SENSATION IN PRISON

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26285, 17 October 1946, Page 7

SENSATION IN PRISON

SENTINEL OUTWITTED THREE NOTES DISCOVERED NUREMBERG, (Rec. 0.30 a.m.) Oct. 16. Selkirk Panton, representing the combined British press, says: “ The first news of Goering’s escape from Allied justice in true Nazi style was given the eight of us cooped up in prison awaiting the executions when, as the Nuremberg prison clock was striking midnight, Colonel Andrus hurried out of his rooms, his face white. He panted, ‘1 have news for you, but I am sorry I canot release, it yet. That is the Control Council’s order.’ “Then, after a slight pause, he burst out: ‘ Goering is dead—by suicide. The sentinel never saw him put his hand to his mouth. He was lying on the bed, with his hands above the clothes. The sentinel saw a twitching and called a doctor and chaplain. “ They heard Goering making a strange noise in his throat, which doctors belived was the death rattle. An examination of the body revealed a small envelope pencilled, ‘H. Goering.’ It contained three pencilled notes, one of which was addressed to the prison commandant. and. a small brass cartridge case. A similar cartridge case containing a phial of cyanide of potassium was taken from Goering a year,ago on his arrival at Landsdorf Prison. He then hid, it in his coffee.” Pan ton continues: “Half an hour before Goering’s suicide I watched him in bed, apparently sleeping peacefully. We eight reporters were being taken on a tour of the prison. Guards stood at the 11 cell doors, looking through the fpot-square grated openings at the condemned prisoners, none of whom, then knew the time of the execution, except perhaps Goering, in cell five, jealously hiding his suicide phial. Although it was only 9 p.m., Goering was already in bed, and seemingly asleep. His hands were covered in the sleeves of a blue silk pyjama coat and resting quietly on the khaki blanket which* was soon to be his shroud. His jackboots stood tidily in a corner of the small, whitewashed cell. "Ribbentrop, still fully dressed, was holding a typewritten sheet in his hand and talking earnestly to an American Protestant chaplain. Keitel was bent on preparing his bed. Jodi was reading quietly. Sauckel was pacing his cell with uneasy movements, like a caged elephant. “After the condemned men were told to dress they had a last meal, which we saw being prepared in the kitchen under ‘ Death Row.’ The last meal was American canned pork luncheon meat, potato salad, tomato salad, coffee, and, because white bread had failed to arrive in time, the cook was making German pancakes.”