Fourth day of the hearing, 15 March 1947
The witness has provided information about himself as follows:
Wilhelm Wohlfarth, 36 years old, Augsburg Confession Evangelical, married, chartered surveyor, no relationship to the parties.
Presiding Judge: What motions do the parties submit regarding the questioning procedure?
Prosecutor Cyprian: We release the witness from the obligation to take an oath.
Defense attorney Umbreit: So do we.
Presiding Judge: The Tribunal has decided to question the witness without an oath. I hereby instruct the witness that he is required to speak the truth and that false testimony is subject to criminal liability.
Please tell the court about the circumstances in which you arrived at Auschwitz, your experiences and, most especially, anything you know about the accused, his behavior in the camp and his treatment of prisoners.
Witness: I was arrested on 19 November 1941 and incarcerated in Pawiak [prison]. I was then sent to Auschwitz on 8 January 1942. I was initially assigned to the Kommando under Rapportführer Palitzsch but, since I was a surveyor, I was soon transferred to a construction office. There were two construction offices: one belonging to the Bauleitung [construction department] and the other to a private company from Bydgoszcz called Lotzky. I worked at the Lotzky office.
At first, I was so weak that I couldn’t do any field work. Only after two months under the care of my fellow prisoners was I first able to walk long enough to do field tasks – initially nearby and then further afar.
There were two types of work in the construction office: the management and office workers planned measurements that the field workers then carried out. I was one of the field workers, so I had a lot of opportunities to witness various happenings in the camp.
Before I proceed with a more detailed description of these things, I would like to describe the area surrounding the Auschwitz camp. When I arrived, the Interessengebiet [economic area of the camp] included over 4,000 hectares of land. In many cases the locals were evicted and the villages in the area were left empty — this happened to Broszkowice, Babice, Brzeszcze, Pławy and parts of the town of Oświęcim itself. The land to the south of the camp was part of the economic area but the locals hadn’t been displaced. They did, however, lose all their usable land — by 1943 all that land was included in agricultural zones administered by the camp and worked by the prisoners, i.e. the Budy, Rajsko, Chyczkowice [?] and Stare Stawy Landwirtschafts. There were many different agricultural enterprises in the economic area. Pławy, Harmęże and Budy had fish breeding. There was a whole system of ponds stretching along the Młynówka creek towards the Soła river — it passed through the following villages: Chyczkowice [?], Strucki [?], Łęki, Bielany. Plants were cultivated in the area and in particular plants used in rubber manufacturing were grown in Rajsko. There was bird husbandry and some animals were even kept for fur in Harmęże. Plant cultivation all throughout the Babice, Groszków [?] and Budy villages. Brzeszcz had a tree nursery (focused mostly on ornamental trees and less on fruit-bearing ones).
As regards the camp itself, at the time of my arrival the main camp was being expanded. Buildings with only one story had been reinforced and had second floors added. Then free space in the camp perimeter was used up — new buildings were added, such that the whole area of the camp was filled with new blocks.
Surviving Russian prisoners of war were sent to Birkenau in the spring of 1942 to expand that area; they were housed in the former stables of the military barracks. According to the drafted plans, the fully expanded Birkenau camp was to consist of four sections and, reportedly, house a total of 300,000 POWs. That planned version of the camp was referred to as the Kriegsgefangenenlager [POW camp], KGL for short. The name was then informally adopted for Birkenau in its current state, first by the SS administration and then by the prisoners themselves. It is worth mentioning that the Birkenau camp was initially supposed to be built in Rajsko, but the administration decided that Rajsko had good land which shouldn’t be wasted on a prisoner camp. Thus, the muddy and marshy area of Birkenau was chosen instead.
Work on further sections of the camp began in 1942 — those were initially sections I A and I B. Women were brought from the Auschwitz main camp to section A, while section B was occupied by POWs and other male prisoners. Then Abschnitt II [section II] was built — it contained subcamps A through F, one section for newly arriving prisoners, two family subcamps and, finally, a hospital.
In 1943 work on section III was initiated. Commonly known as “Mexico” as it was far away from the main camp, it was never completed.
As I’ve mentioned, I was assigned to work at the construction office in January and first went out to do field work in March. At first, I worked for a private company and did work in Harmęże, but eventually I was reassigned to the Baubüro [construction office] because the camp administration wanted to speed up the Birkenau expansion; this is when I began surveying the Birkenau area. The surveying group consisted of three people. We performed all the measurements while standing waist-deep in water because the whole area was wet marshland.
From where we worked we could see the operations of the so called “Little Red House”, i.e., the first gas chamber in Birkenau. The distance was around 400 to 500 meters. Using our instruments we could see that naked corpses were being carried out of the side buildings and loaded onto open-topped rail cars. They were mostly bodies of women and children. The rail cars were so full that the bodies would often overflow and their heads would hang downwards from the wagons. At that time, the women’s heads were not yet commonly shaved so one could often see the hair hanging down as well. We took turns observing the red house so that whichever of us survived could then testify about it. Around two months later I went, out of curiosity, past the red house with a different group of men and looked at the pits in which the corpses were being buried. The bodies were unloaded from the rail cars into the pits in layers. The pits were around 20 to 30 meters deep. One corpse would be placed in the pit, then another with their head in the opposite direction, a thin layer of lime would be spread on top and dirt would be used to even things out; that was one layer of corpses – then the next. When I went there, prisoners were digging new corpse pits. A peculiar incident occurred: Lagerführer [camp leader] Aumeier and Hauptsturmführer Schwarz arrived at the house on horseback. We were frightened and worried that being seen in this place would have some sort of consequences. They were, however, more concerned with a different infraction of camp discipline on our part – one of the men that accompanied me had cigarettes with him and was consequently punished, since possession and use of tobacco during Arbeitszeit [work time], that is from morning till evening roll call, was strictly prohibited.
In March 1942 one of our friends received some bread from the locals and was punished for this by being sent to the bunker. If I remember correctly, over 40 people were crammed into a small cell with no openings or windows. During the night most of them asphyxiated and only a few survived – our friend Grabowski was among the deceased.
In that same month, a number of surveyors were sent to the SK [Strafkompanie – punitive unit] and my co-worker Kluźniak was beaten to death with shovels to the sound of accordion music.
Further in 1942, specifically in June, another group of our surveyors, who worked directly in my office, were transferred to the SK. This was the month of the famous SK revolt. The revolt failed because not all of the prisoners were mentally resilient enough. According to the plan, they were all supposed to make a break for it when the dinner break whistle was sounded, but the guards caught wind of the escape attempt and started shooting. Mohl [Moll?] was particularly vicious – he ran into even cells and shot any prisoner that even lifted his head. It was a bloodbath. Two of my friends died that day.
In the course of our field work we would also meet the accused Höß; he made rounds around the camp, mostly on horseback and sometimes by car. We found it curious that we would mostly see him near Birkenau but never going in the direction of Rajsko. We often saw him travelling in the morning, accompanied by his young teenage son (12 to 14 years old).
On 3 February, five Poles were killed again – this time for making contact with the locals. The guard, who oversaw the group, reported that the prisoners had accepted a package from the locals and ate its contents. Notably, the guard himself ate part of the food but reported the prisoners regardless. Thus, five of my friends were shot to death on 13 February [sic!].
After all these incidents, the Political Department took a greater interest in the Kommandos and assigned a snitch, Stanisław Dorosiewicz, as our Kapo, along with his “aide” Kurcweig [Kurzweig]. As soon as he was assigned to us, he began infiltrating our group. The Political Department knew that we contacted the locals and kept in touch with the various subcamps in the area, whether in Budy, Babice or Brzeszcze. Dorosiewicz was, therefore, tasked with gaining our trust and then tracking our contacts with the locals and fellow prisoners. He was supposed to use the trust of the relatively mobile surveyor group to sniff around in the different camps and immediately report all findings to the Political Department. Many people lost their lives because of this. We were forewarned about Dorosiewicz because relatively many people were snitches for the Germans and their activity was hard to fully conceal. We noticed that in the morning Dorosiewicz would report to the Political Department whether the group was leaving and where it was going. Here, I must mention that whereas in the beginning we were free to move about as we wanted, from that time onwards we were only allowed to go to designated destinations. Our movements were now strictly controlled.
On 20 May 1944, three of our colleagues ran away. They thought that, since they were a completely separate working group and had their own guards, their escape would not cause any trouble for the rest of us. Unfortunately, immediately the next day after the escape two men were arrested under the charge of illicit contacts and further fifty were kept in the camp. Initially, the administration didn’t know how to proceed further because the guard of the escapee group had actually gotten blackout drunk and was found unconscious in Rajsko. Camp command ended up using this to their advantage: they informed Berlin that the prisoners had poisoned the guard and were thus able to escape. We found out it was a lie because that guard came to our office a few months later specifically to explain that he was innocent in the whole affair and only got drunk but was told to report a poisoning.
Regarding escape attempts I must also add here that another snitch of the Political Department, by the name of Bauer, had been placed in the surveyor group quite a while before that and was given the task of making sketches of all escapes. He made six copies of those sketches and, as a result, we believed that each escape was being reported to the top. Now, as I’ve said, 50 men were kept in the camp in connection with that particular escape and the camp administration didn’t know what to do with them because no actual charges could be made against them. They were released after three days. However, right on the next day after that release, new actions were taken because the aforementioned snitch gave the administration some names. Thirteen prisoners were arrested on 26 May 1944, and another twelve on 27 May 1944. We didn’t know what would happen to them, but figured they’d probably be released. On 25 June 1944, we found out that 13 of them were executed by shooting in Block 11, even though no fault was proven on their part. Supposedly, there was some sort of investigation into their case, but I’m not sure of that. Regarding the other 12 we thought that after some of the men had been executed the others would be released. Unfortunately, on the morning of 19 July 1944, the camp was abuzz with the news that a significant execution was being prepared. Gallows were built – two wooden posts with an iron bar in between – and 12 nooses were tied on them.
Around noon people started saying that the surveyors were going to be hanged there; they were, after evening roll call. They were brought out of the bunker with their hands tied behind their backs. Camp security was increased because command expected the execution might spark a reaction among the prisoners. Therefore, the small Postenkette [guard post cordon] was reinforced, a few companies of SS-men were armed and put on alert, and the execution square itself was guarded by four Blockführers [block leaders] with machine pistols. At the beginning of the execution, Höß stepped forward from a group of officers and began reading the sentencing document. Ostensibly, Berlin ordered that the prisoners be put to death for poisoning the SS-man I had mentioned earlier. One of the poor men, who stood quite close – the late Jan Skrzetuski – kicked the stool away from himself as Höß was speaking, to protest this lie. That led to a sort of panic among the SS-men: they immediately began kicking the stools away from the other prisoners, with the help of the Lagerälteste [camp senior]. I’m not entirely certain, but I think the later Lagerführer Hössler took part in this.
A year later, on 24 June 1945, another fellow surveyor fled. He too believed that his actions wouldn’t have any repercussions for us, since he escaped from within the camp. A different camp commandant was overseeing things then and he didn’t punish anyone harshly – we were just put in the bunker for one day and then sent not to the surveying office but to different work groups within the camp. Thus, we saw a notable difference between the administration under Höß, who would murder people to avenge an escape, and this other commandant, who released us without serious repercussions. (Admittedly, he wanted to give himself a sort of alibi that way.) In 1944, when I was still in the camp, we were surveying an area in Birkenau near the so called “Little White House”, i.e., the second gas chamber. It was not operational then and I had a chance to look at the apparatus used for the killing. I have a site plan. The outer door of the gas chamber was labeled “Disinfection station” and another sign opposite the door read “To the showers”. It can be concluded that the poor souls who went into that room were misinformed about its purpose. There was a track for open-topped rail cars behind the house and the corpses would be carried there immediately after the gassing.
Presiding Judge: Are you talking about the little red house?
Witness: There were two “little houses”. One was called red because it was made out of brick and the other white because it was covered with render.
Presiding Judge: Both were used to gas people?
Witness: Yes.
Presiding Judge: Do you know whether these houses were still used to gas people when the crematoriums were operational?
Witness: Yes – they were.
Presiding Judge: Can you specify the house’s location? Did you survey it?
Witness: I can give a detailed account. The red house was some 200 or 300 meters west of Birkenau’s section III. Next to it was a field with pits. It was closed down in 1943 – when I visited it at that time, the whole area had been bulldozed and the house dismantled.
Presiding Judge: Was the house visible or surrounded by trees?
Witness: The red house was mostly visible while the white one was mostly surrounded by trees. There were also screens made of tree branches hiding the view of the camp, so the people wouldn’t see the hustle and bustle.
Presiding Judge: Did the little house make an impression on the people who were being led to it?
Witness: Not really. While we were doing field work, we could observe the columns of people being led to it. In our area the people were still walking slowly, unaware that they were going to be gassed – they were surrounded by guards but weren’t hurried along. We would hear shouting only once the column went down the embankment; that’s where they would be rushed along.
Presiding Judge: What did the little white house look like from the outside? Was anything written on it?
Witness: There was no signage. Just the render.
Presiding Judge: And what were the people told? Did they understand where they were going?
Witness: I don’t know, but I suspect they didn’t. Based on the signs inside the house, I’d say they were being intentionally misled.
Presiding Judge: They thought they were going to be disinfected?
Witness: Yes.
Presiding Judge: What was the building’s capacity?
Witness: Originally it had four rooms. While made out of brick, it was thatched, if I remember correctly. I suspect it previously served a double function – a living space with an attached barn. It was then remodeled: the main area consisted of three rooms and there were four annexes. Each room had doors on two opposite sides and a small window, 50 by 60 centimeters.
Presiding Judge: How many people could the building hold simultaneously?
Witness: The surface area was around 30 square meters – I’d say 4 by around 7 or 8, to be exact. Each room could hold over 100 people.
Presiding Judge: So in total around 400 people at once?
Witness: Yes.
Presiding Judge: Were people gassed there throughout the camp’s whole operating period?
Witness: Yes. Later it was also used to burn bodies.
Presiding Judge: Did you ever witness body burning?
Witness: Not directly. I only heard the people scream as they were being gassed and then saw the smoke. Besides that we only saw movement.
Presiding Judge: What did that look like, practically speaking?
Witness: In the beginning I had the impression that wood was being stockpiled in the area. I really don’t know how else to describe it. First, it would be stockpiled in pits near the train tracks. There was a large field nearby and that’s where the wood was then put in piles. Given the amount of wood that was being transported from Broszkowice, where whole wooden houses would be taken apart for that purpose, and the presence of ashes on the field, it can be concluded that the wood was being burned there. […]
Presiding Judge: Can you give us an estimate in terms of numbers?
Witness: The little house was operational in the period 1942–1943. When I was there, operations were temporarily halted and there was even a plan to close it down. One of my colleagues even took a small holder from the house to make a bedside lamp out of it.
Presiding Judge: Were the corpses always burned or were they buried at first?
Witness: Sometime in 1942, I saw many bodies being buried in the pits. The rail cars that transported the corpses were big: a single rail car could hold around thirty bodies. I personally saw eight corpses lying exposed in a rail car.
Presiding Judge: So initially the bodies of the gassed people were buried but that method was later abandoned in favor of burning?
Witness: Exactly. That was also when the bodies were exhumed from the pits.
Presiding Judge: Why were the buried ones exhumed?
Witness: There were many buried bodies. The pits were quite deep – 5 or 6 meters each – but they were crammed with many layers of corpses and that mass of flesh was rotting.
Presiding Judge: So there was a problem of bacterial growth?
Witness: I suppose so.
Presiding Judge: And that was why they were exhumed? A likelier cause would be to dispose of the evidence of murder, since the pits themselves remained.
Witness: It’s true they likely wanted to dispose of the evidence, seeing as they demolished the house.
Presiding Judge: When the corpses were exhumed, were they thrown into a fire to be burned or were they burned directly in the pits?
Witness: The corpses were taken out of the pits. I saw that myself. The job was done using machinery – dredgers picked up the corpses and shoved them into fires.
Presiding Judge: The bodies could be picked up despite decomposing?
Witness: The dredger scoop picked up the whole mass of flesh all at once. The machines were mostly operated by Jews and their work was overseen by SS-men.
Presiding Judge: What’s your explanation for the fact that Jews were assigned to do this?
Witness: I don’t really understand that myself. I even saw one of the Jews near the Little White House mistreat the poor people. He was nicknamed “Krwawa Mańka” [Bloody left hand] or something like that.
Presiding Judge: How did he mistreat the corpses?
Witness: I mean the living people going to the white house – I heard that the living were also burned in those fires, although I never saw that myself.
Presiding Judge: You’ve mentioned that you heard screaming and moaning?
Witness: Quite clearly. Once there was an incident: when a group of young men were being gassed, an SS-man died in the process. Or something like that. Since then, no young men would be gassed at the house. Only women and children.
Presiding Judge: Why?
Witness: Because the young men would resist.
Presiding Judge: Would you like to continue your testimony or is that everything?
Witness: I’ve said more or less everything I know.
Presiding Judge: You’ve told us that initially the camp expansion was planned in Rajsko and not Birkenau?
Witness: Yes, but that plan was later abandoned and Birkenau was chosen. Supposedly, the conditions in Rajsko were too good for a prisoner camp.
Presiding Judge: Was the change made by Höß, who was in charge of camp expansion?
Witness: Camp expansion was overseen by Bischoff, since he was the chief of the Bauleitung, but Höß participated in the endeavor.
Presiding Judge: Did Höß take an interest in the construction work and visit the area?
Witness: I saw his car once. He came during the building of the camp in Birkenau. At that time, soil was being transported to the area and used to even out the terrain for the first barrack. A series of pits was also being dug.
Presiding Judge: We aren’t concerned with what work was being done. We’re more interested in knowing who was behind the decision to claim the land for the camp and build Birkenau. Did the accused spearhead this process or was it someone else? Can you speak of that?
Witness: Certainly it was the accused.
Presiding Judge: Can you support that assertion with any relevant facts?
Witness: I’d heard at the surveying office that there was a plan to build a palace near the Wisła river for the Landswirtschaft chief — Caesar — instead of Birkenau’s section III but camp command didn’t agree to that.
Presiding Judge: You’ve said, among other things, that the camp was intended to hold 300,000 people.
Witness: That’s correct.
Presiding Judge: How do you know that?
Witness: Firstly, I’d estimate that number from the dimensions of the planned camp and secondly our chief, who was an SS man, told us explicitly that the camp was supposed to hold 300,000. He said so sometime in 1941.
Presiding Judge: So the expansion was moving in the direction of building a permanent camp for 300,000 prisoners?
Witness: Yes. The designs were even more extensive. The expanded Birkenau camp would have actually had a capacity higher than 300,000, while the main camp in Auschwitz would’ve also been enlarged — additional blocks were supposed to be built in the direction of one of the villages. I can’t remember the name though.
Presiding Judge: So plans were made to expand Auschwitz?
Witness: 48 additional multi-story brick blocks were planned. 20 of those were built.
Presiding Judge: You called one section of the camp “Mexico”. Who lived there?
Witness: That name was given to section II by the prisoners who lived in Birkenau. Firstly, because it was relatively far away from the camp headquarters. Secondly, because it was then in construction. Section II consisted of about 180 barracks. Some of them were intended to be offices, some were to house the hospital, but no one lived there yet.
Presiding Judge: Was that a women’s section?
Witness: Definitely not. The women were first kept in section I A and then also in section I B.
Presiding Judge: You’re familiar with the Birkenau camp — in which part were women held naked?
Witness: Oh, I saw that many times. I’d pass through the Birkenau camp and see the women walking around completely naked because they were being deloused. All the women would be naked and would walk around in this state quite freely. SS men would patrol among them. Horrible incidents happened then. That’s how it would be the whole day long — we’d be coming back from work and things would be the same.
Presiding Judge: Are you aware of any instances where women were kept completely naked both during the day and at night?
Witness: I don’t know what took place at night. But as regards the day, I saw that with my own eyes. We’d be going to work in the morning and they’d be naked. We’d be coming back in the evening and they’d still be naked, supposedly for delousing.
Presiding Judge: You mentioned a prisoner revolt. How did it come about? Can you say more about that?
Witness: It is hard to say exactly. The revolt occurred in a unit that was digging ditches. On the first bend, where they were digging knee-deep in water. There were few guard posts there. According to the plan, all the prisoners were supposed to start running towards the Vistula river once the dinner whistle was sounded. The river was about half a kilometer away. I don’t know how many took part in the revolt. The unit was then over 200 men strong and around 20 were left once everything was done and over with. Some were killed right then and there. As regards the event itself, the prisoners tried to run away. There was a particular moment during the day when the guards were getting ready for dinner, the cordon was relaxed, some guards were being relieved — they were taking their rifles and leaving. In other words, a commotion. Then, all at once, the work group darted away. Some kept a good pace, others fell behind. A number of them made it past the Postenkette and managed to flee into a nearby thicket. The guards started shooting. They ordered everyone to fall on the ground and if anyone moved, they were shot. I’d say a small group made it to the thicket— maybe around ten people. Some might have successfully escaped the camp but I’m not sure and if so, it was only a few people.
Presiding Judge: You spoke about Höß reading a sentencing document. Why was Höß doing that — did he always read out sentences?
Witness: In that particular case he read it out to make the occasion more solemn. I don’t remember what he read exactly, but I think he mentioned at the beginning that the men were being sentenced to death due to some order from Berlin regarding the poisoned guard. The poisoning was an utter lie.
Presiding Judge: You’ve described the reaction of one of those prisoners...
Witness: While Höß was reading about the guard supposedly being poisoned, one of the condemned men, who was at the edge of the row, was already standing on a stool and had a noose on, kicked the stool away and hanged himself. As a result, the officers next to Höß started executing the other prisoners in a sort of panic. Höß stopped reading the sentence.
Presiding Judge: So that condemned man didn’t want to hear the rest of the sentence and kicked his stool away. Did he say anything or speak to anyone?
Witness: He didn’t speak.
Presiding Judge: Did the other prisoners follow his example?
Witness: They were all solemn and dignified — so far as I know, none of them spoke.
Presiding Judge: Did they also kick their stools away themselves?
Witness: No — just that one.
Presiding Judge: You’ve told the court that during Höß’s time as administrator, prisoners would be hanged in revenge for escapes, among other things, but that at the time of his successor they were only imprisoned in the bunker. Can you expand on that?
Witness: When I said that I wanted to emphasize that the sentencing — or more properly the murder, since it wasn’t justified by the sentence...
Presiding Judge: What murder wasn’t justified by a sentence? You have to speak clearly — we mustn’t be left to infer things.
Witness: I’m speaking about the largest escape-related execution: the one where 13 of our friends were shot and 12 were hanged. Höß is solely and personally responsible for those deaths because he sent a false report to Berlin. He had to send a report because each escape had to be reported, but in this case information was fabricated to hide the fact that the prisoners were on good terms with some SS men who had been bribed. Apparently, Höß wanted to hide this and, therefore, claimed that the escapees had poisoned a guard. In moral terms, he murdered the men who were condemned to death by Berlin, since he misled Berlin.
Presiding Judge: You’ve said that this supposedly poisoned guard later spoke to you, as if apologizing, and informed you that he was told to report the incident falsely.
Witness: He visited us specifically to explain that.
Presiding Judge: Did he specify who told him to do it? “He was told to” is too general for our purposes. I understand that he participated in creating a false report for Berlin, which was related to the aforementioned execution — did he indicate who ordered him to report things falsely?
Witness: I don’t know who told him to do that.
Presiding Judge: You’ve said that Höß’s successor didn’t take such revenge for escapes and only punished prisoners with time in a bunker. Correct?
Witness: He didn’t take revenge on other, uninvolved prisoners.
Presiding Judge: In other words, escapes still happened but you don’t recollect that commandant using the vengeful punishments that were used in 1942. Would you say the change was due to a new prisoner treatment policy or did things change because the commandant changed?
Witness: We thought things improved because the commandant changed but also because the battlefronts were changing.
Presiding Judge: So you believed that your satiation changed because of the way the war was going and also because the administration changed?
Witness: Yes, both.
Presiding Judge: Did you have any contact with Höß’s successor? If so, please tell the court more about the changes in prisoner treatment.
Witness: There was a change in roll call length: if I remember correctly, they took around 15 minutes, whereas when Höß was in charge they could take hours. The SS men were also less zealous in doing their jobs.
Presiding Judge: In your opinion, was this because the SS men were less disciplined or were they implementing a gentler policy? Did they treat prisoners better because Höß’s successor was less harsh?
Witness: I suspect it was a gentler policy — I think the way they treated us depended entirely on the camp commandant’s wishes. In 1942, when we asked for better living conditions through our German boss, Professor Reinicke, who was supposed to deliver our request to the commandant, we were punished for asking; our whole office had to do “sports” for two hours straight.
Presiding Judge: What exactly do you mean by “sports”?
Witness: We had to run along the camp street and then do a one-handed frog walk: starting from a crouched position, we would jump forward, lean on one hand, push ourselves back into the crouched position, then jump forward again. We’d have to move like this quite quickly.
Presiding Judge: For how long did you jump like that?
Witness: It varied. The frog walk was put in between other exercises; they’d also have us crouch jump, run, roll on the ground and so on. We did these different exercises for two hours in total.
Presiding Judge: As you were saying, this professor...
Witness: We asked him to put in a word with camp command. Instead of better living conditions we got the “sports session” I described, as punishment for daring to ask.
Presiding Judge: And so you didn’t ask for improved conditions any more, seeing it as futile?
Witness: After that we were too afraid to ask again.
Presiding Judge: Going back to Höß’s successor, you said roll calls were shortened. Did food improve in any way?
Witness: I’d say there was no improvement in that area. Near the end of our time in the camp we even got less bread than before.
Presiding Judge: Did the kapos and function prisoners have as much sadistic free reign as before?
Witness: Incidents with them still happened but only occasionally.
Presiding Judge: Did Höß’s successor listen to your complaints? Did you have access to him?
Witness: No, we didn’t. I only know of individual cases when people made complaints to him and this mostly resulted in being punished for complaining.
Prosecutor Cyprian: I’d like to ask you something. You told the court that Höß made rounds on horseback, including into the area where mass graves were dug and bodies were burned, and that he took his son with him — is that correct?
Witness: On most days, when we were heading out to work between 5 and 5:20 AM, we’d see two horses waiting before Höß house. I’d say nearly every day. The horses were waiting for Höß and his son. One day we found out that he sometimes rode in the direction of Rajsko but would mostly choose to ride towards Birkenau.
Prosecutor Cyprian: Did you see Höß and his son going to the area with the mass graves?
Witness: No, I never saw the accused and his son going in that direction.
Defense attorney Ostaszewski: Regarding your statement that camp conditions improved under Höß’s successor, were you aware of the fact that foreign radio stations were reporting on what was happening in the camp? Was the fact of that reporting known among the prisoners?
Witness: Generally speaking, we knew there were some foreign interventions, because news about camp life was being sent out in various ways.
Defense attorney Ostaszewski: So information from the camp was being sent abroad — where exactly?
Witness: I can’t really say. Mostly London reported on the camp on their radio.
Defense attorney Ostaszewski: That is what I was driving at — that London reported on the camp. Did you not consider it possible that the change in policy and Höß’s dismissal from camp administration were caused by that reporting?
Witness: No. As far as we were aware, Höß was sent away from Auschwitz because authorities higher up actually promoted him to oversee other camps, i.e. the whole concentration camp system.
Defense attorney Ostaszewski: But Höß later returned to Auschwitz, did he not?
Witness: Yes.
Defense attorney Ostaszewski: Was there any change in camp conditions after Höß returned compared to the time under the other commandant?
Witness: I don’t really remember if there were any changes. That was in 1944 and I was then being punished: I was prohibited from leaving the camp perimeter.
Defense attorney Ostaszewski: So you can’t really say if circumstances changed.
Presiding Judge: The witness is dismissed.