Document 63
[PMO file BW 30/43, page
19] |
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|
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| Translation of letter from Messrs J A Topf &
Sons: |
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| [manuscript] BW 30 |
To
Auschwitz Waffen SS and Police
Central Construction
Management
Auschwitz. Eastern Upper Silesia |
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Received
7th June 43
[initialed by Bischoff
and Kirschneck] |
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ERFURT. 2/6/43
hes.
30554/43
Our Division D IV R,
Prf
|
Subject:
Krematorium II
Chimney
We acknowledge
receipt of your telegrams: |
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| Of 29:5.43 [Saturday] |
“Construction drawings for Krematorium for chimney
promised by Herr Prüfer for Messrs Köhler not yet arrived. Request
immediate dispatch as work has had to cease.” |
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| of 1/6/1943 [Tuesday] |
“Send immediately drawing requested by telegram for
Messrs Köhler concerning chimney Krematorium chimney II [.] Chief
engineer Prüfer fully aware of the purpose of this request [.]
Delay therefore inexcusable [.] Telegraph whether the drawings
have been sent [.] Chimney constructor had to stop work today due
to absence of drawing."” |
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| To which replied today: |
| “Requested Köhler by telegram Saturday [29th May] supply
original drawing of chimney enable us produce construction drawing
as we do not know dimensions of the chimney.” |
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| Replied in writing |
| PTO |
[Friday] 16/7/1943 Correspondence register no.
[initialed]
Kirschneck |
|
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[The author discovered this letter, which the
Auschwitz Museum subsequently archived in the BW 30/34 file, in
1984 in the investigation service of the Warsaw Central Commission
for research into the Hitlerian crimes in Poland. It had been
transmitted to the Warsaw Central Commission by the Moscow
Prosecutor as part of the incriminating evidence in the trial of
the “cremation architects”, Dejaco and Ertl, held in Vienna at the
beginning of 1972. THIS LETTER FROM TOPF HAS NOTHING WHATEVER TO
DO WITH DEJACO AND ERTL, since when it was written the only
members of the Bauleitung concerned with the chimneys were SS
Second Lieutenant Kirschneck and the civilian employee Jährling.
Among the fifty or so German documents sent by the Soviets to the
Poles to be passed on to the Austrians, this letter has no
relation with the others (and the communication of part of a
drawing of one of the Topf disinfestation ovens installed in the
Zentral Sauna is even less comprehensible). This Topf letter makes
sense only when compared with the telegrams in PMO file, BW 30/34.
It then becomes very useful, as it enables us to give a precise
date, 29th May 1943, to the undated telegram 29684/43/Ki/Schul and
helps us to follow the process of repairing the chimney of
Krematorium II. The letter is obviously incomplete, as the
abbreviation “b.w.” [bitte wenden! / please turn over] shows that
it was continued on the verso. It is part of a file of about one
hundred documents (bearing the two numbers 82 and 87) held by the
Soviets, and only about forty of which are known. It is possible
that in 1945, the Soviet Commission, having seized this letter at
Auschwitz, forgot in the heat of the moment to photograph the
verso, and it is also likely that the Moscow Prosecutor, having
chosen this document for reasons known only to him, also omitted
to communicate the
verso]. |
