8000 IN A DAY

Grey River Argus, 31 January 1946, Page 5

8000 IN A DAY

SLAUGHTERED BY NAZIS. FRENCH CASE AT TRIALS. (Rec. 9.10). LONDON, January 30. An Associated Press correspondent at Nuremberg says: Much evidence at the trials was of such a disgusting nature that, publication would offend public decency. Horrors ranging from the emasculation of Catholic priests to the slaughter at. Maidenek of eight thousand Jews in a single day, were recounted at the Nuremberg war crimes trial when the French prosecution submitted a pile of sworn affidavits. Death inevitably followed each emasculation, since laymen performed the operations. Nazis drowned the cries of butchered Jews in Maidenek by blaring music from loudspeakers. Conditions everywhere were so bad that prisoners who were still alive ate human flesh. Gaolers cut off women’s hair before their cremation, and shipped it to Germany for use as upholstery for aeroplanes and for the manufacture of clothing. One affidavit revealed that seven tons of women’s hair was found at Auschwitz after- the liberation. This corresponds to an estimated 140,000 female corpses. HESS AND VON PAPEN The Nuremerg Court, was taken by surprise when Sir A. Maxwell-Fyfe announced that the presentation of the case against Hess, set down for to-day, would have to be postponed because his counsel, Dr. Rohrscheidt, had broken an ankle in a fall downstairs.

Ribbentrop’s counsel said Hess had asked him to request permission to undertake his own defence from now until the end of the trial. The Court adiourned without giving a decision on this po-nt. The British Prosecutor, Major K. J. H. Barrington, opened the case against von Papen. He said that although von Papen was not a typical Nazi he was an unscrupulous opportunist ready to fall in with the Nazis when it suited him. He participated in the preparations of the Nazi conspirators for the wars of aggression. Major Barrington accused von Papen of participating in persecution of the Jews and betraying the Catholic

Church, of which he was a member

, The American prosecutor opened the case against the anti-Semitic broadcaster, Hans Fritsche, putting in a long affidavit by him in which he attempted to justify his position in Goebbels' Propaganda Ministry. He denied that he had any controlling influence in the Ministry and said he acquired his deputation and influence purely as a radio expert, and was strictly bound by the directions of his superiors. He affirmed that only a few hours before Britain and France declared war on Germany he received assurances from Goebbels and Dietrich that the intervention of Mussolini v ould preserve peace in Europe, and that the German Army was to stop its advance. Britain and France had accepted a suggestion which would give time for conference.

Fritsche described- how Ribbentrop on the eve of the onslaught against Russia, told a Press conference that it should be presented to the people as a preventative of war for defence of the' Fai nerland, forced on us by immediate danger of attack by the Soviet, Union. Streicher has suffered a heart attack, and was not present in Court to-day. He is confined to his bed. M. Gerthoffer said that after the Germans invaded France they embarked on a systematic piliage of the country, except for industries that could be used to feed the Nazi war machine.

The evidence was largely in tne form of statistics showing the billions of francs worth of damage done by the Germans in France and Belgium. A correspondent says that the one man who might have been expected to take a keen interest, in this evidence, Dr. Schacht, the former president of the Reichsbank, read a book all day. The book was “Winston Churchill.”