HOW NAZIS FACED TRIAL

Wanganui Chronicle, 7 October 1946, Page 8

HOW NAZIS FACED TRIAL

SOME SUICIDE PLOTS ATTEMPTS AT RESCUE

London, Oct. 2.

Now that the Nuremberg trial is over Colonel Burten Andrus, the American Governor of Nuremberg Prison, has revealed some new aspects of the Nazi war criminals as he saw them behind bars. On the night of May 10 following his cross-examination by Sir David Maxwell-Fyffe, guards discovered that Doenitz had smuggled a rope made of plaited bootlaces into his cell evidently with intention of committing suicide.

Christine Schroeder, formerly Hitler’s confidential typist, when she was called as a witness at the trial was found to have secreted a small glass phial of cyanide in the hem of her dress. It is not known whether she carried it for her own use or intended to try and pass it to one of the prisoners.

Keitel made several efforts to obtain implements for suicide. On four separate occasions guards found sharp splinters of metal and sharp nails secreted in his mattress. It was established that the nails were left about by workmen and that Keitel found them while exercising. Apart from his suicidal tendencies, however, Keitel gave less trouble than the rest of the prisoners. He once sat upright for three nights running rather than complain that he could not lie down on the hard pillow because he had a carbuncle on his neck. FILE FOUND. A file and hacksaw were discovered in an attache case brought into the court by one witness called on behalf of Kaltenbrunner. At one period his fellow prisoners became so anxious about Ribbentrop’s state of mind that Frank volunteered to share his cell to prevent his attempting suicide. Prison staff do not believe Hess’ stories about frequent stomach cramp attacks. They consider he simulated them in order to avoid the boredom of sitting in court For a considerable period Hess refused to eat food until one of the other prisoners—usually Sauckel—had eaten first to prove that it was not poisoned. Guards consider Schacht the worstmannered and most arrogant of the prisoners, although all of them in different ways caused trouble. Several of the German generals persistently claimed that they were not treated with the respect due to their rank and Doenita once arrogantly refused to eat in the same room as Streicher.

KESSEIJIING ABJECT. Kesselring was the most abject of the officer prisoners. He bowed obsequiously every time he met the governor and thanked him profusely even for giving him an order. A mysterious attempt to kill one of the prisoners was never solved. As Goering, Jodi, and Keitel were being taken through an open passageway in the prison a razor-sharp hunting knife suddenly whirled out of the darkness and embedded itself in a wall a few inches from Goering. The thrower was not discovered. Statistics of the trial prove that it was the longest continuous recorded legal hearing in history. The Tribunal sat for 219 days and had 403 open sessions totalling 2400 hours. Five million words of evidence occupying 15,000 pages were recorded. There were 300,000 affidavits submitted to the court, 200 witnesses were examined, and more than 3,000,000 documents were considered. The second longest recorded case in English legal history was the second Tichbourne trial which occupied 188 days. Although the Warren Hastings trial extended over seven years the number of sitting days was only 145.