT: Under the circumstances, the arrangement outlined by counsel for the Defendant Gebhardt has the approval of the Tribunal.

DR. SEIDL: In the question of my case for Defendant Dr. Karl Gebhardt I have only to submit the rest of the documents which are in my document book. The first one, which I submit, is on page 44 of the document book. It is from the Manual of Virus Research. This is an excerpt from a book published in 1944. I shall not read any of this into the record, but in my concluding speech I shall refer to it. This will be Gebhardt Exhibit No. 11. The next exhibit is on page 72.

THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, what page? The translation did not come through.

DR. SEIDL: The next document is on page 72, It is an affidavit of an attorney, Karl Weiss. The contents speak for themselves. I ask the court to take judicial notice of this affidavit. I have included it in this document book as an example, and I shall give some other affidavits of this type in the supplementary volume. Then I go to page 75 of the document book-the affidavit from Karl Weiss on page 72 is submitted as Exhibit Gebhardt 12. — Then I go to page 75 of the document book, it is an affidavit of Gerhard Schiedlausky. This affidavit has already been submitted by the prosecution as Exhibit 224.

THE PRESIDENT: Has this exhibit in its entirety been submitted on behalf of the Prosecution and admitted by the Tribunal?

DR. SEIDL: This exhibit was submitted by the Prosecution in connection with the sulfonamide experiments. It is in the English document book number ten, but the Prosecution did not read the entire affidavit into the record but only excerpts. In order to simplify the task of the Tribunal, I have out into the Gebhardt document book that part of the affidavit to which I shall refer in my concluding speech.

THE PRESIDENT: Does counsel desire to read this into the record?

DR. SEIDL: I should only like on page 76 to read one paragraph. It is an excerpt which the Prosecution did not read into the record yet.

THE PRESIDENT: Counsel may proceed.

DR. SEIDL: I shall begin on page 76 at line 12.

In Ravensbruck there were about twenty-five women who were executed by shooting there at my time. They were all Polish women, who were already prisoners and the verdict on whom in many cases was fonfirmed by the Governor General only after a long time. The company commander was in charge of executions by firing squad and they took place in the presence of the camp commander, SS-Obersturmbannfuehrer Max Koegel.

The purpose of this excerpt is only to show that the prisoners at Ravensbruck, as far as they were Polish women, were members of the resistance movement, which the experimental subjects, who have testified here, admitted; and the experimental subjects, from whom affidavits were submitted, also admitted this.

Mr. President, now I come to some documents, which I need in order to comment on the status of the experimental subjects under International Law. The first document of this type is on page 77 of the document book. It is the German-Soviet Boundary and Friendship Treaty of the 28th of September, 1939. I submit this treaty as Gebhardt Exhibit 13.

THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, was not your last exhibit 13?

DR. SEIDL: The last exhibit number was 12. This now document is to be Exhibit Gebhardt 13.

THE PRESIDENT: What was the number of the Schiedlausky affidavit was already submitted by the Prosecution. It was Prosecution Exhibit 224.

THE PRESIDENT: I misunderstood Counsel. I thought Counsel desired to offer that again. Counsel is correct. You may proceed.

MR. McHANEY: With respect to the document offered as Karl Gebhardt No. 13, the Prosecution should like to be advised as to the purpose of this offer. Off hand it appears to me to be immaterial to the issues here and consists of nothing more or less than a boundary and friendship treaty between the USSR and Germany, particularly concerning the Polish territory.

DR. SEIDL: I may make the following answer to that, Mr. President. The experimental subjects on whom the sulfonamide experiments were conducted were Polish women. In 1940 or '41 they were arrested because, as they themselves admitted, they were members of a resistance movement.

In the proceedings before the beginning of the trial, the opinion was repeatedly expressed that they were prisoners of war. It will be necessary to investigate under what legislation and under what jurisdiction those Polish women were in 1940 and 1941; and it will also be necessary to examine whether in 1940 and 1941 there was a Polish State under international law.

This border and friendship treaty between Germany and the Soviet Union is the basis for the examination of the question what the status of these Polish citizens was under international law at that time. In particular the question will have to be examined whether Poland as an independent state still existed or not, and what powers had the right to issue laws and regulations for this territory, and whether such laws and regulations were binding on the witnesses who have been examined here. This treaty is the basis for the further documents which I shall submit later.

The important thing is to examine whether the German Government, as Occupying Power, had the authority to issue laws and regulations which were binding on the members of this resistance movement, and also to examine the question whether these experimental subjects were prisoners of war or what their status was under international law.

MR. McHANEY: I think that the Prosecution must object that the document offered is immaterial. Certainly it sheds no light whatsoever up on the legal status of these women, Polish women, who were experimented upon in Ravensbruck. The document can in no way tend to prove that Germany had the right to administer laws in a Polish State. It's simply a boundary agreement between Russia and Germany. It certainly does not intend to prove whether the occupation was in any way legal. As a matter of fact, the Polish Invasion has been held by the International Military Tribunal to have been an aggressive war and hence a crime against peace. I think we are getting a bit far afield in this offer. We think it is immaterial.

JUDGE SEBRING: Dr. Seidl, are you contending that as of the period in which, as you say, these women were condemned to death by some sort of a court, that there was at that time an occupation or a complete subjugation of Poland?

DR. DEIDL: I am of the opinion that the fate of Poland after the German-Polish War was a typical example of a so-called de belaccio. I am of the opinion that this is not merely an occupatio bellica but that through this war and, in particular, through the treaty mentioned here, the Polish State had ceased to exist, and that the entire legislative authority and the entire jurisdiction were transferred to the two states which occupied the territory of the former State of Poland.

JUDGE SEBRING: The International Military Tribunal didn't quite agree with that view, did they?

DR. SEIDL: Your Honor, the IMT expressed itself on this question, that some questions in connection with this they did not discuss but avoided these questions. I do not believe that at the present tiro I could discuss all the points that have arisen in connection with the fate of Poland in 1939; but, on the other hand, I do not believe that it is necessary, because it is decisive what the actual conditions were in 1940 and '41 and not what the subsequent judgment in 1946 by the International Mil itary Tribunal was.

As for the objection of the Prosecutor, it apparently means that he contests the probative value of this evidence. He does not say that the document is not authentic. In my concluding speech I will be forced to comment on all these questions, especially as to whether these experimental subjects were under German jurisdiction; but I do not believe that the objection of the Prosecution is justified, because the relevance of this document is shown only by comparison with the other documents which I intend to submit, and in considering the reasons which I intend to explain later. In my opinion, it would not be necessary at all to submit this document, because the German-Soviet boundary and Friendship Treaty on the 20th of September, 1939, has in the meanwhile become so wellknown that it would be sufficient for me to refer to it and assume that this is a fact which is well-known.

JUDGE SEBRING: Now is it your theory that there occurred a complete subjugation, in effect, then a partition of this territory partly to Germany under such conditions that under international law it became a part of the Reich and that thereafter the municipal courts of Germany and the municipal law of Germany could be brought over into the territory and administered as against those people? Is that the thing for which you contend?

DR. SEIDL: In contrast to the territories which fell to the Soviet Union which were immediately incorporated into the Soviet State, the territories from which the witnesses examined here came were not incorporated into the Reich. It is true that a part of the former State was incorporated into the German Reich, a part of the former Polish State, but the largest part of the area west of the demarcation line was made into a unit called the Government General. This included 18 million people. It was under a Governor General. German law was not applied directly to this territory. The Governor General to maintain order is issued laws and regulations which were in compliance with the Hague Convention of 1907 but I am of the opinion that under the conditions existing at that time, the occupying power was justified in taking the necessary measures to maintain order, and that these laws and regulations were binding on the members of the Government General.

JUDGE SEBRONG: Well, aren't you obliged to contend for occupation rather than subjugation and certain ordinances and laws administered by military courts under the doctrine of military necessity? How which path are you going? What is it that you contend for here?

DR. SEIDL: Your Honors, I have already said that in my opinion this is a typical case of de bellaccio. But I do not believe that wherefore the form of this question is the essential difference, whether one speaks of de bellaccio or only occupatio bellica. Even in the latter case the occupying powers were quite doubtless justified in issuing the orders and regulations, necessary under conditions prevailing at the time, in order to maintain order in this territory, and which were necessary because this territory of the Government General was the largest military transit area ever seen in the history of warfare. Therefore, I do not believe there is any important difference whether one chooses one alternative or the other; but in addition the question will also have to be examined as to whether the members of this resistance movement were under the protection of the rules of warfare at all. They were not members of the armed forces of a lower. One will have to assume that the members of the resistance movement belonged to the group which is called franctireurs under international law.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will admit the document referred to, with the express understanding that in a final hearing the Tribunal reserve the right to reject the document if it finds them immaterial, and if the theory upon which they are offered be found incorrect as to the questions of both fact and law to be determined. The document at this the will be admitted provisionally.

DR. SEIDL: I submit this document as Gebhardt Exhibit No. 13, and I ask the Tribunal to take notice of the contents of this document.

The next document which I intend to submit is on page 80 of the document book. It is a decree of the Fuehrer and Reich Chancellor in the administration of the occupied Polish territory, of the 12th October, 1939. I ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice of the contents of this docu ment, and I go one.

This is Gebhardt Exhibit No. 14.

THE PRESIDENT: This document will be admitted in evidence provisionally under the same restrictions mentioned in regard to the preceding exhibit.

DR. SEIDL: Then I go on to page 83 of the document book. This is an ordinance concerning the military jurisdiction for civilians in the General Government of the 26th of January, 1940. I submit this document with the same reservations as the other document as Gebhardt Exhibit No. 15. I originally intended, Mr. President, to submit a different document at this point. This was not possible because the decree, which I referred to, was in the directive for the Governor General which is not to be found in the library at the present time. Therefore, I shall read from page 84 of the document book Article 4. I quote:

Article 4.

(1) The competence of court martials as established by article 4 of the ordinance of the Commander-in-Chief of the Army regarding possession of weapons dated 12 September 1939 (Official Gazette for the occupied Polish territories, page 8) is discontinued.

(2) The trial of criminal acts as described in Articles 1, 2 of the before-mentioned order will be transferred to court martials, the composition of which is defined by article 11, section 2 of the ordinance to combat acts of violence in the General government, dated 31 October 1937 (Official Gazette for the occupied Polish territories, page 10) and the supplementary ordinance dated 2 December, 1939.

(3) Criminal cases already under review at military court martials will be dealt with under previous regulations.

I have read this paragraph into the record, because, after the presentation of evidence, I shall refer to this ordinance of 31 October, 1939, about combatting acts of violence in the General Government.

Then I go to page 85 of the document book.

JUDGE SEBRING: Will you be prepared during the course of the presentation of your case, or some aspect of it, to bring to the Court the correct translations of the various articles and sections of the laws referred to here?

DR. SEIDL: I shall endeavor to obtain this ordinance of the Governor General which is mentioned here and shall submit it to the Tribunal later.

Volume 39 of the Gazette for the Government General was available here during the trial before the International Military Tribunal. Unfortunately, I cannot find it at the present time, but I shall try to get this decree from a library.

THE PRESIDENT: The offered exhibit will be admitted provisionally under the same condition as the last two preceding exhibits.

DR. SEIDL: The last document which I want to submit in this document book is on page 85. It is a letter from the defendant, Dr. Gebhardt, to the President of the Swedish Red Cross, Count Bernadette. I shall not read this letter into the record. I ask the Court to take judicial notice of it's contents. I submit this letter as Gebhardt Exhibit No. 16.

THE PRESIDENT: It may be admitted.

DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, this completes the presentation of evidence for the defendant, Dr. Karl Gebhardt for the present. I ask to reserve the right at a later time to submit a few exhibits which are in a supplementary volume.

THE PRESIDENT: At what time do you propose to offer the supplementary exhibits?

DR. SEIDL: I hope that I will be able to submit the other exhibits in about two weeks. The delay was because various affidavits, particularly those of the witnesses whom I mentioned before, have not yet been received.

THE PRESIDENT: Counsel may offer the exhibits when they are prepared.

DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, Your Honors, now I turn to the case of the defendant Dr. Fritz Fischer, and ask the Court to call the defendant Dr. Fritz Fischer to the witness stand.

THE PRESIDENT: The defendant Dr. Fritz Fischer will take the witness stand.

JUDGE SEBRING: You will raise your hand and he sworn:

I swear by God, the Almighty and Omniscient, that I will sneak the pure truth and will withhold and add nothing.

(The witness repeated the oath.)

JUDGE SEBRING: Be seated.

DIRECT EXAMINATION OF DEFENDANT FRITZ FISCHER

BY DR. SEIDL:

Q: Witness, you were born on the 5th of October, 1912, in Berlin. Is that true?

A: Yes.

Q: The prosecution has already submitted an affidavit in which your career is briefly described. This is Document No. 559, which the prosecution submitted as Exhibit 26. To supplement this affidavit will you please give more information about your examination and your education.

A: I was born in 1912 in Berlin — in a suburb of Berlin. I was brought up in a middle class home. My parents considered themselves quiet people, that is, their desire was mainly to do their duty in life through work. They had no intention and ambition of playing any role in public life. Ay family descended from peasants in Mark Brandenburg. Mark Brandenburg is the area around the city of Berlin, the core of the Prussian state.

The training which I had at heme on the basis of several hundred years corresponds to this background, It gave the individual the duties of industry in daily life and it was limited by the belief in the authorities appointed by God, the authorities of the King, and the Government, and the State. The King, State, and Government were the units which were absolutely united with the concept of law.

This is how my father lived his life. He served under three Kaisers. He was a loyal citizen of the German Republic. He was also a loyal citizen of the Third Reich. He never took any part in politics and he also gave me this advice. Neither before nor after 1933 did he belong to any political party or any political organization. This basic attitude of a loyal citizen without any political function, who sees more than a duty in loyalty more a virtue — based on the belief in the authority of the State which as an institution has the highest right — this is the spirit in which I was brought up.

Q: Then you went to school in Berlin and high school?

A: Yes. From 1919 to 1931 I attended Real gymnasium.

Q: In 1931 you graduated?

A: In 1931 I graduated and studied at the University of Berlin, Leipzig, Bonn, and Hamburg, I studied medicine. In 1936 in Hamburg I took the medical state examination.

Q: During your studies did you have any special field of interest?

A: During my studies I had great interest and great pleasure in medicine, primarily for the branch which developed next to purely clinics — the step to modern medicine is the border areas between natural sciences and medicine. At that time without discussing it I had the hope of becoming a university teacher some day in the field of surgery. To get a followed and accurate basis for this work as a student and as a clinician I studied pathological anatomy. And, at least two years of my studies, during vacation I worked in pathological anatomy. After taking my state examination for these considerations, keeping surgery as an aim, I chose pathological anatomy for my training for the next few years. And, for that purpose I went to the Rudolf Virchow Institute in Berlin, the Pathological Institute of the greatest German hospital, where 2500 autopsies were performed annually by eight doctors.

Q: What position did you hold at the outbreak of the war?

A: In 1936, as I said, I took the state examination. In 1939, in in spring, I was first assistant at the Pathological Institute.

During this tine, especially during the summer, in the absence of the Director of the Institute I was in charge of the autopsy work and the microscopic histological work, individually representing the chief.

Q: Now, I should like to interrupt you and consider the question: What rule did politics play in your life before the outbreak of the war?

A: In 1933 I was twenty years old. At the time I belonged to a Student Sport Corporation and had taken no part in politics whatever.

Q: Did you belong to any party?

A: I did not belong to any party or any political youth movement. My only activity was in sports and since I belonged to the youth group around Stefan George that was quite far removed from the ideals of national socialism. In 1934 I was in the same position as before. The entire intensification of life since, since Hitler had taken over the government, impressed me. A regulation was issued in 1934 that the students at the universities could matriculate only if they belonged to some national socialist organization. I should like to emphasize that I was not an opponent at the time. I considered myself a member of level and tolerant circles but I did not strive for admission to the Party. I submitted to this regulation because in the first place I had the idea the State wanted it, and because I considered the National Socialist organization as a State Youth organization. For these considerations in 1934 in Bonn on the Rhine I joined the General-SS, or rather I joined one of these organizations. I had participated in a riding and driving training and I participated in sports. For that reason in this I wanted to have the opportunity to continue this activity and since there was the organization in Bonn which had a riding group — it was the General-SS, without considering convenience I joined this organization. That was the General-SS.

Q: The witness Dr. Leibbrant said that the study of medicine in the Third. Reich was shortened, and that students had to be members of Student League and Hitler Youth. He also said that politically active elements had to visit the Fuehrer school at Altrese.

Did you belong to any of these organizations? Did you take work at this Fuehrer school in Altrese?

A: No. I did not consider myself an active political element at the time or later. I was a member of the General SS and, thus in a certain sense, I had the attribute with which I could get through the difficulties of public life. I did not belong to any other National Socialist organization until 1939. In 1939 the General SS asked me to join the Party and I did so. I did not belong to the League of Students or the Hitler Youth, and I was not in the Fuehrer school at Altrese. My studies were not shortened. I took the prescribed number of semesters, which was eleven, and a complete year of intern work.

Q: How was the service in the SS or in the Reitersturm which you joined?

A: I was there only for a year and then, for reasons of training, I went to Berlin, Bonn and Leipzig, and then I served in the General SS not in the Reitersturm because there was none. It will be difficult to describe this service because it was completely colorless. It was a mixture of sport with a certain character of military sport. It was, in some ways, like a veterans' organization.

Q: Then, why did you not leave the SS since you were not satisfied with the service?

A: The situation was that in order to fulfill the demands in public life — and I was a Government employee, an employee of the City of Berlin — one had to have some sort of evidence that one was a member of a Nations Socialist organization. That was one reason. The more comfortable reason. And in the second place I always saw a certain justification for this service in the practical solution for the social question the question of social differences. It was actually so that within the residential district, after the organization was set up, the members of the various classes met on a basis of friendship in this service and the members of the laborers' class were next to jurists, and the merchant next to artisans, and in this realization of the overcoming of class differences I saw a definitely positive task which made it possible for me to bear this uninteresting service — and I must add that, at this time, the service consisted of two or three times a month attending such a meeting and there were no further claims.

Q: When and under what circumstances did you join the Waffen-SS?

A: In my civilian position in the Virchow Hospital in Berlin I had so much to do and had such a definite direction of training that I had never got around to doing military service. Consequently, at the beginning of the war I was not in the Wehrmacht. In November, 1939, I was ordered to report as a member of the General who had not yet done military service. I was ordered to report to the Waffen-SS. At the time I was not particularly happy about this. My friends were in the Wehrmacht and I would have preferred to go there. I went to the magistrate of the City of Berlin with this letter and I went to the draft board with it, but I was told that this had the effect of law and that it was my duty to report in Berlin-Lichterfelde, as instructed. At the time there was a saying that everyone had to do his duty where he was assigned, and I was satisfied with this.

Q: Then you were a reservist in the Waffen-SS?

A: Yes, I was a reservist in the Waffen-SS.

Q: What training did you have in the Waffen-SS?

A: At first, I was in the barracks of Bodyguard Adolf Hitler, at Lichterfelde, and then I came to the recruit training regiment in Stralsund and I was given the normal training for three months by the Waffen-SS.

Q: Then how did you come to Hohenlychen?

A: After the end of this training I was given an order to transfer — an order to report to Hohenlychen at the SS Hospital.

Q: What impression did you have at the time of the hospitals at Hohenlychen?

A: I had already known the names of the hospitals at Hohenlychen. They played a very important role in the German sport movement and among German sport enthusiasts and, in the second place, they were among those hospitals which supplied operation material for the Rudolf Virchow Pathological Institute for histological examinations.

For that reason, I knew this name and the name of the chief physician. In the spring of 1940, I arrived there for the first time. I was quite astonished at what I found there. This clinic differed in many respects from the picture which I had been accustomed to see at clinics. First of all, it was situated and constructed differently. It was on a lake, in the woods, on a hill, and consisted of fifteen large handsome buildings, and between the buildings there were large expanses of lawn, flower beds and sport places. But the first impression, in addition to this, was the attitude of the patients in contrast to the somewhat lethargic attitude of the patients in the usual city hospitals. It is difficult for me today to remember all this. Much of it is over-shadowed, but it is not exaggerating to say that the patients were distinguished because, in spite of the severe injuries, most of them looked happy, and since I had a relatively critical attitude from having worked in the pathological anatomy I was interested in finding out the secret of the reputation of Hohenlychen. First, I was an assistant doctor at a large septic station and I saw there that the treatment was conducted on the same principle as we had been taught at the university clinic. That did not seem to be a good explanation in the beginning until I discovered that the most important thing at Hohenlychen was that orthodox methods of school medicine, which were known to us, here too were used with special intensity according to a special scheme. After a few months I was in a position to see what these principles were, and these principles did not include any principle that was not preached elsewhere. It was the doctrine of Lexer in the treatment of inflammation, the doctrine of the classical orthopedists Lange and Brandes in the treatment by immobilization and plaster cast, and, the only specific thing originated by Gebhardt, the special type of exercise in which there was an exact balance between rest and active exercise. But the other specific thing was that all doctors acted according to these rules which Gebhardt had laid down.

While otherwise individual choice of assistants is rather high, here everything was coordinated in such a way that the treatment at Station 1 was, in principle and in effect, the same as that of Station 15. And there was another thing that I noticed. That was the deliberate emphasis of nursing care. The Chief Physician, Professor Gebhardt, told us at that time that the essential thing is not operating technique because that could be learned. The most important thing the primary thing was the nursing care given the individual patient who must have the feeling that he is given personal care by his doctor. And these rules were centralized and directed by the man at the head of this clinic.

Q: What impression did you have, at the time, of the personality of the head of this clinic, the defendant Dr. Gebhardt? Was he a strong personality?

A: The impressions which I had of Gebhardt were composed of impressions of him in his work as a doctor and a scientist, and of the impression which I had of his effect on the patients. I realized that this concept of a special reputation of Hohenlychen among German patients came exclusively from Gebhardt's personality as a doctor. Gebhardt was such a strong man that he transferred this strength of character to his assistants and to his patients. Or, rather, to this patients and to his assistants, in that order. I shall never forget how, of the many thousands of patients whom I saw go through Hohenlychen, the eyes of hundreds were on him in confidence which I had never yet seen devoted to a doctor. I frequently had an opportunity to see it when I was the assistant and visited the patients together with him. He was aware of this strength of his personality and this was an essential factor in his treatment. For this reason, he, who was the head of a thousand bed clinic, had set up an arrangement which I was unaccustomed to.

Hohenlychen was about 100 kilometers from Berlin and the only connection was by railroad. Therefore, three times a day the patients arrived. During the times when patients were arriving, Gebhardt collected his assistants around him and days after day received the patients so that every single patient who was admitted, through an especially skillful organization, cane into the clinic and was immediately under the eyes of the Chief, who listed to his complaints, who decided the course of the treatment, who gave instructions to the assistants for the treatment, and who then always had time to shake hands with the patient and express his assurance that the case would develop favorably. If I analyze those things now, afterwards, they may seen rather bald. For the person who came to the clinic for help it was certainly a deep human experience that he did not have to wait hours or days, even during the war, until someone took an interest in him — and that it was not just someone who took an interest in him but it was the famous head of the clinic who came to him in the first hour to ask about his complaint, to examine him, and to express his good wishes.

Q: You spoke of a special position of Hohenlychen. What did you mean?

A: Well, there was another thing I noticed especially at the time in contrast to other clinics. I had admitted patients at the Virchow Hospital in Berlin frequently and there was something that almost hurt me and that impressed me greatly that was that the first subject of discussion, the first contact between a patient and the doctor, was always, unfortunately, the question of the financial settlement. First of all it had be established who would pay the expenses and that was something that did not exist at Hohenlychen. There the patients arrived I should like to say, before they realized it they were being et mined, they were being x-rayed, they were examined by the Chief and it is certainly not wrong if I say that some of them were operated on and were in bed for 8 or 10 days before they managed to say that they had financial difficulties and that they did not knew hew they were going to pay.

Then we assistants only had to mention it to the Chief, who was always ready and always able to help them and support them. Thereby the whole clinical experience was given a special breadth and a special centralization on the medical personality of Gebhardt. If I had the impression of a special position, this was due to Gebhardt's announcement to the assistants that Hohenlychen was a clinic which had a special position in Germany. He collected the assistant doctors and all the associates around himself frequently and, at such discussions he said this. He said that the clinic had to keep an especially high level and that therefore we had an especially great duty and he expected very much from us. He took no consideration of any free tine. He had us work from 7:00 in the morning until late at night and he did not recognize Saturday and Sunday. He opposed attempts to get a certain free time. He opposed that very energetically but in this demand for clinical obedience he always appealed to the duty of the doctor to help and to be interested only in medical care. He never asked us with a harshness which we could not understand. He merely appealed to higher moral virtue and aims within our profession. The clinic held a high level oven during the war and it was often said that service at Hohenlychen was just as important as service with the divisions, because this clinic, for example, had special tasks regarding the sickness of very high and indispensable personalities. In the second place, this impression was given to me, who came from the middle class and the highest personality I had ever seen during peace times was perhaps the mayor of my home town— this impression of a special position was given to me because the patients held the highest positions in the society of Germany and other countries.

I knew that a king of a European country was one of the patients. I know and had seen that members of many European royal families were patients. International financial magnates were patients. More than half of all German ministers, foreign ministers, foreign ambassadors and international artists came to Hohenlychen. That, too, was because they wanted to be treated by Gebhardt and Gebhardt projected this duty and this honor to all his clinic, that is, to Hohenlychen.

These are the reasons why I came to the opinion that Hohenlychen had a special position. The next thing that impressed me was that those patients of high positions in society were together with the very poor men who formed the majority of the patients. I read once of very famous clinics abroad which prepared to care for especially rich people. In these clinics rich people were [illegible] and then in contrast to that there were proletariat clinics or charitable clinics for poor people. That was in a form which I had never been able to imagine. That was united in Hohenlychen. In Ward 1, where I was the doctor, there were these whom I mentioned first; in War 15, where I was also the doctor for a long time, there were wounded workers from the highway or minors, or wounded from the army in Ward 7, and Waffen-SS in Ward 7A. Everything was together there and we assistants worked in all wards and all the clinics and know the work in all of them. We know that Private Ward 1 differed from Ward 15 because the minister had a private room and a bathroom and perhaps an anteroom and a telephone and that the soldier was in the same room with 4 other people; but we had to tell ourselves repeatedly that there was no difference whatever in the treatment. Therefore I had a deep respect for the personality of Gebhardt and had enormous confidence in him on the basis of the work which he did there, which had been going on for 10 years.

Q: Were you especially impressed in the sense of National Socialist ideology or SS ideology at Hohenlychen?

A: No. In a certain sense Hohenlychen was extremely tolerant. There was no doubt it was definitely loyal to the State. I know Hohenlychen only during the war. The duty of loyalty to the State was a matter of course but no one felt obligated to the Party and to the National Socialist ideology. I may note in passing that religious services were held in both denominations in the chapel until the collapse and that the priests of both religions came to teach religion to the sick children; but that was not the import thing. I should like to say there was enough room at Hohenlychen for catholic thinking and for protestant thinking and from the time when I examined the ambulatory patients I knew that Jews and half-Jews were also treated there and attracted no attention That was the thing which I noticed. Gebhardt sometimes formulate that and said that we are living the National Socialism here of Gebhardt type.

Q: How long did you stay in Hohenlychen and then where did you go?

A: I stayed in Hohenlychen during 1940 and the first half of 1941, until the outbreak of the Russian Campaign. Then I was transferred to the 1st SS Division, the Body Guard Alolf Hitler, and was made the doctor of the 1st Battalion of this Division.

Q: This Division was in the campaign against Russia?

A: Yes, this Division took part in the campaign against Russia. It was in the southern sector of the Eastern Front.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal now will be in recess.

(A recess was taken)