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frequently remained in the burning
buildings, and jumped out of the windows only when the heat became
unbearable. They then tried to crawl with broken bones across the
street into buildings which were not afire . . . . Life in the sewers
was not pleasant after the first week. Many times we could hear loud
voices in the sewers . . . . Tear gas bombs were thrown into the
manholes, and the Jews driven out of the sewers and captured.
Countless numbers of Jews were liquidated in sewers and bunkers
through blasting. The longer the resistance continued, the tougher
became the members of the Waffen SS, Police and Wehrmacht, who always
discharged their duties in an exemplary manner." Stroop
recorded that his action at Warsaw eliminated "a proved total of
56,065 people. To that we have to add the number of those killed through
blasting, fire, etc., which cannot be counted." Grim evidence of
mass murders of Jews was also presented to the Tribunal in cinematograph
films depicting the communal graves of hundreds of victims which were
subsequently discovered by the Allies.
These atrocities were all part and parcel of the policy inaugurated in
1941, and it is not surprising that there should be evidence that one or
two German officials entered vain protests against the brutal manner in
which the killings were carried out. But the methods employed never
conformed to a single pattern. The massacres of Rowno and Dubno, of
which the German engineer Graebe spoke, were examples of one method; the
systematic extermination of Jews in concentration camps, was another.
Part of the "final solution" was the gathering of Jews from
all German-occupied Europe in concentration camps. Their physical
condition was the test of life or death. All who were fit to work were
used as slave laborers in the concentration camps, all who were not fit
to work were destroyed in gas chambers and their bodies burnt. Certain
concentration camps such as Treblinka and Auschwitz were set aside for
this main purpose. With regard to Auschwitz, the Tribunal heard the
evidence of Höss, the commandant of the camp from 1 May 1940 to 1
December 1943. He estimated that in the camp of Auschwitz alone in that
time 2,500,000 persons were exterminated, and that a further 500,000
died from disease and starvation. Höss described the screening for
extermination by stating in evidence:
"We had two SS doctors on duty at
Auschwitz to examine the incoming transports of prisoners. The
prisoners would be marched by one of the doctors who would make spot
decisions as they walked by. Those who were fit for work were sent
into the camp. Others were sent immediately to the extermination
plants. Children of tender years were invariably exterminated since by
reason of their youth they
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