1947-06-10, #2: Doctors' Trial (late morning)
THE MARSHAL: Persons in the courtroom please find their seats.
The Tribunal is again in session.
DR. WILHELM BEIGLBOECK — Resumed
MR. HARDY: Dr. Beiglboeck, when did you join the National-Socialist Party?
JUDGE SEBRING: Are you now proceeding to examine?
MR. HARDY: Yes.
JUDGE SEBRING: May we ask a question or two?
BY JUDGE SEBRING:
Q: Witness, will you please turn to your Exhibit No. 32 in Beiglboeck Document Book 2, the document having been admitted in evidence this day as Beiglboeck's Exhibit No. 21. I refer in particular to the chart which has been made by Fritz Pillwein. Do you have it before you?
A: Yes.
Q: Can you say whether this chart is a correct representation of the wards, blocks and streets shown and whether or not it is correctly draw to scale?
A: I can not say anything exactly about the scale from memory. These were big barracks. Where is says, "Entrance to Hospital," that was where one came into the hospital. That was between two long barracks as are shown here.
Q: How wide would you say that sick bay entry was?
A: I estimate that it was about seven meters from the camp road until this line which Pillwein put in here at the end of his remark, "Entrance to Hospital," I estimate that was about seven meters.
Q: How wide would you estimate the main corridor shown on the chart?
A: How long you mean?
Q: The width, not the length.
A: Your Honor, you mean this main corridor that goes through the hospital? It was about three and a half or four meters wide.
Q: The space that is indicated on this chart as being the "Block street" through which bodies were wheeled to the morgue and finally to the crematory, was how wide in your estimation?
A: It was the same width as the main corridor of the hospital. As far as I remember, it was the same width.
Q: Was it covered over as a part of a building or was it an open street?
A: It was between two barracks. This was a covered hall and between the barracks.
Q: Is that also true of the passageway which is designated on this chart in English as the "Main corridor?" Was it also covered?
A: Yes. Between the next two barracks there were open courtyards which also are called "Streets" here. This next street, the middle I can't say. I was never there, between the last two barracks where it says "Outer Court of the Experimental Station of Rascher" — that was at that time Ploetner — that was an open courtyard.
Q: Would you estimate that these "Block Streets" or "Courtyard" between the barracks were about the same width as the barracks themselves?
A: At least.
Q: The barrack building or room in which you conducted your experiments, what would you say was the overall width of that barrack room or building?
A: I estimate that it was eight meters wide and at least ten meters long.
Q: Then from the nearest point of the outside wall of your sea water experimental station to the outside wall of the station where Vieweg was stationed would be, in your opinion, about what distance?
A: That was also a courtyard. It was before the Ploetner station, about five meters wide.
Q: Would it be your best judgement then that all of these barracks shown here are about 8 meters in width, and that the yards or streets between them were about 5 meters in width; is that correct?
A: Approximately, I can't give you definite figures, of course, but I remember that the distance was approximately the same as the width of the barracks themselves — it could be one meter or more or less, I do not know, I cannot remember so exactly.
Q: Then, from the place where your Sea Water Experiments were carried on, you were approximately 5 to 7 meters from the Malaria Station in which Vieweg was stationed, and you were about the same distance in the opposite direction from the Malaria Station which is shown on the chart as Block 3?
A: That this was the Malaria Station I did not know at the time. I thought it was part of the hospital at the time. Where it says "Vieweg," that was a laboratory, I know that, a laboratory for blood tests. I was never in either of these places. I can only testify as to what I saw through the window of my station. I saw that over there, where it says "Vieweg" there were microscopes and laboratory tests were carried out. Between my experimental station and where it says Malaria Station, Block 3, there were sometimes prisoners in the court yard. I considered that they were hospital patients.
Q: Now, then, the area, this is an area marked on the chart as "Court yard for Dr. Rascher's experimental station," where, in relation to that court yard, was Dr. Rascher's experimental station?
A: Dr. Rascher was not there any more when I was in Dachau. As far as I can judge from what has been said here, he must have been dead already.
I knew this as the "Ploetner Station". And, in this laboratory which is at the end of the chart, I had a small room as a laboratory. Next to this room there was a big laboratory in which Ploetner worked. And, those laboratory rooms were shut off by a solid wall from the rooms where it says, "Personnel Rooms of the Experimental Station." I believe that the prisoners who worked for Ploetner also came from this direction, apparently they lived there.
Q: One more question. I understood you to say that as one of the rewards for volunteering for your experiments, the experimental subjects were to be given an additional or supplemental ration which was the same in quality and quantity as the SS food ration; was that inducement held out to them? Not the SS food ration but the Luftwaffe food ration?
A: Before and after the experiments, they were to get the Luftwaffe rations. The policy which I asked for them after the experiments was that they should not be put back to work, yet, and that they would be given additional food from the hospital for, sick people, and for persons who did extra-heavy work, there were additional rations, and I demanded these additional rations for my experimental subjects, and the Chief Physician promised them to me.
Q: Can you state in what particulars the additional food rations which were to be given to your experimental subjects differed from the regular Wehrmacht food rations given to the soldiers in the field?
A: I cannot say, exactly. The patients in the hospital, I know this only from hearsay, I did not see this for myself, I only know the food that my nurses got. The hospital patients got milk, butter and bread and, in addition, as far as I remember, they got half a loaf of Wehrmacht bread in the morning, the same kind of bread that was issued in the Wehrmacht; then for breakfast they had either margarine or marmalade and ersatz coffee; for lunch they had a one dish; and for supper, they had some kind of soup and bread, or on several days I saw that they got sausage and cheese and margarine and bread, one of these things each time.
I would estimate that this food of the medical students was about 2000 calories; that is a rough estimate.
Q: I believe you said at the beginning of your direct examination that you made some effort to have these experiments carried out in your own laboratory or institute; is that correct?
A: Yes.
Q: Are you of the opinion that you could have found enough volunteers outside a concentration camp to have carried out your experiments in your own laboratory or institute?
A: I am convinced that if one had gone to a unit of the German Wehrmacht and had said we need so and so many people for an experiment, who wants to volunteer, that I would have got enough soldiers. Certainly it was not that nobody would have volunteered; it was just that because of the existing orders, no one would be released for such a thing. But, under peace time conditions or less stringent orders, I am sure I would have got enough soldiers.
Q: What did you tell your experimental subjects by way of preliminary explanation concerning the details of the experiments they were about to undergo?
A: I told them about the following: It was to be decided whether sea water could be made drinkable or not; and, how one should conduct oneself if in distress at sea; then I described to them, more or less, what the conditions at sea distress are; that the flyer crashes at sea with his life boat drifting along, and has to go along without water or drink sea water. I told them that there were two processes which would make sea water drinkable; I told them that we had two processes which were to be tested. I also told them that drinking sea water or salt water is very unpleasant. And, that I could guarantee only the one group which got some water that they would not be thirsty, and all the other groups would be thirsty. And, then I told them that during this time they would have very little food or perhaps none at all; that they would be hungry, too. I told them that their thirst would be very unpleasant. I made that very clear to them, and then I asked them whether they would be willing to do this, and saying that this was an experiment in the interest of rescuing people; that by taking this unpleasantness on themselves they might help many other people. And, I told them that if they cooperate and the experiment went off well, they would get cigarettes from me according to a system of premiums. And, furthermore, that I would try to get alleviations of their sentences for them. What I had in mind was what had been promised to me by the SS. I had been explicitly told that these people would not have to go through the experiments for nothing; that they would get certain considerations. Two people told me that explicitly.
Q: Who were these people who told you that?
A: One was the adjutant of the camp commandant. The other was Dr. Ploetner.
Q: Did they explain in detail what concessions were to be given these concentration camp volunteers?
A: They told me there was light work in the camp. For instance many prisoners as far as I saw were just keeping the rooms in order-the billets of the SS guards and the officers had to be straightened up in the morning, etc. This work was very coveted. It was much easier than work in the factories, for instance, or construction work. They were to be assigned to such light work for a considerable period And, then I know that many of them wanted certain alterations for their relatives. I remember that one of my gypsies wanted his father or some relative who was also a prisoner to be released. I passed this request on. Then, as I said, part of the gypsies were former members of the Wehrmacht and they told me there were certain prospects for members of the Wehrmacht to be released more easily. And, I reported their names and had their cases reviewed.
Q: Now, then, what wise did you tell your experimental subjects about the experiments? I am talking about prior to the time that you actually began the experiments.
A: I told them that I would divide them into various groups. That one group would receive water that had been processed and the others would go without food or drink and others would get sea water. I told them one group would get one-half as much as the other. One would get one-half liter and the other one liter a day. I also pointed out the group that got nothing and the group that got sea water would have the most thirst, that they would have the most to put up with. And, I made the distribution in this way by picking out the strongest people for these groups. And then I told them at the beginning that we had to make a number of tests, that urine had to be collected and that blood would be taken from them for examination.
That is roughly the explanation that I gave them.
Q: Is that all you told them?
A: Then I asked them whether they were willing under these circumstances, emphasizing the fact that they would suffer from thirst whether they wanted to participate in the experiments. They had a chance to think it over and they came back and said, "Yes, we want to participate." And I said, "If you are willing now then you have to keep the conditions of the experiments later."
Q: Did you tell them anything else?
A: I can't remember anything else at the moment.
Q: You have introduced in evidence Beiglboeck Document No. 32 in Beiglboeck Document Book II, which has been received in evidence by the Tribunal as Beiglboeck Exhibit No. 21. It is an affidavit or a statement made by one Fritz Pillwein, I believe. You introduce that exhibit as part of your evidence in the case and as a part of your defense, do you?
A: Yes.
Q: On page 2 of the original exhibit which appears on page 118 of the English text is the answer directed to the affiant as follows:
What do you know about the citizenship of the experimental subjects?
And as a part of the answer of the affiant appears this statement:
The experimental subjects in most cases spoke the gypsy dialect. Many of them were obviously of Slavic origin.
Is that correct?
A: Yes. Among the gypsies there were some who came from Hungary or the Hungarian border. I don't know how many, three or four perhaps. Then there was a larger group which came from near Bratislava. I don't know exactly where but they often spoke Slovakian. There were many of them who did not have any definite residence. I talked to the gypsies quite a bit during the course of the experiments. I know part were German, part of them from Austria, one was, I believe, from Romania.
I believe, a few of them, I don't know exactly how many at the moment, were from Hungary, from the Austrian Hungarian border, and a group came from Slovakia. I am unable to give any details about the citizenship — anything definite. I didn't see their papers myself and I must say that at the time I didn't consider this question vital.
Q: Appearing in the same answer to the same question is this statement:
I did not see the identification papers, however, as this was quite impossible in a concentration camp and as I did not ask them anything pertaining thereto. I therefore cannot make any exact statement regarding the citizenship of the individual gypsies.
And then I direct your attention to this statement made by the affiant Pillwein
I did not ask them because the gypsies were very primitive people and some of them did not even know their own birthdates.
Did you observe the some thing regarding these people as did the affiant, your witness Fritz Pillwein?
A: I don't remember asking them for their date of birth myself. It is, of course, possible that someone said "I don't know exactly." That is an answer that one often gets from a gypsy. As I know, earlier in Austria we often had occasion at the clinic to treat gypsies and their personal data was not always very accurate.
Q: Well, I ask you this, and this is the matter about which I am interested, was it as apparent to you as it was to your witness Pillwein that the gypsies were very primitive people, and I take it were in many particulars in a sense very ignorant or poorly educated people? Did you observe that in your dealings with these people?
A: I have already said that some of these gypsies were the kind of people that go about the country in carts, didn't have any regular school training. Many of them even if they had a definite residence didn't have regular schooling which could be called even average. That is no doubt true that their education was pretty bad but they weren't dumb.
Q: No further questions.
BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q: Witness, referring to the chart again, the same one which is a portion, an annex, to your Exhibit No. 21, you referred—used the word—barracks. Now, to you is a barracks a room in a larger building or is it one separate independent building under its own roof?
A: If I understood the question correctly by barracks we mean wooden buildings. There were in Germany quite a number of barrack settlements, mostly for Wehrmacht labor service workers homes, etc.
Q: I understand that, witness. But, now referring to your chart. Did the room where your sea water experiments were carried on, was that under a common roof with other adjoining rooms or was it separate and had its own roof?
A: In this barrack where my experimental station was, there were three rooms altogether. A smaller room which stuck out into the big room. Then there was a smaller room where it says "museum". I don't know that personally. That was locked. I was never in there, and, toward the hospital main entrance, there was the wash room and the toilet. That was all under one roof and that was a barrack — a separate building.
Q: And that roof that covered your barrack did not cover any other building?
A: No, no Between my barrack and the other barracks there were open spaces, uncovered court yards.
Q: That answers my question.
Counsel may proceed.
CROSS EXAMINATION
BY MR. HARDY:
Q: Professor Beiglboeck, when did you join the NSDAP?
A: In 1933, I joined the NSDAP before the Party was prohibited in Austria, and then I joined again in 1938 after the Anschluss.
Q: Did you belong to the SS?
A: No, never.
Q: The SA?
A: Yes.
Q: Did you belong to any National Socialist Physician's Associations?
A: Yes, 1938.
Q: Did you belong to any other NSDAP organization?
A: The League of Lecturers. Nothing else.
Q: Did you attend the school at Altrese?
A: No. I was never there.
Q: Dr. Beiglboeck, do you know Hans Popper?
A: Yes.
Q: Who is he?
A: Popper was a student of Eppinger's. He was at Eppinger's clinic as assistant.
Q: Was he Eppinger's immediate assistant?
A: Yes, of course.
Q: Did you succeed him?
A: Did succeed him? I was an assistant together with him.
Q: Well, who was the first assistant? You or Popper?
A: The first assistant was neither Popper nor I.
Q: Where is Popper now? Do you Know?
A: I know that he went to America.
Q: What was your rank in the Luftwaffe again, witness?
A: I was Stabsarzt [Staff Surgeon] at the end. That is, Captain.
Q: When did you enter the Luftwaffe?
A: 1941.
Q: When did you enter the SA?
A: 1934.
Q: Did you stay in the Luftwaffe until liberation?
Q: I remained in the Luftwaffe until the end of the war, yes.
A: When did you resign from the SA?
A: I did not resign from the SA. I 1939 I stopped my SA service.
Q: What was your rank in the SA?
A: At the end I was Obersturmbannfuehrer [Lieutenant Colonel]. That was a honorary rank.
Q: What were your duties in the Luftwaffe. From the time when you went to the Luftwaffe were you on active duty as a Luftwaffe physician?
A: First, I was a medical soldier. I got my basic training like any recruit and after basic training, I was used as a doctor and got the normal promotions just like any one else.
Q: Did you wear the uniform at all times.
A: Of course, I always were the uniform unless I went out in civilian clothes.
Q: Now, in 1944, you received orders to report to the Medical Inspectorate in Berlin. Do you remember the exact date?
A: No, I cannot remember the exact date. It was in the second half of June, I believe. I believe from the letter I saw here where I write that I have been on this job since the 1st of July that it must have been in the last few days of June that I got the order.
Q: Then, when you reported to Berlin you were informed that you had been recommended by Professor Eppinger to perform the sea water experiments. Is that correct?
A: Yes, that's right.
Q: Who informed you to that effect?
A: Becker-Freyseng informed me.
Q: Did all your dealings take place in Berlin with Becker-Freyseng or was somebody else instrumental in instructing you as to how you would perform the experiments at Dachau?
A: Most of the talks about the experiment that I had were with Becker-Freyseng. I received the official order from Merz whom I believe was an Oberfeldarzt [Senior Medical Officer] at the time, and once I reported to Professor Schroeder briefly.
Q: When did you speak to Schroeder?
A: I cannot give you the date exactly. I had been in Berlin for some time. Professor Schroeder was not there until two or three days later, I believe, and he came to the Medical Inspectorate for about one day and I reported to him, but then I never saw him again until I had come back from Dachau.
Q: Immediately upon being informed and instructed by Becker-Freyseng as to your assignment, did you then ask for a release?
A: In my direct examination I said that immediately afterwards I asked that I not participate in these experiments or else be allowed to carry them out in Tarvisio or at the clinic at Vienna or some place else — not in a concentration camp. Then, when I learned that was impossible, as I said in my direct examination, I asked that some one else be put in my place. These are the efforts that I made to get out of it. And then I wrote to my chief physician that he should ask for me to be sent back so I could get out of these experiments.
Q: Becker-Freyseng informed you that it was too late to get out of it, is that is?
A: Yes.
Q: Were your misgivings based on the fact that you had a horror of working in a concentration camp?
A: Yes.
Q: No other reasons?
A: No.
Q: You told Eppinger about your misgivings, didn't you?
A: Yes.
Q: Did you tell Schroeder about them?
A: No, because Merz had already refused definitely. Merz said, "This is an order. You have to carry it out. We can't exchange you", and then I saw there was no point in trying to do anything more.
Q: Why didn't you just refuse to carry out the order?
A: Became I had been given a military order.
Q: And you were afraid that something would happen to your family, as you said in direct examination?
A: I was afraid if I said, after I had inquired whether it was a military order, and then said "I won't carry it out", I was afraid that I would be called to account for refusal to obey orders. That is customary.
Q: You said that, in direct examination, you thought if you had refused to carry out this order that something may come back on your family. That your mother and father may suffer from it. Is that correct?
A: My mother and father would not have suffered. My father, because he was no longer alive, and my mother wouldn't have suffered either, but I would probably have been brought to trial and my wife and children would have suffered from that.
Q: Was Himmler involved in these experiments?
A: I know nothing about Himmler in connection with these experiments or, at least, didn't until this trial, except that Himmler had to give permission for the experiments to be carried out in Dachau. He had been asked to give this permission.
Q: Well now, if you had refused the order and had been brought to trial, just what would have happened to your wife and child?
A: That depends on how the court martial turned out. It would have been possible for me to be condemned to death for refusing to obey an order and then my wife and children would have been helpless.
Q: Is that all?
A: That would have been enough for me, personally?
Q: Would they have been physically harmed?
A: If you consider a death sentence bodily harm, yes.
Q: Well, yesterday you stated on direct examination, very explicitly that if you had refused to carry out these orders that something would have happened to your family. Now, just what would have happened to your family?
A: If I testified that something would have happened to my family, which I don't believe, then I must have expressed myself badly. I believe I said that out of consideration for my family I had to obey this order. I meant that my family would suffer indirectly.
Q: Now, you stated that your father was not alive at this time. Is that right?
A: Yes, that's right.
Q: Was your mother alive?
A: Yes.
Q: Did you have a step-father?
A: No.
Q: Who do you refer to in this letter that you have introduced into evidence dated the 12th of August, 1944, when you wrote from Dachau and addressed it to "Dear Pa and Ma"?
A: Those were my in-laws. The parents of my wife.
Q: I see. Thank You.
Now, when you were instructed by Becker-Freyseng concerning the experiments just what did he tell you the purpose of the experiments were to be briefly, Doctor?
A: He told me that the purpose of these experiments was first of all to decide whether the Berka method was a useful method to avoid damage from sea water, that is to remove the salt from sea water in certain form; secondly, whether we want to test our other method at the same time. The control group which was to get fresh water originally, we will use the Schaefer method for them; thirdly, we did have especially the Schaefer method group introduced because lack of raw material and we thought the Berka method would not do what people expected of it. In this case if one method could not be introduced because of raw material lack, and the other because of ineffectiveness it would be important to decide whether it would be better to go without water or drink sea water.
Q: Then the circumstance as outlined to you was merely to test the efficacy of Schaefer and Berka's methods?
A: Among other things, yes, but the first question that would come up and which had to be decided, was that according to the witnesses at the time it was probably that neither of the methods could be introduced. One because there was not silver available and the other because the medical inspectorates expected that it would not be effected, and the question was whether to go without water or rather drink sea water.
Q: Well, was the Berka method effective enough to reduce damage to the human system?
A: You mean theoretically or according to the results of my investigation?
Q: Well, first theoretically and then according to the results of your investigations; at that time, was it believed that is prior to the time you instituted the experiments, was it believed that the Berka method was effective enough to reduce damage to the human system?
A: I explained in my direct examination what opinions were held. There were two different ideas, one which Mr. Schafer represented with so much nerve was that the Berka motion had no effect at all because it had no chemical reaction with the salt, and I believed everyone realized this with the exception of Berka himself, and perhaps Mr. Sirany. The second idea was one represented by Eppinger that it had no chemical effect but perhaps a physiological effect, and therefore it would be somewhat effective if it was possible to introduce the Schaefer method which might justify a recommendation of the other method.
Q: Well, then the purpose of the experiments was to find out whether or not the Berka method would be effective enough to remove damage to the human system, that was the purpose of testing the Berka method?
A: The purpose of the test was to determine whether under the influence of the Berka drug there would be other reactions of the body than when sea water alone was used. One does not have to have any damage. Physiological tests will be enough or analysis to arrive at such conclusion.
Q: Then what was the purpose of using the Schaefer method in your experiments?
A: The Schaefer method was included in these experiments for an external reason, if I understand correctly. I can't determine the motives here. It would be better to ask Becker-Freyseng that. It was necessary, of course, and was intended that there should be a group which would have the same food conditions, but would get enough water. As far as I recall this group originally was to get drinking water, and I believe I remember that Becker-Freyseng said we might take the Schaefer method right away.
At least the technical office will then have the proof that Schaefer water is drinkable.
Q: Did you consider this whole program to be superfluous work?
A: I considered it superfluous if one has a good method to quarrel for months about introducing a less effective method. I considered it superfluous to build a laboratory from the scratch in 1944 while on one hand a laboratory already, but it seemed to me worth determining whether better results could be given by sea water than by going without sea water. This question was not solved then. At the same time we worked on it and when I was forced to work on it was an urgent problem elsewhere and was solved and better than I did.
Q: Will you tell us why the program was classified secret?
A: I believe I can tell you that. I can't tell you with certainty, but I think it was important the program was secret. Moreover in Germany at this time there was very little that was not secret.
Q: It was classified top secret, wasn't it?
A: I believe it was secret, but I can't say for sure.
Q: Was it customary in the Luftwaffe for an officer working on a secret matter to communicate the secret mater to persons not engaged in that same work?
A: No not as far as the secrecy was concerned. I didn't tell anybody what the Schaefer process was. I didn't know. I don't know today. It was not secret that we were investigating it. Nobody told me it was secret.
Q: You mean it wasn't secret you were working at Dachau on this work at Dachau?
A: Not in no way. At least I was not given any such instructions.
Q: You thought that you could freely communicate to Jaeger or anyone else that you were going to experiment on human beings at Dachau to test the efficacy of two sea wacer methods?
A: I was convinced of it.
Q: Well, I note in Exhibit 7, Biegelbock Exhibit No. 7, which is page 26 of the Document book I, which is a letter to Dr. Steinbauer from Dr. Spiess, in the second paragraph the last two sentences states as follows:
Upon my remark that these experiments surely were Wehrmacht experiments and therefore secret, they were not intended for everyone else. Professor Dr. Eppinger replied, "One could frankly speak about them as no case of death had occurred with the sea water experiments, and also that no experimental person had suffered any serious consequences during the experiment, so that there was no reason to make a secret of it."
Isn't it evident from that passage it was necessary to keep the entire program a secret prior to the execution thereof, and the documents here in evidence are classified secret, not the methods?
A: Whether this undertaking was classified secret or not or what degree of secrecy it was given, I can't tell you, I am not an expert on that subject. In my Wehrmacht service I did mostly medical work and my service was administrative, and I am not familiar with the other side of it. If Dr. Spiess told Eppinger it was a Wehrmacht matter that possibly meant that Wehrmacht matters were on general principle kept secret, but they were not treated as secret as is shown by the fact that Eppinger who was an officer himself talked, about it.
Anyway Eppinger was a Lt. Colonel or something like it, and he didn't see any reason for making a secret of it. He talked about it everywhere. That is probably the reason. One didn't talk about Wehrmacht matters. It was not customary. If one knew there was a new weapon or something, one didn't go around and tell everyone how it was constructed. All the Wehrmacht matters were clothed with a certain secrecy. That was probably the assumption of Dr. Spiess when she asked him about it. The wording, by the way, isn't very much to the point.
Q: Now prior to the time you proceeded to Dachau to start your experimental program you stated on direct examination you remained in Berlin and stayed a couple of weeks; while in Berlin did you have an opportunity to confer with Schaefer?
A: No.
Q: Did you contact Schaefer?
A: No.
Q: Did you talk to Berka?
A: I got in touch with Berka later for a very minor reason. It was that we had certain equipment, test tubes, etc. from his laboratory in Vienna which we had borrowed.
Q: Would you repeat that answer again. I don't think I understood you correctly?
A: I said my connection with Berka or rather the fact that I got in touch with Berka had a very minor reason which was that I had borrowed equipment from Berka's laboratory.
Q: Then you didn't have any extensive consultations with either Berka or Schaefer prior to your actual experiments?
A: Not orally, no, but Sirany's experiments on the one hand and Schaefer's experiments on the other hand I had reported on. It was originally intended I would not get in touch with either or do nothing in order not to endanger the objectivity of the experiments.
Q: What was that again?
A: It was intended that I would not get in touch with either of them in order to not endanger my objectivity, so that I would not be influenced either against or for either of the methods.
Q: Well, was this a competition between the Schaefer and Berka method and you were the judge?
A: I was not the judge. I was the one who had the misfortune to be ordered to carry out experiments which were decided upon at the meeting of 25 May by various civilian and military celebrities, but Berka obviously had the feeling that there was some rivalry. I believe that was the psychological reason why this was demanded.
Q: Well, then if you would have consulted with Schaefer and Berka would that have effected the objectivity of the experiment?
A: I did not talk to Schaefer, I did not consult with Berka either. When I got these things from Berka from his laboratory, I did talk to him, but I did not get any advise from him. I just happened to be there and what influence that had on the outcome of the experiment, I cannot say.
Q: Well is it true that perhaps Berka had more political influence than Schaefer?
A: I know nothing about any political influence of Berka. I believe he was originally a Social Democrat.
Q: I don't mean his party affiliations, I mean his particular influence with the people who were to determine whether or not the Berka method was to be installed or whether or not the Schaefer method was to be installed; did it appear to you from your discussion with Becker-Freyseng in connection with the experiments, that Berka had the most influence?
A: I am convinced that the technical office was behind Berka. Berka was a technical man himself and belonged to the technical office. The technical office made Berka's cause its own and I believe that Berka had quite considerable influence with the important men in the technical office. At least that was my assumption, that was the impression I had.
Q: Would Becker-Freyseng have been medically qualified to have conducted these experiments?
A: You are asking the wrong person, but I imagine so.
Q: Would Professor Eppinger have been medically qualified to perform these experiments?
A: Yes, I am convinced that he would, have.
Q: Then, Schaefer?
A: I am informed about Mr. Schaefer's training only more or less from what I heard here. As far as I know, he was primarily a laboratory worker, a medical chemist.
Q: Could Berka have conducted the experiments?
A: Berka was an Engineer, a technical chemist. I don't believe that experiments can be placed in the hands of a technical chemist.
Q: Then, this question could not have been determined unless you had been employed to determine it; is that correct?
A: If you mean that I was the only person in the world who could have decided this question, then no. I must say there could have been twenty, thirty or more internists in Germany who would have been able to carry out these experiments. That I just happened to have the misfortune, was a unfortunate coincidence.
Q: Did you ever experiment on human beings prior to your experiments with sea-water at the Dachau concentration camp?
A: I must ask you what you mean by experiments on human beings. Of course, we had quite a number of metabolism tests which we carried out at the clinic.
Q: I think you are better qualified to determine what an experiment on human beings is than I. Did you ever carry out experiments on human beings before in the sense we are discussing them before the Tribunal; that is what I mean?
A: That is why I asked you to tell me what you meant by human experiments. I never performed, a dangerous experiment on a human being, including the sea-water experiments.
Q: Well did you ever perform any experiments on human beings prior to the sea-water experiments at Dachau?
A: I have already said that at the clinic I performed a number of metabolism experiments, if you can call them experiments. For example we were interested in how Vitamin B effects the elimination of table salt or potassium salt in the stomach or what the medical influence is to Vitamin so and so, that is the kind of tests we made at the clinic and I performed a number of such tests.
Q: Were the experimental subjects used volunteers?
A: Yes, of course.
Q: Did you have to follow any particular procedure to secure those volunteers?
A: At the clinic?
Q: Yes.
A: The procedure was that I asked, do you want to help? We are interested in finding out certain things if we give an artificial injection or this drug, we want to find out about table salt research. We don't have to go into detail, you will have to keep on a certain diet. Every day you will get a certain injection and we will take the urine and blood samples.
Then the person would say yes or no. If he said yes, then it was done. If he said, no, I did not continue and did not do it, I merely went to the next men who said yes.
Q: Who are the people you refer to; do you mean the clinical employees or were they outsiders?
A: Some of them were the employees of the clinic, or doctors or medical, students. Some of them were therapeutical experiments, for example, we could not decide whether the theoretical effect on a heart patient was similar to the effects we received by testing it on a healthy person and similar tests must be made on patients to see if with certain diseases that is true and effective.
Q: Did you get their consent in writing?
A: No.
Q: Was it necessary to determine the age of a person before you used them in such an experiment?
A: Yes, of course.
Q: How old did they have to be?
A: It was not necessary to know the date of birth, but it was important to know if the person was twenty or eighty.
Q: Well, did you have to know whether or not the person was over the age of twenty-one?
A: On the whole, we had only people over twenty-one at the clinic.
Q: Could you have used a person under twenty-one years of age if they volunteered?
A: That I consider as certain.
Q: A person under twenty one years of age is considered to be a minor in Germany; or they not?
A: Yes that may be, but for example I know well that such tests are performed in children's clinics too.
Q: It is necessary, if a person is a minor, to get written permission of the parents or guardians; is it not under the German law?
A: That is a legal question and I cannot answer it. In the tests we performed at the clinic, we never got any written permission from an eighteen year old, whether it was a stomach tumor which was to be given a new treatment. We did not discuss whether written permission was received from the parents or guardians.
Q: Was there ever certain operations which cannot be performed in German medicine unless you have written permission; this is not a legal problem but a legal medical problem which every doctor is familiar with; is it not?
A: Yes, when performing such major operations, every surgeon gets the statement of consent and he has it signed.
Q: I see. Well, suppose, the person is under twenty-one years of age and a major operation must be performed; who signs the permission, the parents do they not?
A: It is possible, yes.
Q: Well, don't you know, Doctor?
A: I am not a surgeon.
Q: Suppose you had some particular function to carry out which required the consent of the subject and the subject was under twenty-one years of age; would you carry out the duty of a physician without having first received the consent of the parents or would you merely accept the consent of a child?
A: This question never confronted me, because in the hospitals in Vienna when the patient was admitted such questions were discussed with the parents or with the patient and settled. I would like to grant you that in general practice if one was to take any measures to which this law applies, then you would have to ask the parents if it is a minor.
Q: Then, you never bothered considering the problem of consent of a person under twenty-one years of age during your entire career as a medical man; is that correct, until today?
A: At the moment somebody was admitted to the clinic, he signed his consent.
Q: That is a child will come in and sign his consent or will a parent accompany the child and sign their consent?
A: Then the parents signed.
MR. HARDY: This is a good breaking point, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will be in recess, until one thirty o'clock.
(A recess was taken until 1330 hours.)