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Stahlecker Report on extermination of Jews in the Baltics until October 15. 1941
Contemporary Source

1941-10-00 / The October 1941 Stahlecker Report: Genocide in the Baltics

The Stahlecker Report, submitted after October 15, 1941, offers an account of how Einsatzgruppe A, under the command of Walter Stahlecker, conducted mass killing operations across Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia during the early months of the Nazi occupation of the Baltics. The German authorities deliberately incited and staged “self-cleansing” pogroms. But the report also states that “it was expected that pogroms alone would not solve the Jewish problem in the Eastern territories,” and that as a result, “extensive executions were carried out by special commandos.” According to the report “the total number of Jews liquidated in Lithuania amounts to 71,105” and “in Latvia, a total of 30,000 Jews have been executed so far”. By mid-October 1941, the total number of people executed under Einsatzgruppe A stood at 135,567.

Interrogation protocol & photograph of Georg Michalsen
Post-War Testimony

1961-01-24 / Testimony of SS Officer Georg Michalsen On the 1942 Warsaw Ghetto Clearing

On January 24, 1961, West German prosecutors interrogated Georg Michalsen, a former SS officer involved in Ghetto liquidations in the Generalgouvernement. In his testimony, Michalsen stated that he was deployed alongside Hermann Höfle as part of the so-called “resettlement staff” tasked with overseeing the clearing of the Warsaw Ghetto in the summer of 1942. He describes how Jews were rounded up, concentrated at the Umschlagplatz, and sent by train to their deaths. Though he claims he did not know the deportees were being killed “at the beginning,” he admits that he soon “found out during the operation”. He further stated that”other members of our unit and those involved in the resettlement also eventually learned what the real fate of the Jews was”.

Letter dated February 11, 1945 by Odilo Globocnik on Einsatz Reinhard
Contemporary Source

1945-02-11 / Globocnik Urges Promotion of SS Officer Involved in Operation Reinhard and “cleared Bialystok within five days”

A letter dated February 11, 1945, written by SS-Gruppenführer Odilo Globocnik—then Higher SS and Police Leader in the Adriatic Littoral—to SS-Obergruppenführer Maximilian von Herff, Chief of the SS Personnel Main Office, contains a plea for the promotion of his associate, Georg Michalsen, into the Waffen-SS Reserve with the rank of SS-Sturmbannführer. In support of Michalsen’s promotion, Globocnik highlights his service record, including his role in “Operation ‘R’ in an independent and decisive position, and for example, significantly influenced the heavy fighting in Warsaw and cleared Bialystok within five days.” Michalsen served as a staff member in Hermann Höfle’s department for “Jewish Affairs (Sonderaktion Reinhardt).” “Operation R” thus refers to Operation Reinhard – the systematic extermination of Jews in the Generalgouverment, carried out primarily through the extermination camps Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka.

Decree of February 24, 1943 by Springorum on Jewish Deportation Trains to Auschwitz
Contemporary Source

1943-02-24 / Report on Jewish Deportation Train to Auschwitz, February 1943: “several Jewish corpses were found along the railway”

A decree dated February 24, 1943 issued by Walter Springorum, President of the Government District of Kattowitz, reports a incident on February 7, 1943, in which a large number of Jewish prisoners escaped from a halted deportation train bound for Auschwitz in Tarnowitz. According to the decree, four escapees were recaptured, while one Jewish woman was shot and another was run over. Springorum also noted that between January 18 and 20, 1943, “several Jewish corpses were found along the railway”, apparently thrown from moving trains. He was concerned about “politically undesirable unrest among the population” that may be caused by such deportation transports.

Manuscript for Speech on November 18, 1941 Rosenberg
Contemporary Source

1941-11-18 / Alfred Rosenberg’s November 1941 Speech: “…biological eradication of all Jewry in Europe.”

Manuscript of a speech delivered on November 18, 1941, by Alfred Rosenberg at his Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories. In the confidential speech before members of the press, Rosenberg declared that “about six million Jews still live in the East, and this question can only be resolved by means of the biological eradication of all Jewry in Europe.” He went further stating that “it is necessary to push them beyond the Urals – or otherwise eradicate them in some other way.”

1st page of interrogation transcript dated April 1, 1960 on Treblinka Extermination Camp
Post-War Testimony

1960-03-31 / Testimony of SS Guard Gustav Münzberger on Treblinka Extermination Camp

Interrogation transcript of former Treblinka extermination camp guard SS-Unterscharführer Gustav Münzberger, dated March 31 and April 1, 1960. In his testimony, Münzberger describes the arrival of prisoner transports, the systematic deception used to lead victims to their deaths, the operation of gas chambers powered by engine exhaust and the later cremation of the bodies as part of efforts to erase evidence of the mass killings. Münzberger names key SS personell and Ukrainian auxiliaries involved in the extermination process.

Memo of June 5, 1942 on gas vans
Contemporary Source

1942-06-02 / SS-Officer Just’s Memo on Gas Vans: “97,000 have been processed using 3 deployed vehicles”

Memo dated June 5, 1942, authored by SS-Hauptsturmführer Willy Just of RSHA office II D 3 a (Motor Vehicle Department of the Security Police) on technical modifications to the gas vans used in mass killing operations. Just reports that “since December 1941 97,000 have been processed using 3 deployed vehicles, without any defects occurring in the vehicles” and “the known explosion in Kulmhof (Chełmno) is to be considered an isolated case due to an operating error”. He proposes the following “technical modifications to the special vehicles currently in operation and those under production”, among other things ventilation slots on the upper rear wall to allow “a rapid inflow of CO without causing overpressure”. The proposal was reviewed by Walther Rauff, head of the Motor Vehicle Department, on June 10, 1942. He approved the implementation of the modifications on a prototype vehicle.

Contemporary Source

1942-08-12 Swiss Cardiologist Robert Hegglin’s 1942 Account of Mass Killings in Riga / Latvia

The Swiss cardiologist and medical captain Robert Hegglin participated in the so-called third medical mission of the Swiss Red Cross, which took place in Riga, Daugavpils, and Pskov between 18 June and 26 September 1942. Over the course of several months, he documented his experiences in detail in his diary—from train journeys through ravaged Latvia and Russia to clinical cases in overstretched hospitals. Among his most entries is a report on the mass shootings of Jews in Nazi-occupied Latvia: “…based on the reports available to me from German soldiers, officers, and Latvians, that nearly 100,000 Jews have been shot in the Riga area alone since the German occupation. […] If the Germans truly require such bloody atrocities, then they are unfit to become the masters of Europe.”

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