TRANSLATION OF DOCUMENT NO-4145

PROSECUTION EXHIBIT 10

AFFIDAVIT OF WALTER BLUME, 29 JUNE 1947*

AFFIDAVIT


I, Walter Blume, swear, depose, and state -

1. I was born on 23 July 1906 in Dortmund. I attended the elementary school and the Real gymnasium and graduated in Dortmund in 1919. I then studied law for three years at the Universities of Bonn, Jena, and Muenster and passed my first law examination. Then followed a further three years' training in Hamm and Dortmund and, in 1932, I passed the bar examination in Berlin. In April 1933 I obtained my doctor's degree at Erlangen. I was thereupon engaged by the commissioner of police in Dortmund for information purposes and remained there until about May 1934. Shortly before the Roehm revolt I was appointed as a government administration officer to act as chief of the State Police Office at Dortmund. After the Roehm revolt I was transferred to the then Prussian Secret Police Office. I remained there until the spring of 1935. Until autumn 1937 I was in charge of the State Police Office at Halle/Saale and until the beginning of 1939 I was in charge of the State Police Office in Hannover. I was in charge of the State Police Office in Berlin until immediately before the beginning of the Russian campaign. I June 1941 I was assigned to Dueben and until approximately the middle of August I was chief of the Sonderkommando 7a in Einsatzgruppe "B". In August 1941 I was recalled to the Reich Security Main Office as personnel referent and remained there until June or July 1942. After an assignment which occupied me for 1½ months in Feldes, I became inspector of the security police in Duesseldorf. I carried on this employment until August 1943. I then went to Athens as commander in chief of the security police and remained there for about one year. After that I was for a time without employment and was later ordered to take over the frontier police in office I of the Reich Security Main Office. At the beginning of 1945 I was sent by office IV to Bad Blankenburg, in order to take over the direction of the censorship department there and extend it. I could not complete this assignment, as I withdrew in the direction of Salzburg to the Waffen SS and was taken prisoner along with them. After spending a year as a prisoner in American hands, I was released from prison, having remained silent on the subject

*Defendant Blume testified in Court on 31 October, 4 and 5 November 1947 (Tr. pp. 1754-1927).

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on my activity in the security police, and until my arrest in the summer of 1947 I lived under my own name as a servant to a farmer.

2. I have been a member of the NSDAP since 1 May 1933. My party number is 3,282,505. I have been a member of the SS since the summer of 1934 or 1935. My SS number is 267,224.

3. During the setting up of the Einsatzgruppen and Einsatzkommandos during the months of May-June 1941 I was at Dueben. During June, Heydrich, Chief of the Security Police and SD, and Streckenbach, head of office I of the Reich Security Main Office, held lectures on the duties of the Einsatzgruppen and Einsatzkommandos. At this time we were already being instructed about the tasks of exterminating the Jews. It was stated that eastern Jewry was the intellectual reservoir of bolshevism and, therefore, in the Fuehrer's opinion, must be exterminated. This speech was made to a small audience. Although I cannot remember the individuals present, I assume that many of the Einsatzgruppen chiefs and Einsatz- and Sonderkommandos chiefs were present. I heard another speech by Heydrich in the Prinz Albrecht Palace in Berlin, in the course of which he again emphasized these points.

4. As chief of Sonderkommando 7a I carried out one execution in the course of my duty. I remember one occasion on which between 70 to 80 people were executed in Vitebsk and another occasion on which a similar number were executed in Minsk. On the latter occasion I only received a direct order from Nebe, chief of Einsatzgruppe B, to find out whether this execution had taken place. I was not present during the whole execution, but convinced myself that it was carried out. In both cases a kind of trench was dug; the persons destined to die were placed in front of it and shot with carbines. About 10 people were shot simultaneously by an execution force of 30 to 40 men. There was no doctor present at the execution, but the leader of the execution force who was responsible made sure that the people were dead. Coups de grace were not necessary. Neither was there in my unit any specialist in the art of shooting in the neck. I did not take part in any further mass execution.

5. I received all orders regarding executions, direction, and duties of Sonderkommando 7a, which was subordinate to me in Dueben or in the Prinz Albrecht Palace in Berlin. During the campaign I never received any further orders.

6. I do not know by whom the reports of the Einsatzgruppen were compiled in Berlin.

Nuernberg, 29 June 1947

[Signed] WALTER BLUME

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