ZOFIA CZERWIŃSKA

On 31 March 1947 in Gdańsk, investigating judge of the District Court, Judge J. Podolski, with the participation of a reporter, trainee W. Eklert, interviewed the person named below as an unsworn witness. Having been advised of the criminal liability for making false declarations, the witness testified as follows:


Name and surname Zofia Czerwińska
Age 44 years old
Parents’ names Franciszek and Maria
Place of residence Gdańsk, Robotnicza Street 8, flat 6
Occupation feeder/ printing works
Religious affiliation Roman Catholic
Criminal record none
Relationship to the parties none

From July 1943 I was incarcerated in the Auschwitz concentration camp. In that camp there was a senior overseer (Oberaufseherin) Maria Mandl. She was very severe in her treatment of prisoners.

Once, I went to visit my friend in the Revier (block for the sick). When I was still in the Revier, the so-called Blocksperre was dictated, that is, no one was allowed to leave the blocks. Then, two doctors, König and Mengele, entered one of the blocks and proceeded to throw out completely naked sick women.

Blockführer [block leader] Tauber stood in the entrance and beat leaving inmates with a stick so hard that they fell to the ground. When the women were on the ground, the guards who stood in front of the block, Mandl and Drechsel, ran to them. Mandl kicked the prisoners who were lying on the ground and pulled them up by the hair, shouting to Drechsel: “Help me! These stinking Jewesses won’t go on their own”. A selection was then carried out in three blocks – I counted 26 cars in total. All prisoners were taken from these blocks, including doctors and the sanitary personnel, and only the block leaders were left behind. I would like to emphasize that the selection took place in December, when the weather was already very freezing.

From December 1943 I worked in the so-called “Sauna”, from where I could move freely around the whole women’s camp. In the “Sauna”, selections for the gas chambers were taking place. For instance, I personally witnessed a selection attended by Maria Mandl.

This selection was conducted by doctor Mengele, Obersturmführer Hössler and Mandl. Mandl wore gloves then and had a stick in her hand, with which she pushed the prisoners, covered in ulcers, towards Mengele, who had the final say. They chose 3,000 women then, but they were not directly sent to the gas chamber, but to block 25, the block of death. A few days after this selection, I went to block 25 to fetch some rags for gassing. When I reached the gate, I met Mandl and Hössler, who were leaving the block in high spirits. Mandl said to Hössler then: “They deserve this”. When I entered the premises of the block, I saw a big pile of corpses with fragments of flesh gnawed away by rats. Apart from that, I noticed that some woman, exhausted to the utmost degree, was nibbling at the buttocks of a corpse. Our task was to take the clothes off from the corpses and take them for delousing.

On another occasion, I saw one SS man, who was standing in the gate, search a group of prisoners in striped garb who were on their way to work in the women’s camp. Mandl, who accompanied that SS man, hit these men in the faces. I watched the incident from afar, so I don’t know whether she beat all the prisoners or just some of them and for what reason.

Sending prisoners to the so-called bunker or the Strafkommando [punishment kommando] was at Mandl’s discretion. As regards sending prisoners to the bunker and the punitive unit, Mandl was relentless.

One of my friends, whose surname I don’t recall and who came from the Ravensbrück camp, told me that in Ravensbrück Mandl served as the executioner.

The report was read out.