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A. I have already mentioned previously — and I will recapitulate
what I said — how I worked in camp IV. When I carried cement, I worked
directly for Farben. In the shoemaker’s shop, I worked directly for
Farben. As a painter, I worked for the private firm of Burbank, and as a
so-called calculator, for the paint shop of I. G. Farben —
Q. As
a calculator, you had inside work, sedentary work?
A. I had a roof over
my head.
Q. Was that not work which had to give you, of necessity, a
certain amount of freedom? I don't want to hear anything else, but of necessity
it was connected with a certain amount of freedom? I would assume that as
calculator you had a certain power of decision.
A. Please, might I ask
you to define your question a little more? What do you mean by power of
decision?
Q. Tell me what you did as calculator?
A. I had an
adding machine and I figured out the dimensions of the various objects which
had to be painted.
Q. I see. And you did this from what time?
A. According to the season of the year. I believe in the summer from
6:30 to 4:30 or 5:00. There may be a discrepancy of a half hour or so. And in
the wintertime, I believe from 7:30 to 3:30. It is true, however, that in the
room where I worked there was a German foreman who had me under his eye.
Q. And how did this German foreman act toward you?
A. He took
notice of me. He never hit me, but he never did me any favor or gave me even a
piece of bread, although he knew how we suffered. I can give his name.
Q. May I ask what was the proportion of such positions in closed rooms?
What was the proportion of inside work to outside work?
A. I do not
understand your question.
Q. Witness, what percentage of the prisoners
had to work outdoors and what percentage could work indoors?
A. I have
to give you that chronologically. Until 1942, there was no prisoner who worked
inside within the plant area. In 1944, at the time when I left the camp, that
was the beginning of August 1944, I estimate about 3, 4, or perhaps 5 percent.
Q. Who did not work outdoors, you mean?
A. Who did not work
outdoors. There were a number of working details, maybe 200, of which perhaps
30 details worked under a roof. But those details that worked inside were only
three or five or ten or fifteen men strong. But for the heavy work, cables,
painting, scaffold work, there were details of about 150 to 300 men, who worked
outdoors all the time.
Q. Now, Witness, how could one get an inside
job? Did the prisoners who were in special need get this easier work?
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