1947-03-27, #1: Doctors' Trial (early morning)

Official Transcript of the American Military Tribunal I in the matter of the United States of America, against Karl Brandt, et al, defendants, sitting at Nurnberg, Germany, on 27 March 1947, 0930, Justice Beals presiding.

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

The Honorable, the Judges of Military Tribunal I.

Military Tribunal I 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 PRESIDENT: May it please your Honor, all defendants are present in the court.

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

Counsel may proceed.

JOACHIM MRUGOWSKY — Resumed DIRECT EXAMINATION (Continued)

BY DR. FLEMMING (Counsel for the Defendant Mrugowsky):

Q: Before I enter upon a discussion of the typhus experiments in Buchenwald I should like to ask a few questions about Dr. Ding. Dr. Ding came from your institute, did he not?

A: Yes, I knew him as a result of an inquiry I directed to troop doctors of the Waffen-SS and he volunteered for work in the field of hygiene and bacteriology. He was an instructor in the SS-Doctor's Academy in Graz, and at the Hygiene Institute of the university there he received his first bacteriological training. When he began in my institute he had already received his basic training and could developed himself further under me.

Q: Did you know him personally very well?

A: Of course, I saw him and spoke to him very often on technical specialized matters but it would be false for me to say that I knew him well or was in his close confidence.

That was not the case. I didn't like his nature on the whole.

Q: What was your impression of his character?

A: Various witnesses of the prosecution have already made statements on this point. For instance, Dr. Kogon said that one could easily be deceived as to the doctor; when he was still a concentration camp doctor in Buchenwald his former secretary could corroborate that in a book that he wrote before the war in Buchenwald. I myself say Ding was a person in whom one could rely and in whom one could have confidence. But through Kogon's testimony and through careful study of the material presented by the prosecution in this proceeding I have had to come to the conclusion that this assumption on my part was not correct. Kogon for instance said that even the most secret letters, which according to regulations had to be written by an officer himself, had been turned over to him as an inmate with the order that he should make a few typographical errors so that it could be pretended as if he himself had made the letter. The unreliability of character that was manifested in this small trait is probably characteristic of his whole character. But, of course, at the time I knew nothing of it. Otherwise the given characteristics that Kogon stated are correct. Ding was intelligent, industrious, with pathologically ambition, very vain, who liked to take credit for what others had done. He liked to mention his association with people in high offices on every occasion, whether it was a suitable one or not.

Q: We have already said what Ding's specialized bacteriological training was. I would like to ask now what were his other qualifications as a doctor?

A: He had an average medical training. His knowledge of therapy and diagnostics were average. He was very skilful in the laboratory and could handle scientific problems.

Q: What was his additional training in the field of typhus?

A: When the thought arose in our institute of manufacturing our own typhus vaccine for own use, I sent him to Professor Gildemeister in the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin in order to acquaint himself with the who e field of typhus bacteria and to have him learn how these bacillae are bred in chicken eggs.

Subsequently, he was at the Pasteur Institute to learn more about how this vaccine is produced, a method which we wanted to use for our own purposes.

Q: Do you consider this additional training as sufficient?

A: This training was, of course, not sufficient to be a fully trained specialist. That can only be achieved by years of experience, but it certainly was sufficient to form a basis for acquiring one's own experience in the field. His practical activity corresponded to this training, and he was not thought of as to be employed in any special research work at first. He was given several fully trained bacteriologists who were prisoners to help him, one of whom was one of the best specialists in Poland in the field of typhus, Professor Fleck from Lemberg, who was to support him in his work. In this teaming up before his training was altogether sufficient.

Q: I ask you now to describe to the court how these typhus experiments in Buchenwald came about. What were the possibilities of controlling typhus at the end of 1941?

A: After the end of the first world war typhus control was made entirely dependent upon delousing. A person with typhus who has no lice on him cannot pass the disease on. The louse is the necessary perquisite for passing typhus from one person to another. If I can destroy the path of contagion by destroying the carrier, namely, the louse, then I must have success in controlling typhus. In the first world war this control method was sufficient. At the beginning of the Russian campaign in this second world war, however, typhus appeared at the [illegible] among the civil population and in some of our camps, and it appeared with such elementary virulence that this delousing method was no longer adequate. This was the first great disappointment in the medical field. Vaccination for typhus was only theoretically known in Germany at that time. We had no experience of our own to any extent.

Q: Where enough vaccines on hand?

A: No, the only place where they could be produced was a special research and manufacturing institute of the Army in Krakow which was set up there after the Polish campaign. There a special typhus vaccine was produced which was made from the viscera of infected lice. This process is extremely difficult because every louse had to be infected personally with a compressed air needle and to vaccinate one person you had to make use of the viscera of 120 lice. The capacity of this institute was not even sufficient to cover the needs of the Army. Industry, on the other hand, or rather the development of this vaccine by industry as only in the beginning stages of laboratory research.

Here two main methods were known, the method just described, in which lice were used, was not employed, but the germs were bred in chicken eggs, and here there were two German methods which will play a role later on in the trial, the Otto Wehlrat and the Gildemeister-Haagen methods. Greater production of these vaccines was hoped for by industry through these methods. In foreign countries there was still another method which involved the artificial infection of guinea pigs, rabbits, mice, or dogs in the nose, which induced a specific infection of the lungs and the infected lung of the animal was used for the vaccine. To this group of vaccines developed by this method which will play a role later in this testimony, belong also the French method of Gireud, the Roumanian method of Compiesch and Zuta, and a few others.

Q: That was the method which industry used in Germany

A: The method with chicken eggs.

Q: Why did you not leave the production of this vaccine up to industry?

A: Industrial production had not reached sufficient proportions at that time. On the other hand there was a prodigious need of typhus vaccines by every one and it could be seen that in the next few months that need could not be covered by industry alone. We ourselves had, for the troops and for the concentration camps a great requirement also. Consequently, it was clear from the very beginning that industry could not cover this need and I was at that time of the opinion which I still hold today, that the only solution for these difficulties was our own manufacturing of these vaccines for our own purpose. We did not choose the chicken egg method in Germany because the food situation there was becoming worse from month to month and because we knew that in the use of this method we had to count on a loss of fifty to eighty per-cent of the eggs used which could not be used in the manufacturing of vaccine. Consequently, I suggested that Grawitz use the French Giroud method, and Grawitz was agreed to this.

Q: Why were other vaccines tested other than those made from rabbits lungs, if it had been decided from the beginning to manufacture own vaccines from rabbit lungs?

A: In Germany we knew at that tine from our own experience only of the Weigle vaccine from lice. We knew nothing of the effectiveness of the vaccine from chicken eggs. We hoped the vaccine would be efficacious but we did not know then, and it is, of course, comprehensible that in a fight to control typhus epidemics we should be most reluctant to rely on unknown weapons. That is to say, at the beginning we simply had to make use of industrial production, hence the necessity of knowing how effective these vaccines were.

Q: How was this testing to be carried out?

A: This testing was first to be carried out by animal experiments, such as were customary in industry, and in other institutes, and secondly these really untested vaccines were to be used among a population infected with typhus and it was our idea to vaccinate Germans who came from an area free of infection and who were going into the East where typhus was rampant, with this vaccine, and then to keep an eye on these people and compare the relative efficiency of this vaccine and other vaccines in protecting them from catching typhus.

Q: Why was that not done?

A: It was in part done, but another line of development caught up with and passed it. I myself suggested this method of comparative investigation of epidemics to Grawitz. It was submitted to the Eastern Ministry, which dealt with Occupied Russian Territory. At the end of 1941 there was another conference with Grawitz. He asked me at that time how long it would take before we knew how effective these vaccines were and I answered him that it wbuld take a few months, but that one could not count on any certain knowledge before the end of the next year 1942/43, so he asked me if there were no other ways that night possibly shorten this length of time. I answered that the animal experiments and the testing in endangered groups of population took suck a length of time that the process could not be shortened without endangering the likelihood of any success at all.

Grawitz was most discontent to hear this. He had again been asked by Himmler when some positive results would be coming in. And Grawitz was a fellow who did not like to give any negative answer to his boss. Thus the bad relations between him and Himmler played a roll in this matter. The conversations became more and more excited because Grawitz finally got to the point of saying that a way simply had to be found to shorten the period of testing because it was quite impossible for him to give such a negative report to Himmler and finally he asked me whether the following way might not be feasible. It would decidedly shorten the length of time if these experiments were not carried out on animals but on human beings. Thus these human beings were first to be vaccinated and subsequently artificially infected. This thought, which came to me for the first time, outraged me. I told him that, of course, this procedure would shorten the length of time necessary because the discrepancy between animal and human being experiments is that the animal experiments must be repeated several times in order for the results of the experiment to be transferable to human beings, for as everyone knows a guinea pig is not a human being and in the very decisive points it reacts much differently from the way a human being reacts. Grawitz said, "What do you want? That is the only way that we can consider now. We are confronted by a dire necessity and I believe we must follow this if we see a chance to do so." I answered him that he should not understand my statement to mean that, because that way was impossible, namely, to artificially infect healthy human beings simply to test a vaccine because the same results could, although somewhat more slowly, be achieved by other means. He said, "Then you do admit that we must simply passively accept this loss of time and also accept the responsibility for the deaths that will result as a consequence of this time we are losing among the population infected with typhus?" I told him that was something which those people would have to take as their fate; I myself could see no other way. And I told him my attitude — that human life was sacred — an attitude which I had set down a few years previously in a book and that, of course, I could and would not act contrary to my own convictions and beliefs.

Grawitz was not satisfied with this. He concluded this conference, which was among the most dramatic conferences I have ever had in my whole life, with the statement that he would submit this matter to our common chief, Himmler, and would tell me later what happened. I then found out that a few days later he actually did meet Himmler somehow, and when he told me of this talk with Himmler he told me specially that he had informed Himmler of his and my points of view and that Himmler had decided against my point of view. He had been so kind to me as not to commission me with these experiments but on Grawitz's suggestion Ding, who had already been trained in the field of typhus, was to be used for this purpose.

Q: Mr. President, I refer now to Mrugowsky Document 38, which I put in evidence yesterday as Mrugowsky Exhibit 13. I should like to read number 1 to 3 on page 48 of the document book. This is the affidavit of Mrugowsky's former secretary, Susanne Dumont, page 48:

1. I was employed as Mrugowsky's secretary from 1 March 1939 to April 1945. I dealt with the greater part of his correspondence. Mrugowsky also often talked to me about the various matters connected with the correspondence in order that I should be informed in case of queries during his absence.

When I started work there, the Hygiene Institute of the Waffen SS was in the process of formation. I therefore took part in the whole development of the Institute and have personal knowledge of many details.

2. Because of the numerous cases of typhus in the concentration camps and among the Waffen SS troops during the winter of 1941/42 Mrugowsky decided to manufacture typhus vaccine for the concentration camps and for the Waffen SS in the Hygiene Institute, in order to be inde pendent of the industrial supplies.

One day Mrugowsky told me that he had spoken to Grawitz about the intention to manufacture typhus vaccine and that a department of the Hygiene Institute was to be formed at Buchenwald for the manufacture of this vaccine.

The process was to be carried out in Buchenwald so that it would not be endangered by air raids on Berlin. Also it was easier to obtain fodder there for the animals necessary for the tests and there was also a sufficient number of experts at Buchenwald to lock after the animals and to manufacture the vaccine. I also heard then that Dr. Ding would be in charge of the vaccine production and that he was to learn under Professor Gildemeister in the Robert Koch Institute the process of manufacturing typhus vaccine which the professor had developed.

I know from Dr. Ding that he worked for some time in the Robert Koch Institute with Gildemeister in order to learn the Gildemeister method of producing typhus vaccine.

3. Some time after Ding had been sent to the Robert Koch Institute to learn the manufacture of the vaccine, Mrugowsky told me that Grawitz had asked him when his vaccine manufacture would be far enough advanced for large quantities of vaccine to be available for inoculations. He replied that this would take at least six months because the animal tests had to be repeated before workable results were achieved and because even then the vaccine would have to mature. Grawitz was annoyed at the long delay and suggested that the animal tests be dispensed with and prisoners be used for the tests instead. Mrugowsky grumbled at the time about Grawitz and said that he had only suggested the tests on human beings because he did not want to have to report to Himmler that the vaccine for the inoculations would not be available for approximately another six months. He told me he had rejected in the presence of Grawitz the suggestion of testing with prisoners and had quoted his book "Medical Ethics" in which he had stated his opinion about such tests.

A short time later on his way back from seeing Grawitz again, Mrugowsky told me that Himmler had decreed that prisoners should be used for the vaccine tests. He mentioned in this connection that Grawitz would very likely pass Himmler's order directly on to Ding.

Now I should like to read from Document No. 39, page 59 of the document book. This is the affidavit of Mrs. Hildegard Pfaffinger, who was assistant secretary and proxy of Susanne Dumont. Page 59, Mrugowsky Document 39. I wish to give this Exhibit Mrugowsky 16. Frau Pfaffinger says, after the customary introduction:

From about October, 1940, to March, 1942, I was a shorthand typist, and subsequently from January, 1944, until April, 1945, as assistant secretary to Professor Dr. Mrugowsky at the Hygiene Institute of the Waffen-SS. During the above periods, as well as during the intervening period, I used to do the work of the first secretary, Miss Susanne Dumont, when she was absent due to sickness or vacation. Through those activities I was able to gain an extensive insight into the correspondence and operation of the Hygiene Institute of the Waffen-SS. I still can remember that one day my co-worker Dumont told me at the institute that the "old man", meaning our chief, Professor Dr. Mrugowsky, had another argument with Grawitz and an advocated his divergent opinion against Grawitz. Grawitz had asked him to conduct the experiments with typhus vaccine not on animals but on prisoners because the experiments on animals would take too much time. But the chief had rejected that emphatically as contrary to his conception of professional ethics. My co-worker, Susanne Dumont, and I were happy when hearing of the upright attitude of our chief since our conception of medical ethics was the same.

Now from Document Book 1-A which has just been submitted to the Tribunal, I should like to read the affidavit of co-Defendant Dr. Rose, Document Mrugowsky 48. I should like to submit it as Mrugowsky Exhibit 17, page 159 in the document book 1-A. After the ordinary usual introduction, Dr. Rose says:

My controversy with Dr. Ding and Professor Dr. Schreiber during the third meeting of the consulting physicians occurred in a morning session of the session hygiene and tropical hygiene.

I will begin again at the beginning the microphone is not working:

My controversy with Dr. Ding and Professor Dr. Schreiber during the third meeting of the consulting physicians occurred in a morning session of the section hygiene and tropical hygiene.

THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, on what page of Document Book 1-A is this affidavit to be found?

DR. FLEMMING: 159 of Document Book 1-A which was just submitted to the Tribunal.

THE PRESIDENT: That is the affidavit of Gerhard Rose?

DR. FLEMING: That is correct, Document No. 48, Mrugowsky Exhibit No. 17. Should I begin again from the beginning, Your Honor?

THE PRESIDENT: No.

DR. FLEMING: (Reading)

During the lunch recess several listeners of the Ding lecture came to me in order to discuss with me my attack on these experiments. The majority agreed to my opinion. A not unimportant minority, however, regarded my point of view as wrong, whereby the latter counted upon the assurance given by Dr. Ding during the discussion that the experimental subjects were criminals who were sentenced to death.

I cannot remember for sure who spoke for and who against it. I remember only the person of Dr. Mrugowsky because I regarded him as Ding's superior in every respect. Dr. Mrugowsky belonged to these who agreed to my opinion. Naturally, today, after nearly four years, I do not remember the exact [illegible]; however, I remember the fact itself. He said approximately that he had on principle the same scruples as I had, and that he, therefore, voiced them prior to the experiments to Dr. Grawitz. The latter discussed that with Himmler and there a decision against him had been reached. He stated that he, too, would have preferred, in spite of the results achieved, if the SS would not have had to carry out the experiments.

BY DR. FLEMMING:

Q: Were the available vaccines on hand known as to their effectiveness?

A: No, only the Weigl vaccine was known so far as its effectiveness is concerned, but the vaccines manufactured in the Reich were not. The difficulty with the Weigl vaccine was not purely technical in the way that I have just described, but was also an organizational difficulty because two types of lice breeds were necessary in the institute. On the one hand ordinary lice had to be bred, and also infected lice had to be bred, and both of them had to be fed, but the only thing they could feed on were human beings. That's where the whole herd of lice feeders was necessary to keep these lice alive. But we don't know lice in Germany, our population is not used to these little animals, consequently, it would have been very difficult to find men who would be willing to act as food for lice.

Regarding the chicken egg process, on the other hand, we did not know its effectiveness. Later in the year 1943 it was not so well known as was the Weigl vaccine. That can be seen from a document to be found in Professor Handloser's document book and which is signed by Professor Otto in Frankfurt, the man who knows most about typhus in all of Europe.

Q: Now this Handloser document — this Handloser Document No. 44-A, Handloser Exhibit 14-A. I now submit to you the affidavit to be found in Document Book 12, the affidavit that Dr. Ding drew up before his death, Document NO-257, Exhibit 283, Document Book No. 12, page 9 in the German document book.

THE PRESIDETE: What is the number of that exhibit?

DR. FLEMMING: NO-257, Exhibit No. 283. It is the third document in this document book 12 page 9 of the German document book.

BY DR. FLEMMING:

Q: I draw your attention to Roman Numeral II on the second page of this affidavit. There it says:

In February, 1942, the carrying out of the experiments on the effectiveness of typhus vaccine was ordered. I (namely, Dr. Ding) was appointed to carry out these experiments. Since my office was in Berlin, I had to have a deputy in Buchenwald during my absence. For this post the Reichsarzt-SS Dr. Grawitz, in agreement with the leading doctor of the concentration camps Lolling, named the SS Obersturmfuehrer Dr. Hoven as station doctor at Buchenwald.

Would you like to say anything about this statement of Ding's?

A: This statement of Ding's reinforces what I said, namely, that Grawitz appointed Ding directly for this job. It can also be soon from this that Grawitz appointed a deputy, about whose existence, by the way, I knew nothing. I did not know Dr. Hoven, and made his acquaintance only a week before his own arrest in 1943, whereas this statement refers to a period of time a year and a half earlier than that. Let me also point out that from the next page of this document, page 3, it is to be seen that for the experiments, the RSHA and the chief of concentration camps had freed inmates from concentration camps, namely, habitual criminals who had been condemned to death, which were used by Dr. Balachowski makes the same statement, who was working as inmate in Block 50 in Buchenwald.

Q: I come now to the conference which took place on the 29th of December, 1941, according to Ding's diary, at which it supposedly was decided to carry out experiments on human beings. The Prosecution has in the meantime submitted Document 1315, Prosecution Exhibit 454, and 1321 Prosecution Exhibit No. 453, the two documents form one unified document apparently. I shall show you this document. It is not in a specific document book but was submitted subsequently. It can be seen from this document that on 29 December 1941 there was a conference on the typhus problem at the Reich Ministry of the Interior, and the participants in this conference were quite different from those whom Ding stated.

Do you know whether on 29 December 1941 there was, besides this conference in the Reich Ministry of the Interior, another conference on typhus, and let me point out right away that Dietsch, in his affidavit, Document 1314, Prosecution Exhibit 433, stated that aside from the persons mentioned by Ding also Rose, Ding and Schreiber supposedly took part in the conference?

A: Such a conference as is here described in Ding's diary on 29 December 1941, which Handloser, Conti, Reiter, Gildemeister and I are said to have attended, did not take place as here described. Not did I know that Ding ever took part in such a conference. I, at any rate, did not, so far as I remember, take him along. That on 29 December 1941 there was a conference in the Reich Ministry of the Interior — it was, as can be seen from Prosecution Document 1315, a conference between members of the Reich Ministry of the Interior with industrialists — was not known to me. Nor is it said that I took part in that. Only in the interrogations that preceded this trial did I find out that this conference ever took place at all. On the other hand, it is true that at some conference or other which also dealt with methods of controlling typhus I met Professor Rose but, as I remember, this was a purely army matter which has nothing to do with the problems her under discussion but discussed de-lousing. That is all I have to say about that.

A: When did you find out about this conference on 29 December 1941 in the Reich Ministry of the Interior?

A: That this conference took place in the Reich Ministry of the Interior I only discovered from seeing this Prosecution Document 1315.

Q: But according to this Prosecution Document, in this conference it was decided that Dr. Demnitz of the Lehring works was to get in touch with to test typhus vaccines. Now, according to that, you must have known about the fact that this conference took place. Please read the passage in question

A: On page 2 of Document 1315, Prosecution Exhibit 454, under (b) it says that:

the vaccine now being manufactured by the Behring Works, which is extracted from chicken eggs, is to be tested as to its efficacy. For this purpose Dr. Demnitz will get in touch with SS Obersturmbannfuehrer Mrugowsky.

Of course, I know Dr. Demnitz. He is the technical manager of the Behring Works. He had considerable experience in foreign lands, Brazil, and know a great deal about the production of vaccine to control all sorts of diseases in human beings and animals. But it was only now that I have become acquainted with this file note at the presentation of this document. I did not know that at that conference it was agreed that Demnitz should get in touch with me, and he did not get in touch with me.

Q: I submit now to the Tribunal, Mrugowsky Document 62. This is an affidavit on the part of Dr. Demnitz, in Document Book No. 1, page 64. Please let me submit it as Mrugowsky Exhibit #18.

MR. HARDY: May it please Your Honors, this document is an affidavit with several German documents attached thereto. Prior to any admission of this document into evidence, the prosecution would like to examine the original German documents that are attached to this affidavit. Then, if they are in due order, I will refrain from objecting, but if they are not German documents which should be submitted here I will tender an objection. I would like to see them prior to admission.

THE PRESIDENT: Can Counsel for the prosecution examine those German documents during the morning recess or the noon recess?

DR. FLEMMING: They are accessible to him right now.

MR. HARDY: Your Honor, attached to these affidavits are two letters which presumed to be documents dated in the year 1942. Dr. Flemming has here, as his original exhibit, a carbon copy which is certified to by the Burgomeister as being a true copy of the original German document. Now, as during the course of the presentation of the Prosecution's case-in-chief, and throughout, we have, in every instance, introduced either photostatic copies of German documents or the original German documents, I don't see how it is possible for the Tribunal or the Prosecution to ascertain the authenticity of this document without a more elaborate certificate, or a photostatic copy of the original, or the original. This is certainly not in compliance with the regulations that we have followed to date. Therefore, I object to the admission of these two carbon copies will are copies of the letter and not a photostatic or the original itself.

I would like to pass them up to the Tribunal to look them over.

DR. FLEMMING: Mr. President, these are certified copies which have been taken from the files of the Behring Works and the authenticity of which has been certified by the Mayor. The Tribunal has permitted that affidavits shall be certified either by a notary or, in small places where there is no notary public, can be certified by the Mayor. It is my opinion that, in the same way, the Mayor then is also authorized to certify the correctness of copies of documents which are contained in the files of firms and of which we defense counsel can not get the original. Also, in small localities like Marbach near Marburg, where the Behring Works are, it is not possible to make photostatic copies of such documents. The only possibility that we have to use these documents in our defense is to present certified copies, the correctness of which is certified by a person whom the Tribunal has accepted as competent to do so. The Prosecution can not hold it against this that they have submitted photostats when they haven't submitted the originals, because the Prosecution is in a position, with its wonderful equipment, to make photostatic copies of anything it wants copies of. This opportunity, however, is not available to us in small country communities, and consequently it would simply cut us off from presenting evidence if you asked that we produce the originals or photostats of documents that are in the files of business firms. If the Mayor certifies that the copy is a verbatim copy I really can not see why its authenticity should be substantiated more by the introduction of a photostat instead of a verbatim copy. That could only have a purpose if they were documents in long hand in which the handwriting had to be identified for some reason or other, but never in the case of documents written on a typewriter.

MR. HARDY: Your Honor, I submit that I am not objecting to the affidavit which precedes the documents, this affidavit of Dr. Demnitz, I do not object to that at all. I am objecting to these two documents — letters and orders attached thereto on vaccines, simply because these are not copies of the original. They are not carbon copies made at the same time. These are copies which were made on February 28, 1947.

Now, whether this is a copy of the original document — it is so certified — but I think with the spirit of the case as we have been going along, the prosecution has introduced the German documents, that this does not comply with the regulations of the Tribunal, and, therefore, I do not see why we should be in a position to admit this into evidence. Now, in the case of its being certified by a notary or burgomeister, which is true of the affidavits, at any time if we doubt the authenticity of a document we can call in the document or call in a person in respect to an affidavit, but, in this instance, we do not even have the original German document. It seems to me that defense counsel could borrow it for a period of a week or two weeks in every instance to avoid this problem.

DR. FLEMMING: Mr. President, if the objection of the prosecution is sustained, then my only alternative would be to call Dr. Demnitz with his files to Nuernberg as a witness. That a mayor does not certify anything that is incorrect —

THE PRESIDENT: Does the Secretary General have a copy — a Germany copy — of Mrugowsky's Document Book No. 1?

JUDGE SEBRING: Dr. Flemming, will you refer to page 2 of the Demnitz affidavit and read beginning at the bottom of that page, beginning with the words. "Furthermore, on 3 February 1942".

DR. FLEMMING: That I shall read in a different context later.

JUDGE SEBRING: I want you to read it now because it appears that this affidavit is not complete.

DR. FLEMMING: Shall I read it aloud?

JUDGE SEBRING: Just that small portion. I don't think the English document is completed.

DR. FLEMMING: (Reading)

Furthermore, on 3 February 1942 eighteen bottles ing each contain/25 ccm typhus vaccine were forwarded to SS Hauptsturmfuehrer Dr. Ding, Berlin Knesebeckstrasse 43/44.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you.

DR. FLEMMING: Mr. President, may I ask once more to look whether it isn't already with the Bench. My secretary tells me that she gave the originals to the representative of the Secretary General and that he passed it on to the Bench.

THE PRESIDENT: The Court will be in recess for a few moments so that the matter may be investigated.

(A recess was taken.)