Statement
Regine Lebensfeldová-Hofstädterová,
Bratislava.
It was a hot and humid July night. Already during the afternoon
they’re had been a certain degree of unrest in the streets of Bratislava. The rumour
was another transport.
We were collected from my house and on the next
day were put into train carriages. In
one carriage, there are 60 people, men,
women, healthy and unhealthy, whether young or old, everybody was put into the wagons.
1000 people were next to each other and the train
began to move. Heat and a bad, pestilent air made breathing difficult. We didn’t know where
our journey was taking us. The carriages were completely closed, no light came on, no air or water was available
to us. Finally, after a two-day journey, tired and exhausted, we arrived on the 25.7.1942 in an awful, empty field. The carriages were opened by high-ranking members of
the SS. We were told to get out.
First, us women had to get out of the carriages, then the men. We
could hear the loud shouting of the SS
hordes. Come on, come on, this is your final destination
. And so, it was
either obey or die; that was our welcome. Us women
were put to one side, of course only the young ones, maximum 35 years old. The rest were
thrown into vans like bags of flour, 60 to 80 per van. Before we were taken somewhere else,
we saw the other vans leave. New vans were filled and driven away. Then was our turn: we
were put in a line, counted, and made to march. A member of the
SS, SS-Schütze was our
supervisor. With rifles and pistols, he showed us the way to our new site. On the way to the
camp the supervisor shouted and so this is how you left Egypt, and here you will die
anyway
, those of us who heard this, broke out into a cold sweat. On the way, we met
men in striped uniforms, accompanied by SS
with carabiners in the hands. Some of them might have shouted to us whether we had any food,
but their fear of death was too great. As we approached the camp,
we saw the large inscription Arbeit macht frei
(Work
makes you free), but still we didn’t know where we were being brought to. Columns of men
walking along the long, terrible streets in the camp.
The tired and drawn faces of the men
solved for us that puzzle.
In was a morning roll call in the women’s
camp as we arrived. Thousands of bald-headed people
with a Russian military uniforms turned to look at us as we entered. In that moment,
we thought, that we were in a Russian
prisoner
of war camp. From the individual rows, I could hear muffled calls, I was recognised
by several acquaintances from my own town. If you have anything with you, throw it
away.
A few people from the rows
of the roll call even put their hands out, in order to take some bread or whatever from
us, for the hunger was eating away at them. It was a terrible sight. Immediately
afterwards, all of the columns left the camp to go to work.
We were led to a bathroom, undressed, shaved. They called it delousing. We were given new clothes. A linen dress and wooden shoes, that was all the clothes I had, everything that I had on.
We received a small flannel, that they called a hand towel, to share between three people. 93 freshly shaved, bathed, and newly dressed, we were led to a muster point. SS-Hauptscharführer Schwartz, the camp leader and commander, reprimanded the newly arrived cohort. After registration was carried out in the afternoon, we were allowed into the block, which would now be our new home.
The head female supervisor, Marie Mandel, also didn’t miss the opportunity,
for us to be lined up again. It offered her amusing moments to insult us. Mistbiene
(garbage bees) was her special term.
That’s how we spent the first day in the camp. On the next day, we went to work. Five hours we had to stand in roll call, until the supervisors Gertrude Weniger, Brandl, Erika Clauss, Marie Hasse, Berta Franz and others, agreed to pronounce roll call over and let us leave the rows.
And so, every day was the same for us. On 9.8.1942, the women’s camp in Auschwitz was moved to Birkenau. Here the plague have reached full bloom; illnesses, hunger, and abuse were all part of the daily regime. In the blocks there was no light, water was not to be found in the whole camp, and the people had to go to the toilet in the streets between the barracks.
Hundreds of corpses lay on the streets, without being cleared away. Transports arrived hourly. Because there was no space, the old prisoners were sent to the crematorium. There was daily selections, which the camp leaders (SS-Obersturmführer Müller und Frau Marie Mandel) carried out with the camp doctor Dr. Rohde (SS-Obersturmführer) and ended with a balance of least 400 to 600 human lives.
On 21.9.1942, office workers were being looked for in the
camp. Me and about nine of the female
prisoners made themselves known. We were tested in the German language and sent
over to the political department of the camp. Here in the
office, the motto was silence
. At the beginning of our work there we were made aware,
that if we said a word about the work done in the office of the camp, then we would
have to pay for this with our lives.
This department was actually nothing different than the Gestapo. For example, the name of anybody who entered the camp, normal cases of death, those male and female prisoners who were on a list for the crematorium. Post that was meant for the individual prisoners was registered and distributed. Investigations of any sort, for example, interrogations in court cases, tax, investigations by the Gestapo, all carried out here and noted in the files. These investigations were carried out by individual SS members in the political department, which was under the jurisdiction of the camp commandant. The leading figures of the Kommandantur where Höss, Baer and later Liebehenschel,the leader of the political department was SS-Untersturmführer Ernst GRANNER 1Note 1: Head of the Political Department was Maximilian Grabner from Vienna. was from Vienna and his successor was SS-Untersturmführer Schurz, also from Vienna. The work in this department was divided amongst the SS members according to the circumstances. I worked for a while in the registry, where all deaths certified by a doctor were recorded in the files. These files were then forwarded to the registry office for further processing, for a certificate to be produced and for family members to be informed, and forwarded to the Reich Security Headquarters in Berlin. Such notificaions were not sent to the family members of Jewish prisoners. The head of this registry office was SS-Hauptscharführer Karatensen (from Stuttgart or Mannheim).
The terror of the camp overall, was SS-Oberscharführer Willy Boger, from Stuttgart, head of the escape department. He butchered in cold blood those prisoners who had fled and been caught when they tried to defend themselves with a lie, about why they are tried to escape. It was common, such prisoners were locked immediately in the bunker, and after several days, on Boger’s command, that they would be beaten to death. Afterwards, the political department would receive the message, that the prisoner in question had died from some disease or another. Usually, the cause of
We were well aware of what this meant, but we had to keep our countenance. We heard it from him often, that he would make us ready for a happy ascension to heaven, if we said a word about it.
It was peculiarity of his, that Boger made sure that his staff received better food and clothing than others. He didn’t ask his typists to be involved in the so-called secret service, because he didn’t trust them. There were 60 women prisoners in our commando. One day, it became clear that several of us have not been adhering to the regulations laid out for the camp at the office. Namely, documents about certifications had been found in the corridor. Because none of us would say from whom they came, eight of the staff in the office were fired and sent immediately back to Birkenau. This happened by order of the head of personnel, SS-Oberscharführer Robert Kirschner 2Note 2: Hermann Kirschner.
In the first week of this hard labour outside, the eight female prisoners were ill and brought to the Revier. After they had recovered, one of the prisoners managed to be assigned to an agricultural commando. There she met a male prisoner, with whom she exchanged letters for a long time.
Personal discussions were completely forbidden at this time, and came with great personal
danger. One day, one of the women’s commandos was
returning from work. On the way, they met a men’s commando. One of
the female
prisoners took the opportunity to give a passing male
prisoner a letter. This was noticed by a member of the
SS and immediately reported to the political
department. After a long interrogation of the female prisoner, they were unable to find out, for which
man the letter was intended. She was abused and locked in the prison. And then
suddenly, we received a notice of her death, that the prisoner had died from lung
infection whilst under camp arrest. The letter was even by the camp standards
completely trivial, she wrote when will there be a time when we can say anything we want
and nobody will stand in our way?
.
Such cases happened almost daily, first the prisoner would be abused and then shot, or even sent to the crematorium alive.
It sounds perhaps unbelievable, when I write down the individual things that happened during the months that I worked in the office. We experienced some incredible things, for example: at the beginning of the month, always on a Thursday, purges were done in the camp prison. With a degree of delight, the SS members of the individual departments from our political department went to the camp prison and shot the individual prisoners that they did not like.
Naturally, they would drink afterwards and end the day with celebrations.
SS-Rottenführer Perry Broad from Berlin-Spandau, Jordanstrasse No. 84, Rottenführer Kaufmann from Ljubljana, Unterscharführer Kristan, Oscha Kirschner, Boger, Kamphuis. The addresses of some of them I can’t remember anymore.
In 1943-06, six male Polish prisoners working in a surveying commando were able to escape from the camp. They were not recaptured. By way of reprisal, SS-Unterscharführer Gerhard Lachmann aus Niederstreslitz 9 chose nine Polish in intellectuals as prisoners and on the 30th August 1943, had them publicly hanged in the camp.
Such cases were repeated often. And so, you were never sure whether
SS-Oberscharführer Lachmann collaborated with the secret service within the Gestapo. Prisoners, particularly in the men’s camp, smuggled letters and other things out of the camp with the help of civilians.
Lachmann was a small, thin man and looked very pale, he would often put on the prisoner clothing, go into the camp and spend the night there, in order to hear from prisoners who didn’t recognise him what was going on in the camp.
After such undercover work, there are always many prisoners who would be doomed to death.
SS Uscha Otto Schmidt issued death sentences without substantial investigations.
As the second and neighbouring camp of Auschwitz, Birkenau was known as Camp II. SS-Obersturmführer Kramer was the commandant of this camp. The head of the camp was SS-Obersturmführer Schwarzhuber. They lead the selections in the camp, along with the camp doctor and together with the camp supervisors. In the years 1942 to 1945, the camp doctors in Auschwitz were: Dr. Josef Mengele, Dr. Entress, Dr. Rohde, Dr. Wirths, Dr. Thilo, amongst others.
These led in the most terrible and infamous way the selections in the camp.
It is well known from several sources, that in Auschwitz there was a special experimentation block. This block was solely occupied by Greek, Polish, and Belgian female Jews. The head doctor was Dr Wirths.
Based on different pieces of correspondence in our office, it was clear that the block was supervised Prof Clauberg in Königshütte near Kattowitz, who ran a sanatorium there.
He wanted to develop a serum for fertilisation and sterilisation, and in order to do so, experiments were carried out on individual prisoners who were accommodated in this block.
In the crematorium, the work was solely carried out by Jews under the supervision of SS members, such as SS-Uscha Seitz, Georgen, Erber, Mokrus, Schillinger and others. Schillinger was shot by a female prisoner, who had only just arrived at the camp, with his own pistol.
The men’s camp in Auschwitz was under the command of SS-Obersturmführer Max Sell, a master tailor from Berlin. He was a monster in human form. He couldn’t stand either the smiling or the crying of a prisoner. The abuse of prisoners was a delight to him.
Sell found his equal in the form of SS-Obersturmführer Rössler. He was the head of the women’s camp. His subordinate, the female guard Drechsler, carried out all of his commands and wishes in the camp as quickly as possible. So, for example, searches in the camp to find out whether a prisoner has a piece of clothing that the camp leadership considered excessive. Cooking in the camp was one of the major crimes. This was punished with your hair being cut off, being put in the bunker, denied food and even 24 hours of standing. In the beginning, there was also a stake in the camp, and 30 to 60 minutes at this stake were given as a punishment. In 1943, in July or thereabouts, this was abolished. A memo in the file about punishment at the stake was destroyed. As a result of this, we had to go and re-write thousands of files which contained such memos.
Another toy
that was used as a deterrent and to which prisoners and civil workers both fell victim, was something that was known as
the swing
. It was a wooden contraption, to which iron bars were attached. The prisoner that was to be the victim, was bound to the swing
One such swing was installed in the office – in the interrogation room – where I worked.
At such performances, I was observed to see what faces I made.
Such things occurred almost daily. My nerves had reached the point that I’ve become quite mechanical, like a machine. Sleepless nights, illness and tiredness were written large across my face. After several months, the SS clerk Rottenführer Perry Broad was transferred to another department and I was assigned to him again. Now it was a little bit easier. The abuses no longer took place right in front of my eyes.
January 1944, I was once again in Birkenau, in the so-called gypsy camp. Here they were only German, Czech, and Polish gypsies. At the beginning, there was roughly 20,000. Illness and disease in the camp meant that after barely six months, the reduction by more than 10,000 was noticeable.
In spring 1944, the Hungarian Jews were brought to the camp. Between 15 and 20,000 arrived daily. The crematorium – there was four of them – couldn’t keep up with the rapid burning of these victims and so between the third and fourth crematorium, ditches were dug, and fires were set in them.
The crematoria were located in a wasteland, that was called the woods
. Giant
flames could be seen from far away. The smoke was such that for the whole of summer it was enough to almost suffocate.
One morning, as I was on the way to work, I noticed that there was a mass of people gathered by our office block, which was located outside of the camp. In that moment, I didn’t know what it meant. It was old people, mothers with children in their arms. They were praying, because they had understood everything that stood before then. The crematorium was only another hundred steps away. And soon it meant for the people who are waiting, that it was their turn. After several minutes, from this mass of around 300 people, there was only clouds of smoke to be seen. This went on for the whole summer, even into late 1944 of 1944, when in crematorium three there was an uprising and mass escape planned. It was a sunny evening in September, and we heard break a lot of noise coming from the camp around midday. Crematorium three have been set on fire. People were sent back to the blocks ordered by the SS and were not allowed to leave. After roughly an hour, the fire was brought under control. A report was written immediately by us in the office. I learnt that a mass escape had occurred. Namely, that all of the prisoners who worked in crematoria 2 and 3 that escaped.
Before they blew up the crematorium and escaped, they had done a purge of the commando. As their leader – the so-called Capo – the Jewish prisoners had had an ethnic German prisoner. He had spied on them for the SS. In order to make sure that they were able to escape and to blow up the crematoria, they pushed him into the fire.
Roughly two hours after the successful escape, all of the prisoners have been recaptured. SS-Oberscharführer Erber – Heustek, who had the Czech background, carried out a heroic act, in that, with the help of SS-Unterscharführer Wurm und SS.-Uscha Wunsch– both of whom came from Vienna – shot and killed 279 prisoners in front of crematorium 2 and 450 prisoners from crematorium 3. We had a death notice for over 729 prisoners who had been shot trying to escape.
After about four weeks, by way of deterrence, a further 100 prisoners from the commando in crematorium 1 and 4 were punished with death. In connection with the crematorium, four female prisoners, Polish Jews, were hanged on 30.12.1944 in the camp and all camp inhabitants had to be present for the carrying out of the death sentence.
The prisoners had been working in the ammunition factory UNION. From there, they brought explosives and had smuggled them into the men’s camp as well as the crematoria.
During summer 1944, prisoners also escaped from camp 2. There was a Belgian female Jew and a Pole. After roughly 14 days, they were found near to Auschwitz as they were trying to travel away, caught and locked in the camp jail. After a long interrogation and harassment, the prisoners were supposed to be hanged. The female prisoner was brought to the roll call in the camp and because she knew that this was the day that the death sentence would be carried out, she slit her wrists by the gate to the camp. This was noticed by SS-Unterscharführer Ritters. He jumped at her, and took the razor that she had in her hand away from her.
As the razorblade was taken away by the SS man, the prisoner was able to deal him several blows to the face. And so, the abuse of the prisoner began again anew. She was forced along the camp streets and beaten. Every prisoner of the Jewish nation had to be present. After an hour of this wrestling with death, the prisoner was half-conscious and thrown into a box with wheels attached and transferred to the crematorium.
The male
prisoner was hanged at the same
time in the men’s camp. The reason behind his sentence was because together
with a Jewish female
prisoner he attempted to escape from the camp
.
Such cases repeated themselves during my time at the camp quite often. Prisoners were escaping almost daily from the men’s camp, particularly Polish and Russian prisoners. When they were recaptured, they were hanged or shot in front of all the camp inmates.
If a prisoner was shot during their escape, the corpse would be tied in a sitting position to a chair and all of the camp inmates had to march past. This was used as a deterrent. After all of these experiences in the camp, we all became more and more numb. Here it was either bend or break.
Our facial expressions weren’t like those of people living in freedom. Hunger, fear for your own life, this made us animals without feeling.
Our many experiences in the camp, such as the selections and other things during my almost 3 years in the camp, made us hard. Often, I had the feeling that I would never experience the free world again. Particularly those of us in my commando didn’t think about ever being free again. Our supervisors comforted us by saying that if Germany was victorious, that we would still have to stay in the Reich, but that will be no longer concentrated, but rather obliged to work. If Germany were to lose the war, that will be the end of us.
We were no longer informed about the political events in the world, because we only had very few chances to listen to illegal radio stations in the camp. This was also punishable by death. And there were many such victims. Particularly Czechs and the Polish fell victim to this.
This kind of illegal activity developed amongst the prisoners in the neighbouring camp Jaworzno. In this coal mine a tunnel was being built.
The escape was well-planned and well prepared. However, amongst these prisoners there was a Pole who knew what the Czechs had planned. He pretended that he planned to escape with them and was able to find out when they planned their escape. He reported this to the political department, who were able to prevent the escape with guard posts.
At the end of October 1943, 32 Czech people were shot after a long period of torment in the camp. The Polish man had, through this betrayal, gathered some attention in our department, especially with SS-Unterscharführer Schürz and SS-Uscha Lachmann. He carried out his work as an informant quite openly, and was a very feared man in the camp. None of the prisoners dared to remove him from the camp. It was shortly before Christmas, that the Polish prisoner came to SS-Uscha Lachmann, who at this time I was working at the typist for, and demanded $100, so that he could catch prisoners and civilians smuggling. He gave the prisoner the hundred dollars that he demanded. The prisoner also asked that he be accompanied by SS-Rottenführer Jarosewitsch, as the place of exchange was outside of the cordon. The prisoner left our office and said that he would report back that afternoon before roll call with the results. The whole commando returned from work to the camp, but I had to wait in the office as the prisoner and the SS man Jarosewitz had not reported back. I was frightened.
The message came, that the Polish prisoner, together with the Jewish prisoner, accompanied by Jarosewitz had escaped. Jarosewitz had been murdered by them behind the large fence of the camp. Telegrams and wanted posters followed, regarding the two escaped prisoners. Nothing was said in front of me in the office, but I used to get the post, from which I was able to glean the important facts.
From that day on, prisoners were only allowed to leave the camp with two SS members present.
There are many other things that happened in the camp and in the office that I don’t feel I'm able to write down at the moment. On the 13.1.1945, the evacuation of the camp began. After eight days of wandering around without aim, we arrived half-frozen, hungry and tired at Ravensbrück. Here we spent our time without food, in a tent – 1500 prisoners – for over three weeks.
After that we were sent to the neighbouring camp in Malchow in Mecklenburg. The Auschwitz SS monsters were now for us a forgotten chapter. Now we had a new one, camp commandant, Luise Danz.
Opsáno dle originálu.
Dáno dokumentační akci k dispozici od pí. Reginy Lebensfeldové-Hofstädterové, Bratislava.
Za dokumentační akci přijal: Scheck
Za archiv přijal:
Alex Schmiedt
19.XII.1945