Inside Nuremberg Prison: Hitler's Henchmen Behind Bars

by Helen Fry

‘Men, women and children, only Jews,’ Höss replied. What did Höss think of this? He replied he was only obeying orders from Himmler and it was not possible to question Himmler’s orders. Höss tried to rationalize that if the Jews were not exterminated, then Jews would in the end exterminate all Germans. When pushed further by Goldensohn, Höss acknowledged that he had blindly accepted Himmler’s orders. He then explained how Auschwitz was almost empty when he arrived there in May 1940. In the summer of 1941, he had been summoned to Berlin to meet with Himmler, where he was given instructions to rebuild Auschwitz to accommodate twenty thousand prisoners and turn it into an extermination camp. Himmler had told Höss: ‘The Führer has now ordered the final solution to the Jewish problem. Those of us in the SS must execute these plans.’

  Höss had duly returned to Auschwitz to execute Himmler’s orders. From his subsequent description to Howard and Goldensohn, it was clear that he carried out orders with alarming efficiency and enthusiasm. Höss organized two derelict farmhouses on the Auschwitz site to be converted into gas chambers for the arrival of the first transports. It was he who took the decision to use Zyklon B gas in the gas chambers.

  ‘How many people at a time were exterminated in each farmhouse?’ asked Goldensohn, through Howard interpreting. Höss stared at the floor for several moments in silence. Goldensohn wrote in his diary: ‘He then shifted his eyes from me to the floor to Mr Triest, and finally after about half a minute he said, “In each farmhouse eighteen hundred to two thousand persons could be gassed as one time”.’

  ‘How often were the gas chambers used?’ asked Goldensohn.

  Höss replied: ‘sometimes two or three times a day, but there could be a gap of three weeks or more between its use. Men were gassed separately from women and children. When transports arrived, SS doctors decided who was suitable for work around the camp and separated them from the rest of the arrivals. The others were marched for nearly a kilometre to the two farmhouses and gassed.’

  ‘Did the prisoners ever panic?’ asked Goldensohn.

  Höss replied, ‘Yes sometimes, but we worked it smoothly, more smoothly as time went on.’

  In this lengthy interview, Höss explained how, from 1942, new crematoria with four underground gas chambers were built at the camp and these were used immediately. This now covered the period when Howard’s own parents arrived at there from Camp Drancy.

  Howard swallowed hard and continued translating as Höss, oblivious to Howard’s personal pain and connection, explained the capacity of each chamber. Two gas chambers accommodated two thousand people; the smaller two could take sixteen hundred each. Höss dispassionately described how only those selected for work had their names added to the camp lists of prisoners. All files on those who were gassed were destroyed. This explains the absence of Berthold and Lina Triest’s names from the lists which survive in the camp archives. Howard tried to concentrate, his mind all the while piecing together bit by bit his parents’ fate.

  ‘Did ordinary Germans know about Auschwitz?’ asked Goldensohn. Howard quickly re-focused his attention to translate.

  In a monotone voice Höss replied: ‘only those who worked there and they had to sign an oath of secrecy. Newspapers were not allowed to print anything about the camps.’ Höss then admitted to being present when the gas chambers were used.

  ‘There was no question,’ says Howard, ‘he knew everything that went on at Auschwitz.’

  Goldensohn and Howard visited Höss again two days later. In his diary, Goldensohn records the interview in which he asked Höss what he had been thinking about. Goldensohn wrote: ‘He had the usual puzzled, apathetic expression and gazed from me to the wall and back to Mr Triest, the translator, in a doleful manner, and then answered, “I haven’t been thinking of anything in particular”.’

  During that interview, Höss proceeded to speak about his family history, childhood and religion. Goldensohn asked him if he was ever haunted by the memories of the murder of over 2.5 million people. Höss simply replied, ‘no’. That figure excluded the other extermination camps of which he was administrator. Höss continued, ‘I thought I was doing right, I was obeying orders and now of course I see that it was unnecessary and wrong. I don’t know what you mean by being upset about these things because I didn’t personally murder anybody. I was just the director of the extermination program in Auschwitz. It was Hitler who ordered it through Himmler and it was Eichmann who gave me the order regarding transports.’

  HÖSS TAKES THE STAND

  Howard attended the court proceedings the day Höss took the stand in the courtroom, ‘On that occasion Höss was bureaucratic and matter-of-fact,’ he says. Howard listened attentively as Höss’s affidavit was read to the court. In it, Höss admitted:

  ‘I commanded Auschwitz until December 1, 1943 and estimate that at least 2,500,000 victims were executed and exterminated there by gassing and burning and at least another half million succumbed to starvation and disease. Those who were fit for work were sent into the camp. Others were sent immediately to the extermination plant.’

  Of all the Nazi prisoners held at Nuremberg, the astonishing part about Höss’s involvement was his sick pride at what he had done. The other defendants might have denied their guilt, remained belligerent or anti-Semitic, but they did not show any sign of pride at their part in the Third Reich.

  In his defence, Höss boasted to Howard back in the cell: ‘I received the orders. I carried them out. I did them the best I could.’

  This same admission came from the other defendants too – Hitler gave the orders. And they obeyed. Howard says, ‘It was clear to us then that they blamed Hitler because he was dead and could not deny it.’

  How did Howard cope with being in such close proximity to Höss, a man of such evil who had personally decided the fate of his parents? He coped only because he knew that Höss would eventually face the gallows for his crimes. And so he did. After Nuremberg, Höss was handed over to a Polish Military Tribunal for trial. He was found guilty and hanged at Auschwitz on 7 April 1947, on the same gallows used by the Nazis.

  Although today Howard claims he felt no bitterness towards the defendants or ordinary Germans at that time, only once has he publicly expressed hatred and that was on a documentary made about his life called Journey To Justice (2006). In it, he says: ‘When I left Germany in 1939, I hated Germans and everything connected to Germany.’

  When pressed further, he slightly modifies what he expressed in his film. The lack of bitterness, Howard argues today, is down to a childhood fantasy when he was thirteen years old. By then he had lived for three years under the Nazi regime. He dreamed of himself returning one day as the victor and driving through the streets of Munich in a white Mercedes. The young Howard also fantasized that he had a huge vacuum cleaner and held it all over Germany and sucked up the bad people. Every bad German, which for him was most Germans, was taken away. All that remained in Germany were empty buildings, the countryside, streets and homes – all the familiar things which made Howard feel secure.

  Later on, at the end of the war, these sentiments held true in Nuremberg and his contact with the German population. He wanted Germany rid of its bad Germans. However, he still knew a small number of “good Germans”, mainly those who had once worked for his father, but he mistrusted all the others when they told him they had not been Nazis.

  Howard says, ‘I did feel bitterness towards the Germans and hatred for the defendants at Nuremberg. Not everyone was in the same pot – there were some good Germans. Whether those “good Germans” were truthful to me about their past remained an open question.’ When pressed further about the war criminals and exacting revenge, Howard responds with unqualified solemnity and sincerity:

  ‘Emotionally it was difficult at times. You stand in front of the man who murdered your parents. What can you do? I couldn’t kill him. That would have made me a murderer too. In most of the cells were men who in some way were responsible for my parents’ death. Do I kill them too? Would I g
o into Hans Frank’s cell and kill him too? Frank – the bloody-thirsty governor of Poland? Not only would it make me a killer, but the emotion would ultimately turn in on me and I would end up killing myself. I couldn’t kill them but I would have liked to have done the same thing to them as they did to millions of innocent people – to see them suffer a long, slow, painful death; to be killed in the same horrific manner that they inflicted on innocent men, women and children, including my own parents. There were those who could not do my job because of their own suffering. On the other hand for me there was so much feeling of superiority, of gratitude that I was now the one who is the victor. I could call the cards and give the orders. They were sitting behind bars. I had my life and freedom. I was 22 years old at that time. We had just won the war. I could ride on a torrent and that enabled me to do my job with the top Nazi defendants. I had to let justice take its course.’

  In the end, for Howard, it remained true. For justice was finally done without him having to exact personal revenge. He says levelly: ‘Höss was not the only one responsible for my parents’ deaths. He was one in a chain of Nazis or Nazi collaborators who carried out mass murder. It was not possible for me to hunt them all down and kill them. The only rational way forward was to allow justice to take its course and trust in that process.’ Perhaps the most sobering message from Howard’s contact with the two ‘beasts of Poland’ is his comment, ‘any personal revenge could not bring back my parents.’

  FOURTEEN

  THE MILITARY MEN AND KEY NAZI WITNESSES

  HITLER’S FORMER MILITARY men Admiral Doenitz, General Jodl, Admiral Raeder and Field Marshal Keitel were held on the ground floor of the prison. They had a ready answer for the atrocities and the easiest way out by claiming ‘we were just obeying orders.’ They told Howard: ‘We are military men and when Hitler ordered us to do something, we had to do it. We were bound by our military oath.’ Or they would say, ‘Goebbels told me to do this,’ or ‘Goering ordered me to do that.’ Howard recalls with some cynicism that the higher up the hierarchy the defendant was, it was all Hitler’s doing. They usually blamed the leaders who were dead. That effectively meant Hitler and Himmler.

  The day the guard unlocked the cell door of 54-year old Doenitz, Howard found Doenitz as proud and aloof as the day he had arrived at the prison. In spite of his formal reserve, Doenitz did not find it beneath himself to sign a book to the prison translator. With dignity, he took the copy of Die U Bootswaffe from Howard and wrote: ‘In memory Great Admiral Doenitz, Nuremberg January 1946.’

  On 3 March, the courtroom showed film reel of Buchenwald concentration camp. Goldensohn was keen to gain some reaction to the atrocities. When the defendants returned to the cells at the end of the day, Howard followed him into the cell of Doenitz. Doenitz was questioned on the evidence which he had seen. ‘Of course he couldn’t deny what was shown on the film,’ says Howard, ‘but he saw it as an isolated event rather than part of a wider program of persecution and extermination.’ In the coming months, Goldensohn would probe further and ask Doenitz whether he knew about the existence of the concentration camps. ‘Yes and no,’ Doenitz replied. ‘I knew of some from 1933, but I was too busy with naval matters. I knew nothing of the killing of Jews.’ What did Doenitz think of the trial? He replied:

  ‘It is a joke. If these trials confined themselves to who ordered killings of the Jews and other killings of human beings, it would be all right. I wouldn’t be kept in the dock three hours. But I sit here from November on, and hear the same stuff over and over again. Half the time I no longer listen. I just draw pictures or jot down my musings… The big folly of this trial is that it lacks the two men who are to blame for anything which was criminal, namely Hitler and Himmler.’

  During his questioning and interviews, Doenitz stood by Goering and continued to believe that Goering was not as bad as the prosecution were trying to claim.

  Doenitz was a key figure in the Nazi Regime at the end of the war. As Hitler’s chosen successor after Hitler’s suicide in the Berlin bunker, Admiral Doenitz had immediately retreated to the protected enclave of Flensburg on the German-Danish border. From there, he had arranged Germany’s unconditional surrender to the Allies. After his arrest, he always claimed he did not know the other Nazi leaders. He tried to justify and qualify his position by saying that he had barely met them other than on some formal occasions. ‘Doenitz was determined to set the record straight regarding his own position,’ says Howard, ‘and told us he was going to write his own memoirs. He went on about how he took no responsibility for the mass atrocities even though he was Hitler’s top naval man. He, Doenitz, knew nothing of the extermination plan for Jews, 30 million Slavs or mass murders in Russia and Poland. Even so, Doenitz was still accused of carrying out unrestricted submarine warfare. Nothing could change his part in that.’

  JODL AND KEITEL

  At the beginning of the following month, Howard went to see Alfred Jodl, one-time Colonel-General and chief of operations for the German High Command. Jodl’s inscription to Howard inside the book Mit Hitler in Westen was short. It read: ‘A. Jodl, Generaloberst retired 2.2.46.’ Leaving Jodl’s cell, Howard turned his attention to Admiral Raeder. He found Raeder cordial in conversation. Raeder wrote inside Jahrbuch der Deutschen Kriegsmarine: ‘With best wishes E. Raeder, Nuremberg 2.2.46.’

  Howard then headed to see Keitel, former Field Marshal who had ordered captured British commandos and SAS men to be shot in cold blood by his Keitel Order. Keitel, not unsurprisingly, justified Hitler’s defeat in military terms. He inscribed inside the book, Jahrbuch der Deutschen, the words: ‘The German army of yesterday has only one purpose – to fight with honour or perish in battle, Keitel, Field Marshal retired.’

  The inscription reveals that even in defeat this military leader confidently retained his sense of duty, code of honour and fight to the death, something which was imbued into the German military consciousness. Howard reflects on the military men and says: ‘To me, they seemed quite ordinary men sat in their cells. Their kind, gentle faces hid the fact that they were also guilty of crimes on a massive scale because they had sent hundreds of thousands to their deaths by their battle orders and commands.’

  THE WITNESSES

  While the main defendants spent each weekday in the courtroom, Howard was back in the prison interviewing key witnesses for the trial, some of whom would later themselves stand trial for war crimes. The witnesses were held in a different wing and were called to the trial as witnesses to the atrocities. There were held Margarete Himmler (wife of the deceased Heinrich Himmler) and their daughter Gudrun. Howard and Kelley interviewed them in the cell, during which Himmler’s wife was questioned about her late husband’s activities. Although the Allied authorities had kept watch on her, she was ultimately not implicated in charges of war crimes.

  By February 1946, the following Nazis were being held as witnesses, awaiting interview in the cells by Howard and Goldensohn: Rudolf Höss, Otto Ohlendorf, Oswald Pohl, Sepp Dietrich, Paul Schmidt, Albert Kesselring, Franz Halder, and Ewald von Manstein. Also held were:

  Erhard Milch, Field Marshal and armaments chief of the Luftwaffe, tried at a later court in Nuremberg and given 15 years imprisonment;

  Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski, SS General from 1941, chief of anti-partisan units in Russia from 1943.

  Kurt Daluege, Reichs Protector of Bohemia and Moravia. He was tried in Czechoslovakia and hanged in 1946.

  Rudolf Mildner, Head of Gestapo in Chemnitz and Kuttointz, Poland

  Walter Schellenberg, Chief of Office VI (Secret Intelligence Services) of RSHA from 1942.

  Occasionally, Howard accompanied Goldensohn to interview witnesses outside the prison who were not in custody, and that included Goering’s wife and daughter, Edda. ‘In the case of Mrs Goering,’ says Howard, ‘we delivered personal items to her from her husband, like a couple photographs and letters.’

  THE FIELD MARSHALS

  Albert Kesselring, former General Field Marshal a
nd Supreme Commander of the German armed forces in Italy, was an important witness at Nuremberg. His was a rank below Reich Marshal which was held by Hermann Goering. The sixty-year old Kesselring was interviewed by Howard and Goldensohn in early February 1946, having first spent time under interrogation at the London Cage in Kensington Palace Gardens, London which had become the War Crimes Interrogation Unit (WCIU). Kesselring told Howard and Goldensohn that no soldier under his command committed any crimes or atrocities. He claimed to suffer from amnesia and dizziness due to a past fractured skull.

  When interviewed by Howard and Goldensohn on 12 March, he was asked about art treasures looted from the Abbey of Monte Cassino in Italy and delivered to Goering. Kesselring replied that he thought the treasures were in the Vatican. Goldensohn went on to ask about the bombing of Rotterdam. Kesselring maintained that throughout the war he only ordered the bombing of military targets, not civilian places or cultural and historic sites. He was reminded by Goldensohn of the Keitel Order of 16 December 1942 about dealing with partisans in Italy; how partisans which included women and children, should be shot if captured. Later, Keitel issued an order to arrest a significant number of the male population amongst the partisans “… and in the event of an act of violence being committed these men will be shot.”

  Kesselring was held culpable for his role in the army. He was tried by a British military court later in 1947, was given the death sentence, but this was reduced to life imprisonment.

  In C wing, Colonel Andrus was also holding eight Field Marshals and Generals who were initially brought to Nuremberg as witnesses. Howard and Goldensohn were engaged in interviewing them while the main defendants were otherwise occupied in the courtroom. While at Erlangen, Howard had acquired a copy of the book Soldaten. Inside the front cover, each of the eight military witnesses penned their signature and rank:

  Gerd von Rundstedt, Field Marshal, 28.5.46

  Guenter Blumentritt, General of the Infantry, 28.5.46