dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
VON SCHIRACH: It says here youth home (Heimstaette), not hostel (Herberge). I am not familiar with the expression "Heimstaette." That must refer to a home run by the National Socialist Public Welfare Organization or the National Socialist Women's League. We had only "Jugendheime" and "Herbergen."
MR. DODD: Well, doesn't it strike you as being strangely coincidental that in your program for one of your youth camps you suggest a show which portrays a Jewish man with a great nose and ridicules him and teaches children to dislike him and laugh at him and that from a youth camp a youngster writes to Streicher saying that she and boys and girls saw such a show?
VON SCHIRACH: This letter was not written from any youth camp.
MR. DODD: Well, I accept it if that is your answer.
VON SCHIRACH: I do not deny That this puppet play was shown and that this letter was written; but I believe the connection is pulled in by The hair, so to speak. The connection is a very remote one.
MR. DODD: You think the connection about the ridiculing of the Jews is very far afield and pulled in by the hair.
VON SCHIRACH: No. I dispute the statement that this is a Hitler Youth institution. I believe actually it is a day nursery run by the National Socialist Public Welfare Organization or something similar.
MR. DODD: Well, maybe the explanation is that all the young people in Germany saw one of those shows. But, in any event, I want to take up the last matter on this subject with you. This morning your counsel examined you about the confiscation of a monastery, I believe it was in Austria while you were there, Klosterneuburg. Do you remember?
VON SCHIRACH: We discussed Count Schwarzenberg's palace this morning. That was not a monastery. It was the property of a private citizen.
MR. DODD: Well, the document that Counsel Dr. Sauter referred to was R-146, USA-678. It was a letter from Bormann to all Gauleiter, and it began by saying that valuable Church properties had to be seized in Italy and in Austria. It was signed by Bormann. And then also on that document was a letter from Lammers saying that there had been some dispute as to whether the seized Church property should go back to the Reich or should remain in your Gaul You remember that, don't you? Well, now, you seized the monastery down there, didn't you, in 1941, at Klosterneuburg? Klosterneuburg, you know what I am referring to. I may mispronounce it.
VON SCHIRACH: Yes. The well-known foundation Klosterneuburg, the famous monastery, served as a receiving office for collections of works of art taken from our art museum.
MR. DODD: Yes. Now, what excuse did you have for seizing the monastery at that time?
VON SCHIRACH: I can no longer give you exact details with regard to this. I believe there were very few people in the monastery, that the large building was not being used to the fullest possible extent, and that we urgently needed more space for the expansion of the experimental station run in conjunction with our State School of Viniculture. I believe that is why this monastery was confiscated.
MR. DODD: All right. I am going to ask that you look at Document 3927-PS, and I wish you would remember that this morning you told the Tribunal that you stopped the confiscation of churches and Church property in Austria. When you look at this document I wish you to recall your testimony.
THE PRESIDENT: Did you offer M-25 in evidence or not?
MR. DODD: I wish to do so, Mr. President. It is USA-861. And this one, 3927-PS, becomes USA-862. Now, the first page of this document shows that it is marked secret. It is dated 22 January 1941. It is a letter addressed to Dellbruegge in your organization in Henna. He says that he hears there is a possibility of getting a Hitler School, which the city of Hamburg is also trying to get, and that he wants the monastery Klosterneuburg considered as the place for the Hitler School in Vienna. This letter is written by Scharizer, your deputy, as you described him yesterday. Now, he enclosed a communication, a teletype letter, from Bormann; and if you turn the page, you will see that it is dated 13 January. Bormann says it is strictly confidential: "It is learned that the population does not show any indignation when monastery buildings are used to serve what appears to be a generally appropriate purpose." He goes on to say: "Their conversion into hospitals, convalescent homes, educational institutes, Adolf Hitler Schools, may be considered as serving a generally appropriate purpose." Now, that communication was dated the 13th of January, and your deputy wrote the letter on the 22d. Now turn another page, and you will find a Gestapo report on the monastery, dated 23 January 1941, addressed to your assistant Dellbruegge. I wish you would look where it says, "Oral order of 23 January 1941." Apparently somebody in your organization, you or your assistants, orally asked the Gestapo to get up a report on this monastery the very day that you wrote to Berlin asking that it be considered as a Hitler School. There are some charges against the inhabitants of that monastery in this Gestapo report, but I ask you to turn over further and you will find where you wrote an order for the taking over of the monastery as an Adolf Hitler School on 22 February 1941. I will show it to you if you like to see it, but that order bears your initials, the original does-Pages 15 to 17 of the photostat that you have.
MR. DODD: Now, you framed up an excuse to seize that monastery, didn't you, when you really wanted it for a Hitler School; and you didn't have any just grounds for seizing it. And you get the Gestapo to write a report and then you never referred to the reason that the Gestapo framed up for you.
VON SCHIRACH: I myself as head of these schools was naturally extremely anxious to have such a school established in Vienna. At one time the idea expressed here of taking Klosterneuburg and housing one of the Adolf Hitler Schools in it did occur to me, and I probably did discuss it with Herr Scharizer; but I dropped the idea completely. Klosterneuburg was never converted into an Adolf Hitler School.
MR. DODD: No. But it never was turned back to The Church people, either, was it?
VON SCHIRACH: No. Since the museum space available in Vienna was not sufficient for the very large collections, we wanted to turn this monastery into an additional large museum which would be open to the public. We began to carry out this plan, and a great part of the collections was transferred to the building. In addition, we needed the strongly built cellars of this monastery for the safekeeping of the many art treasures which we had to protect against bombing attacks. It occurred to me that we might house an Adolf Hitler School in this building and I discussed the possibility with one or two of my colleagues and then abandoned it: Firstly, because it would have caused some ill-feeling if we had housed an Adolf Hitler School in a building which had formerly been consecrated ground, and secondly, because we badly needed the monastery for these other purposes. I have nothing to add to my explanation.
MR. DODD: You will notice the date of that whole transaction and the communication from Bormann. When did you first discover that Bormann was so antireligious and anti-Church as you told the Tribunal he was?
VON SCHIRACH: Bormann...
MR. DODD: Just tell us when you found that out.
VON SCHIRACH: I was just about to. Bormann showed his antireligious views most clearly in 1943; but they had already begun to appear in 1937.
MR. DODD: And this telegram from him was when? 1941?
VON SCHIRACH: 1941.
MR. DODD: Witness, when did you first start to do business with Himmler?
VON SCHIRACH: I met Hitler...
MR. DODD: Himmler.
VON SCHIRACH: I met Himmler in 1929 when I visited the offices of the Party Leadership. At that time he was the propaganda chief of the Party. That was our first meeting.
MR. DODD: I did not really want to know, although it's of interest, when you first met him. What I really wanted to know was when you with your youth groups started really to do business with him for the first time. And by "business" I mean arrangements such as the recruitment of young men into the Death's-Head Brigade of the SS.
VON SCHIRACH: I think I explained that this morning. One of the first agreements laid down was, I think, contained in the agreement regarding the patrol service, the date of which I do not recall. This was not, by the way, a guarantee of reinforcements for Death's-Head units, but for police units generally. These were special troops to be at the disposal of the Police.
MR. DODD: How long did you continue to channel or divert young men from your Youth organization to the SS? When was the last time that you remember this program being effective?
VON SCHIRACH: I did not artfully drive young people into the SS. But I permitted the SS to recruit among young people like any other organization.
MR. DODD: I did not ask you that. I asked you when you would say was the latest date when you were effectively helping at least, Himmler to get young candidates from the young people of Germany through your Hitler Youth organization. I do not expect an exact date. Approximately?
VON SCHIRACH: From 1940 on I tried constantly to have youth taken into Army units. The SS, the Waffen-SS, carried on very active recruitment among youth up to the last day of the war. I could not prevent this recruitment.
MR. DODD: And you knew what use they were being put to in the last days of the war and in the mid-days of the war, did you not?
VON SCHIRACH: I did know that all young people who were drafted or who volunteered had to fight.
MR. DODD: I am talking about something other than fighting. You knew what was going on in the East, and you knew who the guards were in the concentration camps, did you not?
VON SCHIRACH: This morning I testified on what I knew about events in the East. I did not know that young men who volunteered to go into the Waffen-SS were used during the war to guard concentration camps.
MR. DODD: You did not know who were the guards there, although you visited two of them yourself?
VON SCHIRACH: Those guards did not belong to the Waffen-SS.
MR. DODD: I know, but your agreement with Himmler provides specifically for recruitment for SS Death's-Head troops.
VON SCHIRACH: When I concluded that agreement, I did not know that he effected the supervision of concentration camps chiefly by means of Death's-Head units. Besides, I thought at that time that concentration camps were something quite normal. I said so this morning.
MR. DODD: You told the Tribunal yesterday that it was in 1944, I think, that you found out about the extermination. And I want to talk to you about that a little bit, and ask you some questions. And the first one is, how did you find out? Was it only through this man Colin Ross?
VON SCHIRACH: I said that I heard of it through Colin Ross. . .
MR. DODD: All right.
VON SCHIRACH: And, furthermore, that I asked numerous questions of everyone I could reach, in order to get definite information.
MR. DODD: Really I asked you if, from any other source, you found out? And you can answer that pretty simply. We know that you found out through Ross. Was there anyone else from whom you found out?
VON SCHIRACH: I Could not obtain any really definite information.
MR. DODD: All right.
VON SCHIRACH: Most people had no information. I only received positive-that is, detailed-information by way of the Warthegau.
MR. DODD: Now, as a matter of fact, you got regular reports about the extermination of the Jews, did you not?
VON SCHIRACH: These...
MR. DODD: Written reports, I mean.
VON SCHIRACH: These reports, two of which have been submitted in this Court, were sent to the Reich Defense Commissioner for the attention of the expert in question. This expert passed the copies on to the inspector-I believe-or the commander of the regular Police. I have looked at the copy which was submitted here in Kaltenbrunner's case but I had never seen it before (Document 3876-PS).
MR. DODD: You mean you did not know that it was arriving in your office?
VON SCHIRACH: I have never seen this text before.
MR. DODD: All right.
VON SCHIRACH: My office was the Central Office; it was not the office of the Reich Defense Commissioner. The affairs of the Reich Defense Commissioner were officially in charge of the Regierungspraesident, whose personal adviser took care of routine matters. My mail was delivered at the Central Office.
MR. DODD: You were the Reich Defense Commissioner for that district, were you not?
VON SCHIRACH: Yes.
MR. DODD: This was an SS report of a highly confidential nature, was it not? They were not just peddling this all over Germany?
VON SCHIRACH: I do not know how many copies of this wet sent out, I cannot say.
MR. DODD: 100, and you got the sixty-seventh copy.
VON SCHIRACH: And these copies, as I gathered from the original which I saw, were not sent to me but to the competent adviser, a Herr Fischer.
MR. DODD: And who was Herr Fischer?
VON SCHIRACH: I have already told you this morning the I have no idea who this Herr Fischer was. I assume that he we' the expert attached to the Regierungspraesident, the expert of defense matters.
MR. DODD: Now, I am going to show you some documents from your own files. We don't have a full translation, Mr. President, because some of this we located too late (Document 3914-PS). But I think you will readily recognize this original is from your files. And in there you will find-and I will direct your attention to the page-something that I think will recall to your mind who Dr. Fischer is. Now, I think it is on Page 29, you will find the names of persons to serve on the Reich Defense Council submitted; and you will find the name of Fischer, together with General Stuelpnagel, Major General Gautier, Dr. Foerster-do you find that? This was your own Reich Defense Council, before which you appeared from time to time, and with whom you met frequently. And I will show you documents on that, if you care to deny it.
VON SCHIRACH: Just a moment, please. Will you please re peat the page to me?
MR. DODD: Page 29; it is a memorandum dated 28 September 1940.
VON SCHIRACH: I have it now.
MR. DODD: Do you find the name of Dr. Fischer? You found Dr. Fischer's name as one of those suggested to your defense council? His is the last name, by the way, and his signature. He is the one that suggested the others to you.
THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Dodd, will you go a little bit more slowly?
MR. DODD: Yes.
VON SCHIRACH: His name is the twentieth name on the list "Regierungsrat Dr. Fischer, Expert for Reich Defense Matters"- in other words, expert attached to the Regierungspraesident. I have probably seen him at some meeting or other. I take it that he kept the minutes. However, I must admit that I have no personal recollection of this gentleman. I cannot attach any owner to that name; but it is clear to me now that he was the person who took charge of incoming mail for the Reich Defense Commissioner and probably kept the minutes as well.
MR. DODD: All right.
VON SCHIRACH: In view of his junior status-he is only a Regierungsrat-he cannot have held any other appointment on this council.
MR. DODD: On Page 31 of that same file you will find another reference to him, and your initials on the paper this time. It is the membership list of the Reich Defense Council. There are 20 persons on there, and the last name is Fischer's. And at the bottom of the page are your initials, apparently approving the list. Do you see that? .
VON SCHIRACH: Yes; I had to initial this list.
MR. DODD: And you approved the membership, did you not?
VON SCHIRACH: I cannot swear that I would not recognize Dr. Fischer again if I were confronted with him. He seems to have been the official who kept the minutes. However, among the large circle of people who attended meetings of this kind, he did not come to my attention. Only very few Reich defense meetings of this sort actually took place. What seems to me the decisive point is that he did not report to me personally but to the Regierungspraesident.
MR. DODD: How could you fail to meet him? You met regularly in 1940 with this Reich Defense Council. We have some documents here, and I will be glad to show them to you, showing exactly what you said before that council.
VON SCHIRACH: Yes, as I said, he probably kept the minute; of the meetings.
MR. DODD: Well surely, then, you saw him certainly on some occasions, between 1940, the date of these files, and 1942, the date of the SS reports on the exterminations. He apparently was with you for 2 years before the first report that we have, which is dated 1942, and he was 1 of 20 on your council
VON SCHIRACH: I believe I must describe the exact composition of this Reich Defense Council. There were the leading commanding generals of the Army and the Luftwaffe; there were various Gauleiter; there were the people mentioned here; there was Dr. Putt, the representative of the Economic Management Staff and all the others who are listed here. In this large circle of people, whom I had to welcome, there was an official who kept the minutes and who was one of many officials in my office. These meetings, as you have probably ascertained, took place very infrequently. Dr. Fischer did not report to me currently, nor did he submit to me the minutes of these sessions; the Regierungspraesident reported to me.
MR. DODD: Do you think that Heinrich Himmler or Reinhard Heydrich were sending these reports to inferior people around Germany in these Gaue about the exterminations in the East?
VON SCHIRACH: If these reports had been meant for me, they would have been sent to me directly. Moreover, I said today that I do not dispute having been informed of the shooting of Jews in the East, but at a later period. I mentioned that in connection with the war. However, the reports themselves were not in my hands. If these reports had been before me, they would have had a certain note, which I would recognize immediately.
MR. DODD: Well, let's see. Of course they are addressed to you. to the attention of Fischer. But I am going to move on a little bit. Now I am going to tell you that you got weekly reports. You haven't seen these. What do you say to that?
VON SCHIRACH: Weekly reports?
MR. DODD: Yes.
VON SCHIRACH: I received innumerable weekly reports from every possible office.
MR. DODD: No, I am talking about one kind of report. I am talking about the reports from Heydrich and Himmler.
VON SCHIRACH: I do not know what you mean.
MR. DODD: Well, you had better take a look (Document 3943-PS). We have 55 of them, for 55 weeks. They are all here, and they run consecutively, and Dr. Fischer is not involved in these. And each one bears the stamp of your office having received it on it, and the date that it was received. They tell, by the way-and you can look at them-what was happening to the Jews in the East.
VON SCHIRACH: All these probably-I cannot look at them all just now. These reports went from the Chief of the Security Police to the Office of the Reich Defense Commissioner. They were not, as I can tell from the first document, initialed by myself, but bear the initials of the Regierungspraesident. I did not receive these reports; 'otherwise my initial would have to be there.
MR. DODD: Dr. Dellbruegge was the man who received them, according to the note, and he was your chief assistant. Incidentally, I think we ought to make this clear to the Tribunal, both of your chief assistants were SS Brigadefuehrer, were they not?
VON SCHIRACH: I should in any case have stated that Dr. Dellbruegge was one of Himmler's confidants; but I believe...
MR. DODD: And he was your chief assistant, that is the point I am making. And so was your other chief assistant, also an SS Brigadefuehrer.
VON SCHIRACH: I believe that this statement proves the opposite of what you want to prove against me.
MR. DODD: Well, I am going to go on with these weekly reports in a minute, but there is one thing I do want to ask you. Were you pretty friendly with Heydrich?
VON SCHIRACH: I knew Heydrich, and while he was Reich Protector in Prague he extended an invitation to me as President of the Southeastern Europe Society to hold a meeting there which I accepted. However, I did not have close personal contact with Heydrich.
MR. DODD: Did you think he was a good public servant at the time that he was terrorizing Czechoslovakia?
VON SCHIRACH: I had the impression that Heydrich, as he said himself during my stay in Prague, wanted to carry out a policy of conciliation, especially in regard to Czech workers. I did not see in him an exponent of a policy of terror. Of course, I have no practical knowledge of the incidents which took place in Czechoslovakia. I made only this one visit, or possibly one further visit.
MR. DODD: You sent a telegram to "Dear Martin Bormann" when Heydrich was assassinated; do you remember that-the man who was, I understand, not in your good standing in 1942? Do you remember when Heydrich was assassinated by some Czech patriots in Prague?
VON SCHIRACH: Yes.
MR. DODD: Do you remember what you did when you heard about it?
VON SCHIRACH: No, I do not remember exactly.
MR. DODD: Perhaps if I read you this telegram you will remember it. "To Reichsleiter Bormann, Berlin, Party Chancellery; Express. Urgent. Immediate attention. "Dear Martin Bormann: "I request that the following be submitted to the Fuehrer. "Knowing the Czech population and its attitude in Vienna as well as in the Protectorate, I would draw your attention to the following: "The enemy powers and the British cliques around Benes have for a long time felt bitter about the co-operation generally found among the Czech workers and their contribution to the German war economy. They are seeking for a means to play off the Czech population and the Reich against each other. The attack on Heydrich was undoubtedly planned in London. The British arms of the assailant suggest parachuted agents. London hopes by means of this murder to induce the Reich to take extreme measures with the aim of bringing about a resistance movement among Czech workers. Id order to prevent the world from thinking that the population of the Protectorate is in opposition to Hitler, these acts must immediately be branded as of British authorship. A sudden and violent air attack on a British cultural town would be most effective and the world would have learned of this through the headline 'Revenge for Heydrich.' That alone should induce Churchill to desist immediately from the procedure begun in Prague of stirring up revolt. The Reich replies to the attack at Prague by a counterattack on world public opinion. "It is suggested that the following information be given the press tomorrow regarding the attempt on Heydrich's life." And then you go on to say that it was the work of British agents and that it originated in Britain. You sign it, "Heil Hitler, Dein Schirach." Do you remember sending that telegram to Bormann?