The building in which the prisoners of war lived had no glass in the windows; in even in the coldest of weather; of course, this could not heat the big premises, where up to a thousand men lived in a draught.
Mass cases of frostbite were observed.
There were no baths. People in general could not have a wish for six months and suffered from vermin.
In the hot summer months men suffered from the heal; for 3 to 5 days on end they received no drinking water."
evident from the quoted extract, exactly the same as the regime in other German prisoner of war camps. This is undoubted proof of the existence of general directive orders. camp commanders had opportunities to commit atrocities each in their own way, while remaining entirely unpunished.
You will find on Page 105 the Paragraph which is read by me in the record:
"Prisoners of war were beaten with sticks and rifle butts under any liquid food ration was reduced by half."
As a result of such a regime mortality in the camp was enormous. In winter, deaths amounted to 200 per day. Epidemics broke out in the camp. Numerous cases were observed of swelling as a result of starvation and of death from inanition. The guards derived pleasure from degrading the Prisoners of War and from setting then one against the other. policemen and received 120 strokes with the lash and 15 with sticks for not having obeyed the order to beat his fellow prisoner of war. The beatings were conducted by German Officers.
The Commission came to the conclusion that in the grounds of the camp and of the central hospital no fewer than 25 thousand Soviet prisoners of war were buried. This conclusion is based on measurements and numbers of graves and on the testimony of witnesses. German-Fascist invaders in another town in the Don basin, Artyomovsk. A special Commission, consisting of the Military Prosecutor of the town of Artyomovsk, of the priest of the Pokrovsky Church - Ziumin, of representatives of the intelligentsia, public organizations and army units drew up an official report on the mass murders of Soviet prisoners of war organized by the Fascist invaders. This official report is to be found on page 4 of document U.S.S.R. - 2a, and it is also on Page 105 of your Document Book - I quote:
"In November 1941, soon after the occupation by the German-Fascist invaders holding 1,000 captured Red Army prisoners of war."
there:
"Owing to hunger, in the spring of 1942 prisoners of war used to leave the camp and on all fours like animals, gather and eat grass.
In the rows and with wire entanglements placed at intervals."
I omit one paragraph and pass on to the conclusions:
"Near the camp 25 graves were discovered - 3 of them mass graves.
The first grave measured 20 by 15 metres; in it were found remains of about one thousand corpses.
The second grave measures 27 by 14 metres and there were discovered remains of about 900 corpses; in the third each - altogether remains of up to 3 thousand corpses". of the Stalingrad area, the Hitlerites established a prisoner of war camp here, with the sadism characteristic of them, in the same way as in other camps, they exterminated the combatants of the Red Army.
I present to you as proof our No. U.S.S.R.-63 which contains an official report of the 21st June 1943. It is drawn up and authenticated in an appropriate manner and contains the following information. It is on page 110 of the document book:
"Owing to the bestial regime, during the 3 1/2 months of the existence "The Germans forced the prisoners to work from 14 to 16 hours per "A few days before the arrival of the Red Army the Germans ceased tion.
Nearly all the prisoners suffered from dysentery. Many had open wounds, but no medical aid was given to prisoners". debasing treatment of prisoners of war.
"Germans mocked the patriotic feelings of Soviet prisoners of war, equipment.
The Hitlerites systematically humiliated Soviet prisoners of war, forcing them to kneel down in front of Germans."
evidence - tools which were used to torture Soviet prisoners of war (a leather lash, a dagger, found amongst the dis rmed bodies, with the well-known Hitlerite slogan: "Blut und Ehre"). was to be understood by the German honour (Ehre) and for what blood (Blut) it was intended. Extraordinary State Commission documents concerning the town of Kertch. I submit to you the documents of the Extraordinary State Commission under No. U.S.S.R. - 63 (6) and I shall make Public several extracts. In your copy they are all marked so that the Tribunal may be able to follow the quoted text.
THE PRESIDENT: I think we might break off now.
(A recess was taken). Citizeness P. Y. Bulytchyova, which I will cite. She is from the town of Kertch.
"I was more than once a witness of them driving along our Red Army Prisoners of war - officers and men, and those who, owing to wounds and general weakness, fell out of the ranks and were shot right in the street by Germans. I several times saw this horrible sight. Once in freezing weather they drove a group of weary, ragged, barefooted men by. Those who tried to pick up pieces of bread thrown by passers-by in the street were beaten unmercifully by the Germans with rubber truncheons and rifle butts. Those who fell under these blows were shot".
"During the period of the second occupation, when the Germans again broke into Kertch, they began to avenge themselves with even greater fury on persons guilty of nothing at all." primarily on military personnel, killing wounded soldiers with blows of a rifle butt. On the same page, 115, you will find this quotation:
"The prisoners of war were driven into large buildings which were then set alight. In this way the Voikov school was burnt down, and the engineering and technical workers' club, in which there were 400 soldiers and officers of the Red Army. Not a single one of them managed to escape from the burning building. Those who tried to save themselves were shot with automatic rifles. Wounded soldiers were bestially tortured in the fishing hamlet of Mayak".
Another female witness, who lived in this hamlet, A.P. Buryatchenko, testified:
"On the 28th May 1942 the Germans shot all the peaceful inhabitants who had remained behind in the hamlet and who did not succeed in hiding. The Fascist monsters mocked the wounded Soviet prisoners of war, beat them unmercifully with rifle butts and then shot them. In my dwelling, the Germans discovered a girl in military uniform, who having offered resistance to the Fascists, cried: "Shoot, reptiles, I die for the Soviet people, for Stalin, but you, scoundrels, you will meet a dog's death". The girl patriot was shot on the spot.
In the district of Kertch, there is the Adjimushkaisk stone quarry. There Red army soldiers were exterminated and poisoned by gas. N. N. Dashkova, a woman inhabitant of the village of Adjumushkaisk testified:
"I personally saw the Germans - having caught about 900 Red army soldiers in the stone quarry - subject them to ill-treatment and afterwards shoot them. The Fascists employed gas."
I am omitting a few sentences. On the same page, 115, you will find the following citation:
"In the Engels club at the time of the occupation there was situated a Soviet prisoners of war camp, in which there were over a thousand people.
The Germans ill-treated them, fed them once a day, drove them to do exhausting work, and those who fell from exhaustion were shot on the spot."
It seems to me necessary to quote several other pieces of evidence: N. J. Shumiloff, a woman resident of the small hamlet of Gorki, declared:
"I personally saw a group of prisoners of war being led past my courtyard. Three of them were unable to move. They were shot on the spot by the German escort."
Citizeness P.I. Gerassimenko, inhabitant of the hamlet of Samostroy testified: "Many Red army soldiers and officers were driven to our hamlet. The land which they occupied was enclosed in barbed wire. Naked and barefooted people perished from cold and hunger. They were kept in the most awful, inhuman conditions. Next to the living were lying numerous corpses which were not Removed for several days. These conditions rendered life in the camp still more unbearable. The prisoners were beaten with rifle butts, they were bashed and fed with refuse. The inhabitants who endeavoured to give food and bread to the prisoners were beaten, and the prisoners of war who attempted to take such gifts were shot". Regarding the regime in this camp, a school teacher, A. N. Naumova, testified:
"At the camp there were many wounded. These unfortunate people were losing blood but remained without help. I collected medicines and bandages for the wounded and a medical orderly from amongst the prisoners of war bound up their wounds. The prisoners suffered from dysentery as, instead of bread, they were given refuse to eat. People dropped from exhaustion and disease, and died in awful agonies. On the 20th June 1942 three prisoners of war were beaten with the lash for attempting to escape from the camp. Prisoners were shot. In June one of the escaped prisoners was caught and executed". district of the Kitchen factory and Voikov works a Group of Red Army men and officers were shot. the Caucasus. The whole road from the river crossing to the town; a distance of 18 to 20 Kilometres, was littered with Red army corpses. There were many wounded and sick persons amongst the prisoners of war.
Whoever was unable to walk, either owing to exhaustion or to sickness, was shot on the way.
"In 1942 the Fascists threw 100 Red Army prisoners of war alive into the village well of Adjimushkay; the corpses were afterwards extracted by the inhabitants and buried in a communal grave. have just quoted to you. session of the Court. He testified that in the course of four months, out of ten thousand Russians whom he saw as prisoners of war in the German camp at the city of Rava Russkaya, only two thousand remained alive. limitless torture inflicted on the prisoners-of-war at Rava Russkaya.
Witness V.S. Kotchan, who was interrogated under the procedure prescribed by our laws, testified before the Guard Captain of Justice Ryzhov, on 27 September 1944 (the minutes of this interrogation is hereby submitted to you under Number USSR-66):
"I worked under the Germans at the Red Army prisoner-of-war camp from December 1941 to April 1942, as ground digger." This is on page 124 of your Document book.
"This camp was set up by the Germans in the barracks near the railway. The whole camp area was surrounded by barbed wire. According to statements by the prisoners-of-war themselves, the Germans drove into this camp from twelve to fifteen thousand men. While we were working, we observed how the Germans ill-treated the Red Army prisoners-of-war. They fed them once a day on unpeeled frozen potatoes, baken in their skins and with dirt on them. They kept the prisoners-of-war in the cold barracks all winter. this camp, any clothes, overcoats, boots, as well as shoes, which were at all wearable were taken away from the prisoners, leaving them in rags and barefooted. The prisoners of war were taken to work daily under escort from 4 to 5 in the morning and were kept working until 10 o'clock at night.
Worn out, cold and hungry people were driven into huts in which the windows and doors were specially kept open by day so that the frost should get into these huts, and in this way the people were frozen too. In the morning, hundreds of corpses were taken away in a tractor by the prisoners of war themselves, guarded by German soldiers, into the Volkovitch forest, where they were buried in previously prepared pits. While prisoners were being marched off to work, the Germans placed a detachment of soldiers armed with rifles and stakes in the passage gates leading out of the camp, and killed with stake blows in the head, stabbed with bayonets and shot those who, owing to inanition and hunger, could not move properly." Thus, for instance:
"The German administration of the camp brought out completely naked prisoners of war, bound them with ropes to a wall surrounded by barbed wire and kept than there in the wintry frosts of December until thy froze to death. The groans and cries of the persons maimed by rifle butts continually filled the air in the camp grounds. Some they killed with rifle butts on the spot. prisoners of war rushed to a heap of rotten, frost bitten potatoes. This was followed by shooting by the German escort."
I present to the Tribunal other evidence, under the same number, No. 66, the deposition of a French prisoner of war. Emile Leger, a soldier of the 43rd Colonial Infantry Regiment, Service No. 29. This is on page 129 of the book of documents.
In his deposition, the camp at Rava Russka is called "the famous camp of slow death", "Stalag 325." the testimony of the witnesses Roser and Kochan. The Soviet Prosecution has at its disposal a considerable quantity of material unmasking the Hitlerite usurpers in numerous other crimes as well against prisoners of war in the territory of the Lvov district.
It seems to me sufficient to read extracts from one testimony by D.Sh. Manussyevitch and state that this evidence is confirmed by that of two other witnesses: F.G. Ash and G.Y.Khamaydess. All three documents are submitted by me again as Nu. 6 b. detachment which cremated the bodies of men shot by the Germans in the Lvov region, and in particular in the Lisssenitzky camps. Witness Manussyevitch states (I quote, beginning with line 20 at the bottom of page 11 of our No. 6 b) and on page 129 on your book of documents.
"On completing the cremation of bodies we were brought in the night in cars ("the death brigade") to Lissenitzky forest, opposite the Lvov yeast factory. Here in the forest were about 45 pits with the bodies of people shot previously during the period of 1941-42. In the pits there were between 500 and 3,500 bodies in each. There were corpses of soldiers of the Italian, French, Belgian and Russian Armies, i.e. of prisoners of war, but also those fo peaceful inhabitants. All prisoners of war were buried clothed. Because of that, while unearthing them from the pits, I could recognize them by their uniforms, distinguishing signs, buttons, medals and orders and from spoons and kettles. In the same way as in the Yanovsky camp, grass was sown on the spot where the pits were, trees were planted and stumps of cut down trees were placed, in order to erase any trace of these crimes unknown in human history." Citizens, we have at our disposal the testimony of the members of the German armed forces. I submit to the Tribunal as exhibit USSR-62 a document which was signed by more than sixty persons who were members of different units and branches of the German Army. We find their signatures to the document which they addressed to the International Red Cross in January 1942. In their protest they mentioned facts of criminal attitude towards Soviet prisoners of war, facts of which they had personal knowledge. The persons who signed this protest were prisoners of war at the Soviet Camp No. 78. Their protest is the result of the comparison made by the authors of this document between that which they saw with their own eyes as to the treatment of Soviet prisoners of war and that which they witnessed at Camp No. 78.
I will quote a few excerpts from this document. The text begins with the following words: Page 125 of the document book.
"We, the German prisoners of war of Camp No. 78, have read the note by Mr. Molotov, Peoples' Commissar of Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Government, concerning the treatment of prisoners of war in Germany: We would consider the cruelties described in that note impossinle had we not been witnesses of such atrocities. In order that truth should prevail, we feel compelled to confirm that prisoners of war, citizens of the Soviet Union, were ofter subjected to terrible ill-treatment on the part of the members of the German Army, and were even shot." the authors had knowledge:
"Hans Drews, of Regenwalde, a soldier of Company 4 of the 4th Tank Regiment, had this to say:
"I am acquainted with the order issued by Lieut-General Model to the 3rd Tank Division which stated that prisoners should not be taken. A similar order was issued by Maj.Gen. Nehring, the commanding officer of the 18th Tank Division. Two days prior to the beginning of the campaign against Russia we were told at the briefing session of 20 June that in the forthcoming war wounded Red Army men should not have their wounds dressed, because the German Army had not time to be bothered with the wounded." Headquarters Company of the 18th Rank Division, Harry Marek from Alsace near Breslau:
"On 21 June, a day before the beginning of the war against Russia, we had been given by our officers the following order: the officers of the Red Army must be shot on the spot. There is no need to stand upon ceremony with them. It is not necessary either to bother too much with Russian wounded: they must simply be finished off on the spot."
Wilhelm Metzick, from Altona, Hamburg, cites the following case:
"When on 23 June we entered Russia we came to a small place near Beltsa. guns five Russian prisoners in the back." of the Red Army, the soldier of Company 2 of the 3rd Tank Destroyer Battalion, Wolfgang Scharte, of Gerhardtshagen, near Braunschweig, testified:
"One day before the beginning of our campaign against the Soviet Union the officers told us the following: if you happen to meet Russian Commissars, who can be recognized by the Soviet star on their sleeve, and Russian women in uniform, they must be immediately shot. Anyone who does not do so and fails to carry out this order will be held responsible and punished. On 29 June 1941 I myself saw how commanders of the German Army shot wounded Red Army men who were lying on a field of grain near the town of Dubno. were dead. German officers stood nearby and laughed."
Joseph Berdsen of Obernausen, a soldier of the 6th Tank Division, stated:
"Even before entering Russia we had been told at one ot the briefing sessions: Commissars must be shot." 112th Infantry Division, Jacob Korzillias, of Horforst, near Trier, certified as follows:
"At a village near Bolva, in accordance with the order by Lieut. Kierick, the Headquarters Adjutant of the 112th Engineer Battalion, fifteen wounded Red Army men were thrown out of the hut in which they were lying. They were stripped an bayoneted. This was done with the knowledge of the Division Commander, Lieut-Gen. Miet." Infantry Regiment stated:
"On 27 June in the forest near Augustovo, on the order of the battalion Commander, Captain With two Red Army Commissars were shot."
Paul Sender of Koenigsberg, a soldier of the 4th Platoon of Cannon Company 13 of the 2nd Infantry Regiment: Page 135 of the Document Book.
"On 14 July on the road between Porchov and Staraya Russia in the gutter, corporal Schneider of Company 1 of the 2nd Infantry Regiment shot twelve captured Red Army men. When I asked him about it, Schneider said: "Why should I bother with them. They are not even worth a bullet." I know also of another case.
Soon after that he was shot by the acting corporal of Company 1. As soon as the Red Army men tell, the corporal took out of the man's bread bag all the food which was there." prisoners of war, I would like to quote two more depositions of Fritz Rummler and Richard Gilling respectively. Their depositions we find on the lower part of page 4. Fritz Rummler of Streilen in Silesia, a corporal of Company 9 of the 3rd Battalion of the 518th Regiment of the 295th Division, reported the following facts:
"In August, in the town of Zlatopol, I saw how two officers belonging to SS units and two soldiers shot two captured Red Army soldiers after having taken off the army overcoats from these men. These officers and soldiers belonged to the armoured troops of General von Kleist. In September the crew of a German tank on the road to Krasnograd crushed with their vehicle two Red Army men who had been taken prisoner. This was done simply for lust of blood and murder. The tank commander was non-commissioned officer Schneider who belonged to von Kleist's armoured troops. I saw how in our battalion four captured Red Army men were questioned. This took place at Voroshilovsk. The Red Army men refused to answer questions of a military nature which the battalion commander, Major Warnecke asked them. He flew into a rage and personally beat up the prisoners until they lost consciousness. Richard Gilling, stated:
"Many a time I was witness of the inhuman and cruel treatment of Russian prisoners of war. Before my own eyes, acting on the orders of their officers, German soldiers took off the boots from the captured Red Army men and drove them on bare-footed.
Many such facts I witnessed at Tarutino. I was an eyewitness of the following fact. One captured Red Army man refused to give up his boots voluntarily. Soldiers of the escort beat him up to such an extent that he could not move. I saw how prisoners had taken away from them not only their boots but also all their clothing including underwear."
Here I omit a few sentences, and turn to the end of Gilling's statement:
"During the retreat of our column I saw not far from the town of Medyn how German soldiers beat captured Red Army men. One captured man was very tired and unsteady on his legs. One soldier of the escort jumpted at him and began to kick him with his boots and hit him with the butt of his rifle. The same was done by other soldiers. Near the town this prisoner dropped dead."
The statement further reads:
"It is no secret that in the German Army at the front, at Division Headquarters, there are specialists whose particular work is to torture Red Army men and Soviet officers in order to force them in this manner to disclose military information and orders."
The photostate of this statement I submit to the Tribunal. The Tribunal will satisfy itself that there are sixty signatures personally executed by the members of the German armed forces followed by the names of the regiments and smaller units to which they belonged.
I submit to the Tribunal four photographs of German origin. Each of these photographs was taken by a German; the time and place being indicated. One of these photographs is a picture showing the distribution of food; the second shows search for food; the third and fourth are pictures of the Uman prisonerof-war camp.
THE PRESIDENT: Where are the pictures?
COLONEL POKROVSKY: If I am not mistaken, you have been given the photostats.
THE PRESIDENT: This isn't a copy of the photographs; these are the signatures of the sixty German prisoners.
COLONEL POKROVSKY: They will be submitted very shortly, those four photographs.
THE PRESIDENT: Go on. distributed is insufficient. New are almost fighting to get some. The second photograph shows hungry Soviet prisoners of war wandering around an empty barn and eating oil-cakes which they have discovered stored away in the barn as foo for cattle. With respect to the third and fourth photographs, I can submit to the Tribunal important testimony by the witness Bingel. Excerpts from his testimony have a direct hearing on the question of the treatment of Soviet prisoners of war. to the Tribunal as Exhibit USSR-111. On December 27, 1945, Bingel, who was formerly company commander in the German Army, testified -- I quote the excerpt from the eighth page of the record of his interrogation.
"I have already made one statement concerning the interior regime in the prisoners-of-war camp at Uman. This camp was guarded by one company of the 783rd Battalion, and therefore I had knowledge of everything which took place there. It was the task of our battalion to guard the prisoners of war and to supervise highways and railroads.
"This camp was normally designed for six to seven thousand men; however, at that time seventy-four thousand men were kept there.
"Q. Were those barracks?
"A. No. It was formerly a brickyard, and on the site of it was nothing but low sheds for drying bricks.
"Q. Were the prisoners of war quartered there?
"A. It can be hardly said that they were quartered there, because each shed at the most could contain not more than 2-- to 300 men; the rest had to sleep in the open "Q What was the regime at that camp?
"A The regime at the camp was somewhat peculiar. The conditions at the camp created the impression that the commanding officer, Captain Bekker, was unable to handle such a large mass of people and to feed it. In the camp there were two kitchens; though they couldn't really be called kitchens. On concrete and on stones, iron barrels were placed, and in them the food for the prisoners of war was prepared. If these kitchens were to operate for twentyfour hours a day they could prepare food for approximately 2000 men. The usual diet for the prisoners of war, the daily ration, consisted of one loaf of bread for every six men. The bread, however, could hardly be called bread. During the distribution of cooked meals disorders often took place as the prisoners of warand there were more than 70,000 of them in the camp-struggled to get at the food. In such cases the guards used clubs which were the usual thing at the camp. I got the general impression that at these camps the club was the foundation of all things." the Tribunal; the other two will be given you very shortly.
"Q Do you know anything about the death rate at the camp? "A Sixty to seventy men died at the camp daily.
"Q What were the causes? "A Before epidemics broke out it was mostly because the men were being killed.
"Q Killed during the distribution of food? "A Either during the distribution of food or during working time, and generally men were being killed throughout the whole day." shown the photographs of the Uman camp. Bingel was asked the following question.
"The camp shown here, is it the one you spoke about, or some other camp?"
After this he was shown photographs from negative 13/18 of August 14, 1941, and from negative 13/22, of the same date. Bingel replied:
"Yes, it is the same camp of which I spoke.
"This actually is not the camp, but a claypit which belongs to the camp, where the prisoners of war coming from the front were placed. Later on they were distributed among the different sections of the camp."
"Q. What can you say about the second photograph?
"A. The second photograph shows the same camp only taken from another side, from the right side. These buildings which are shown here were actually the only brick buildings at that camp. This brick building, though entirely empty and undamaged, and which had excellent large quarters, was not used for housing the prisoners of war." to the Soviet prisoners of war at the so-called "Grosslazarett" of the town of Slavuta in the Kamenez-Podolsk region should not be considered as the limit of human baseness. Be that as it may, the extermination of Soviet prisoners of war by the Hitlerites at the "Grosslazarett" is one of the darkest pages in the history of Fascist crimes. Extraordinary State Commission, and will read into the record several excerpts from the report itself as well as the appendices thereto. units of the Red Army discovered on the site of the restricted military area what the Germans called the "Grosslazarett" for the Soviet prisoners of war. In the "Lazarett" there were found more than 500 emaciated and critically ill men. The interrogation of these men and the special investigation carried out by medico-judicial exports, and by the expert members of the Central Institute of Food of the Peoples Commissariat of Health of the USSR, enabled a detailed reconstruction to be made of the extermination of a large number of Soviet prisoners of war which took place at that appalling institution.
On page 153 of the book of documents you will find the place from which I am going to cite.
"In the fall of 1941 German Fascist invaders occupied the town of Slavuta and organized a 'Lazarett' there for the wounded and sick officers and men of the Red Army, the designation of which was 'Grosslazarett, Slavuta Zailage 301.'" The "Lazarett" was located approximately 1 1/2 to 2 kilometers to the south east of Slavuta, and occupied ten three-story buildings-blocks.
All these buildings the Hitlerites surrounded by a dense net of wire entanglements. Along those entanglements, at a distance of every 10 meters, were built towers in which machine guns search lights, and guards were placed. "Grosslazarett," as represented by the commanding officer, Captain Plank, and later Major Pavlisk, who replaced him, the Deputy Commander Kronsdorfer, Captain Boie, Stabsarzt Dr. Borbe, his deputy Dr. Sturm, Master Sergeant Ilsemann and Technical Sergeant Bekker, carried out a mass extermination of prisoners of war by means of creating a special regime of hunger, congestion and insanitary conditions, the use of tortures and outright killings, by with-holding medical treatment from sick and wounded, and by forcing utterly emaciated men to perform the hardest work. "Grosslazarett" the hospital of death. I quote a small part of the section thus entitled. This is the third page of the Russian original.
"At the 'Grosslazarett' the German authorities concentrated 15 to 18 thousand critically and slightly wounded Soviet prisoners of war, as well as those suffering from different contagious and noncontagious diseases.
prisoners of war were continuously moved in. On their way the prisoners of war were subjected to tortures, starved and killed.
From each train which arrived at the "Lazarett" the Hitlerites throw out hundreds of corpses." each train unloaded at a branch line, 800-900 corpses used to be thrown out. The report of the Commission states further as follows.
"In the course of their march thousands of Soviet prisoners of war perished from hunger, thirst, lack of care, savage arbitrary practices of the German guard. war at the gate of the "Lazarett" with beatings with butts and rubber clubs, and then the leather footgear, warm, clothing and personal belongings of the newcomers were taken away. reports that infectious diseases were deliberately spread by the German medical officers among the prisoners of war in the "Lazarett." "The German medical officers artificially created in the 'Grosslazarett' an unbelieveable congestion. The prisoners of war were forced to stand up close to each other, broke down with fatigue and exhaustion, fell and died. The Fascists used different methods of 'congestion' in the 'Lazarett.'" A former prisoner of war, I. Y. Chuazhev, reported that the Germans, "by shooting sub-machine guns created a congestion in the place and the men perforce pressed closer to each other; then the Hitlerites pushed in some more sick and wounded and the door was closed."
of war suffered in one chamber and one block. not more than 400 patients, the number of typhus and tuberculosis cases amounted to 1800.
"The rooms were never cleaned. The sick remained, for months on end, in the same linen they had worn when captured. Many were half-dressed; others were entirely nude. The buildings were not heated and the stoves fell apart. There was no water for washing. As a result of these unsanitary conditions, the death rates were very high." food consisted of 250 grams of flour which was supposed to be given to the prisoners, and such flour was found in the "Lazarett" in the quantity of tons. On the bags made of paper there was the label "Scholmehe". Samples of this flour were sent for investigation to the Central Food Institute of the Commission for USSR National Welfare. of War by the Hitlerites in the "Gross-Lazarett", as No. USSR 5a, on pages 9, 10 and 11 of this document. out by this institution and, on the other hand, by the analysis which was carried out in the institute, there was "Ersatz-Flour" with the addition of some authentic flour. It was proved that it was impossible to bake a loaf with "Ersatz-Flour" alone. It was found that the bread was made with the addition of some quantity of natural flour, and the user of that bread was driven into starvation. The analysis has shown that the flour is nothing else but particles of flour as low as two millimeters and sometimes three; and under the microscope they showed, together with food and vegetable fiber, they found grains of starch and the institute came to the conclusion that the use of such bread, on account of the irritation of the intestines, led to diseases of the alimentary tract.
I wish to report the result of the examination of 112 corpses. In the first case, the cause of death was found with respect to 96 victims, was exhaustion. of death, has been determined on the basis of the examination of the 500 corpses.
diet in the Slavutsk "Gross-Lazarett" can be characterized by entirely inadequate food. The bread was 64 percent with the addition of sawdust and from foul potatoes and other excrement.
I am citing from page 4 of Document USSR 5:
"In the "Gross-Lazarett" we periodically observed outbreaks of a disease of an unknown nature, called 'para-cholera' by the German doctors. The appearance of 'para-cholera' was the result of barbarous experiments by the German doctors. Quite suddenly these outbreaks would appear and as suddenly they would vanish. The mortality in 'para-cholera' was from 60 to 80 percent. Autopsies were performed on some of the victims of the disease, to which autopsies no captured Russian Medical Officers were admitted." sub-division S. conditions of searched war prisoners kept in the camp; more so, with a lot of material, the food also was terrible.
In the "Gross-Lazarett" there was a considerable number of medical help. At the same time, as stated in the communication of the Government Commission, sick and wounded officers and soldiers of the Red Army did not receive even the most elementary medical attention. And how can there be any talk of medical attention when the entire task of the "Gross-Lasarett" was diametrically opposed to such assistance. The administration of the "Gross-Lazarett" not only strove to destroy the Prisoners of war physically; they endeavored to fill the last days of the sick and wounded with suffering and anguish.
I quote part of this section. It is printed on page 4 of Document USSR 5.
"In the "Gross-Lazarett", the Soviet Prisoners were subjected to torture and torment; they were beaten when food was distributed, they were beaten again when sent out to work. The legal-medical examination of the exhumed bodies brought to light, amongst a number of other bodies of Prisoners of War, the body of a prisoner who, in his death agony had been wounded with a knife in the inguinal region with the knife still sticking in the wounded. He was thrown in a grave still alive and covered With earth.