Interrogation protocol of former member of the SS-Sonderkommando Kulmhof Fritz Ismer dated 9 November 1960, recorded in West-Berlin on his participation and experiences in the extermination camp Kulmhof (Chełmno).
Testimony of Ismer, Fritz on Kulmhof / Chełmno extermination camp Read More »
Certified copy of interrogation protocol of former forester Hans Staegemeir, dated 30 August 1961, recorded in Paderborn (West-Germany) on his experiences and observations on the extermination of Jews near Kulmhof (Chełmno). Staegemeir was appointed as a district forester to Wartheland and witnessed unusual and secretive operations involving the transportation of Jewish people and the ominous presence of gas vans. The area was heavily policed and eventually fenced off and raised suspicions among local forestry officials. Staegemeir described the regular shuttle movement of sealed, gray vehicles that resembled small furniture vans, intensifying in frequency, sometimes every 10 minutes. His observations are also recalled in Heinrich May’s manuscript on Kulmhof from early 1945.
Testimony of Staegemeir, Hans on Kulmhof extermination camp Read More »
As Wilhelm Rediess declined to pay 10 Reichsmarks for each institutional inmate killed by the Sonderkommando Lange in Soldau and requested a decision from the Reichsführer-SS, Wilhelm Koppe reiterates his position on this matter to Karl Wolff, chief of the personal staff of the Reichsführer-SS. Koppe notes that he “took 1,558 troublesome people away from the Higher SS and Police Leader Northeast for alternative accommodation” and emphasises “it was necessary for a Kommando from my office to stay in East Prussia for 17 days”. He stresses that East-Prussia’s “Gauleiter Koch has agreed to cover all expenses associated with this order”. Additionally, the payment will be also used to fund “Sonderkommando Lange’s stay in Holland ordered by the Reichsführer-SS with over RM 3,000”.
Certified copy of interrogation protocol of forestry official Heinrich May dated 13 December 1960, recorded in Bonn (West-Germany) on his experiences and observations linked to the Holocaust operations near Kulmhof (Chelmno). May was a longstanding member of the NSDAP and SS, career took a dark turn during WWII when he found himself managing a forestry office near Kulmhof extermination camp. May witnessed suspicious activities, including the movement of “gas vans” used for exterminating Jewish individuals. Despite not seeing the killings firsthand, the evidence was overwhelming, with frequent sightings of smoke rising from the forest. Bothmann, the commander of the Sonderkommando operating the site, later revealed to May the presence of mass graves and confirmed the scale of the atrocities. At the end of the war, May penned a manuscript, “The Great Lie,” which recounted these grim details but was never published. In the post-war interrogation, May corroborated the details presented in his manuscript.
Testimony of May, Heinrich on Kulmhof extermination camp Read More »
This document, dated November 7, 1940, is a response to the letter from Wilhelm Koppe to Jakob Sporrenberg. The former Higher SS and Police Leader of East-Prussia, Wilhelm Rediess, escalated the financial dispute to the Reichsführer-SS over the payment of 10 RM for each victim killed by Sonderkommando Lange in Soldau (East-Prussia). In the letter, addressed to Karl Wolff of Himmler’s personal staff, Rediess mentions “the Kommando Lange” evacuated “1,558 inmates from the East Prussian Provincial Institutions” and “also about 250 to 300 mentally ill (Poles) from the Zichenau region” after “obtaining permission from the Reichsführer-SS”. He explains that he could not take Koppe’s demand for “payment of RM 10.- for each patient…seriously”, as he considered “the matter to be in the interest of the Reich”. Wolff added a handwritten remark “Brack” to the text, referencing to Viktor Brack, a key figure in implementing Nazi Euthanasia.
In the letter of 19 October, 1940, the Higher SS and Police Leader of the Warthegau, Wilhelm Koppe, disclosed to his counterpart in East Prussia, Jakob Sporrenberg, that “the so-called Sonderkommando Lange…evacuated 1,558 sick individuals from the transit camp in Soldau” in the period from May 21 to June 8, 1940. Koppe mentions that Sporrenberg’s predecessor, Wilhelm Rediess, had agreed “at that time that an amount of RM 10.- should be paid for the evacuation of each sick person”. At the beginning of the operation, the “leader of Sonderkommando Lange, Kriminalkommissar Lange, took an advance of RM 2,000.- from the Inspector of the Security Police and the SD in Königsberg”. Koppe requests from Sporrenberg the “transfer the remaining amount of RM 13,580”. The document provides insight into the administrative and logistical aspects of early Nazi extermination operations, particularly how they managed and funded the tasks involved SS and police units.
The document details a list of transports carrying 16,748 Jews from Radegast Station in the Łódź Ghetto to Przybyłów near Kulmhof, conducted between March 16 and April 2, 1942.
At the end of 1941, the SS-Sonderkommando leader Herbert Lange recruited Plate to the extermination camp Kulmhof. After the departure of SS-Obersturmführer Herbert Otto in early 1942, Plate assumed the position of acting camp commander until the camp’s dissolution. In this role, Plate was a key figure in the extermination of Jews at Kulmhof. He personally shot members of the Jewish work commando selected for execution.
Plate, Albert – Deputy Commander of Kulmhof Extermination Camp Read More »
The document provides a list of transports with 10,348 Jews deported between March 1 and 15, 1942 from Radegast Station in the Litzmannstadt (Łódź) Ghetto to Warthbrücken. It was used to establish the transportation costs, which were reviewd by SS-Hauptscharführer Alfred Stromberg from the Stapo Litzmannstadt on March 27, 1942.
The document, dated April 22, 1942, was written by Forschungsstelle A Litzmannstadt, a local branch of Hermann Göring’s Secret Service Forschungsamt of the Reich Ministry of Aviation. The message recalls a statement by Hebert Schefe of the Litzmanndstadt Stapo office. Schefe stated that “All Jews in the Warthegau capable of working would be resettled into the Litzmannstadt Ghetto after the removal of those unfit for work”. Furthermore, he noted that “those Jews not capable of working would be placed in so-called care camps” – an euphemistic term for Kulmhof extermination camp.