If This Is a Woman: Inside Ravensbruck: Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women (124 page)

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Authors: Sarah Helm

BOOK: If This Is a Woman: Inside Ravensbruck: Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women

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Chapter 6: Else Krug

89	A number of them : Herbermann, The Blessed Abyss .
89	‘we set right what we could’ : Teege statement, ‘Hinter Gitter und Stacheldraht’, ARa 647.
90–1	They said I was a traitor : In Schikorra, ‘“… ist als Asoziale anzusehen”’.
91	‘but we know …’ : LAV NRW R BR 2034/83.
92	Ottile Gorres’s life story : This is told in a file at the Landesarchiv NRW, along with that of Elisabeth Fassbender and many other ‘asocials’. Also see Schikorra, Kontinuitäten .
97	The letter states : Correspondence in VVN files, BA.
99	‘There she is …’ : Maase, WO 309/416, and echoed in many prisoner testimonies.

Chapter 7: Doctor Sonntag

Much of the Hamburg trial testimony on Sonntag is in WO 309/416, but is also scattered in other files at TNA.

101	‘Himmler left Berlin …’ : Witte et al. (eds), Dienstkalender .
101	‘Häschen’ : Himmler, The Himmler Brothers . Local historians believe that the house at Brückenthin was built by prisoner labour. Exactly when the land was bought and when Häschen moved in is unclear. Before Brückenthin was available Himmler may have stayed with her at a new experimental farm he had set up, which was also close to Ravensbrück and where he reared livestock. Today Brückenthin is a children’s holiday camp; details of Himmler and Häschen’s sojourns there were exposed in the Schweriner Volkszeitung , 30 June 2003.
103	‘For several weeks …’ : Cited in Friedlander, The Origins of Nazi Genocide .
103	‘The power over …’ : Ibid.
104	‘whether and how …’ : Ibid.
104	instructed his chief surgeon : Himmler to Grawitz, 3 February 1940, cited in Witte et al. (eds), Dienstkalender .
105	‘Reproduction by …’ : See Stoll, ‘Walter Sonntag’.
107	‘extreme pleasure’ : Buchman deposition, 23 January 1948, WO 309/416.
108	‘I remember a woman …’ : Apfelkammer, BAL B162/9818.
108	‘You old pig …’ : Vera Mahnke, WO 309/416.
109	‘Sonntag, the greatest scoundrel …’ : Wiedmaier statement, 6 July 1958, ARa.
109	what was left of his breakfast : Dictators .
110	try it out at Ravensbrück : As was revealed at Nuremberg, Rudolf Brandt, Himmler’s personal physician, wrote to Clauberg on 10 July 1942, requesting he go to Ravensbrück to perform mass sterilisation experiments on Jewesses ‘according to your method’. Brandt said that by 1941 ‘it was an open secret’ that Hitler planned to exterminate all Jews. The purpose of the sterilisation experiments was to come up with an alternative to total extermination. In view of the labour shortage the idea was to preserve about two to three million Jews who were fit to work, but to sterilise them. Cited in Mitscherlich and Mielke, Death Doctors .
110	I remember one day : Buchmann deposition, 23 January 1948, WO 309/416.
111	‘I have never been happier …’ : Sonntag family papers.
112	‘We heard him enter …’ : WO 309/416.
112	I was asked one day : Teege statement, ‘Hinter Gitter und Stacheldraht’, ARa 647.

Chapter 8: Doctor Mennecke

115	‘The women seemed …’ : Teege statement, ‘Hinter Gitter und Stacheldraht’, ARa 647.
116	‘In the camp …’ : Dictators .
116	‘Have you ever seen …’ : Hayes (ed.), The Journalism of Milena Jesenska .
118	‘The woman stopped …’ : Anič ka Kvapilová, cited in Buber-Neumann, Milena .
120	first execution : See Kiedrzyń ska, Ravensbrück .
122	‘big and pleasant room’ : Chroust (ed.), Friedrich Mennecke .
122	Several times a week : Friedlander, The Origins of Nazi Genocide .
123	‘ accustomed to their own atrocities’ : Longerich, Heinrich Himmler .
125	‘medical commissioners will shortly …’ : Cited in Mitscherlich and Mielke, Death Doctors .
125	‘My dearest Mummy! …’ : Chroust (ed.), Friedrich Mennecke .
127	‘We had to get out …’ : Cited in Strebel, Ravensbrück .
132	‘an Appell for Blockovas’ : My account of how prisoners viewed events in the camp that followed Mennecke’s arrival are compiled from interviews, as well as a series of testimonies in WO 235/416 and WO 235/318, and Rosa Jochmann, ‘Wenn der Elferblock voll gewesen ist, dan …’, < http://www.doew.at/erinnern/biographien/erzaehlte-geschichte/haft-1938-1945/rosa-jochmann-wenn-der-elferblock-voll-gewesen-ist-dann >. Also: Dictators ; Herbermann, The Blessed Abyss ; Clara Rupp memoir, ARa; Teege statement, ‘Hinter Gitter und Stacheldraht’, ARa 647.; and Luise Mauer, BAL 162/9809 and in Elling, Frauen im deutschen Widerstand .
135	‘Take my hand …’ : Dreams .

Chapter 9: Bernburg

136	‘very ordinary – nothing’ : Author interview.
138–9	‘Tuesday 13 Jan …’ : Witte et al. (eds), Dienstkalender .
140	‘dearest baby’ : Chroust (ed.), Friedrich Mennecke .
142	‘The guard Zimmer …’ : Falkowska, ‘Report to the History Commission’, Institute for National Memory, Poland.
143	‘… extermination transport’ : In addition to the testimony and memoirs cited above, events immediately after are based on statements of Wiedmaier statements, ARa, witnesses and guards in further Hamburg trial evidence (e.g. Quernheim, Zimmer and Bernigau in BAL B162/9811) and Apfelkammer, BAL B162/9818.
146	‘Visit of RFSS …’ : Witte et al. (eds), Dienstkalender .
148	‘ so we knew …’ : von Skene, WO 235/316.
151	My darling Karli : In his biography Olga , Fernando Morais quotes from a different last letter, in which Olga says ‘goodbye’ and talks of ‘preparing for death’. There is no trace of this letter in the archives and its authenticity seems doubtful.
152	All our hopes : Leichter family papers.
153	Herta ‘Sara’ Cohen : LAV NRW R RW-58/54910.
155	‘exemplary’ : Lina Krug letters in VVN files, BA.

PART TWO

This section draws in particular on interviews with Polish survivors, most notably Maria Bielicka, Wanda Półtawska (née Wojtasik), Wojciecha Zeiske (née Buraczyńska) and Zofia Cisek (née Kawińska).

I have also used the statements of scores of Polish survivors at the Polish Institute at Lund and now held in the Lund University Library. These long, invaluable accounts were taken down within months of liberation, on the initiative of Zygmunt Lakocinski, a Polish art historian living in Lund. They were made public only in 1996.

Chapter 10: Lublin

160	‘They couldn’t get …’ : Michalik, Lund 117.
161	‘He took off his clothes’ : Jezierska, Lund 402. On the torture of Poles before reaching the camp, see also Wanda Kiedrzyń ska, introduction to Beyond .
161	St Adalbert’s bookshop : Details of Krysia and Wanda’s meeting, resistance and imprisonment in Lublin from author interviews and Dreams .
161	Michał Chrostowski : Chrostowska, Jakby Min ę ło Ju ż Wszystko and documents at Museum of Martyrology ‘Pod Zegarem’ (Under the Clock), a branch of the Lublin Museum (Muzeum Lubelskie w Lublinie).
162	‘Write if you know something …’ : Chrostowska papers, Museum of Martyrology ‘Pod Zegarem’ (Under the Clock), a branch of the Lublin Museum (Muzeum Lubelskie w Lublinie).
162	hidden in a palm : Author interview with Maria Wilgat.
162	a train left Lublin : Author interviews, also Dreams and Lund, various.
162	‘We were all pleased …’ : Stefaniak, Beyond .
166	Schmuckstücke : See also Tillion, Ravensbrück : ‘the human debris that at Ravensbrück they threw outside’. In Auschwitz, the jargon for poorest of the poor was Muselmann (Muslim). The supposed fatalism of Muslims is a possible reason for the word, says Sofsky in The Order of Terror . In Majdanek they were called ‘donkeys’, in Dachau ‘cretins’, in Mauthausen ‘swimmers’. Sofsky says in Ravensbrück the term ‘Muselweiber’ (female Muslims) was used, but I did not find the term in the course of my research.
167	telling stories : Wiń ska, Zwyciężyły Wartości .
167	Helena Korewina : See Kiedrzyń ska, Ravensbrück , and Dictators .
168	Verfügbare : Dreams . Also Młodkowska, Beyond .
168	brought new rules : Moldenhawer, Lund 420.
170	‘But don’t sing out loud’ : Author interview with Maria Bielicka; also Kiedrzyń ska, Ravensbrück .
170	Polish farm girl : Michalik, Lund 117.
171	Gerda Quernheim : Testimony and memories of Quernheim and Rosenthal is plentiful. See, for example, WO 309/416.
172	‘She asked me …’ : Tanke, BAL B162/472.
172	We often caught sight : Housková, BAL B162/455.
173	‘I didn’t return the smile’ : LAV NRW 3997. The interrogation of Leni Bitterhoff (née Reinders), who was categorised as an asocial, is in her criminal police file. The fifth of eleven children, she was the daughter of a farmer and worked as a maid near Kleve. Her husband died at the front on 25 October 1941. She had no previous convictions and no interest in politics.
173	‘Can’t you see …’ : Dreams .
174	tiny little gifts : Author interview.
174	Grażyna composed : Author interview.
174	ugly and inhuman acts : Dreams . On the spread of lesbianism see also: Moldenhawer, Lund 420; Młodkowska, Beyond ; Morrison, Ravensbrück .
175	beginning to starve : Dreams ; Dragan, Lund 239; Michalik, Lund 117.
177	‘Langefeld was full of affection …’ : Kiedrzyń ska, Ravensbrück .

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