The Fantastic Laboratory of Dr. Weigl: How Two Brave Scientists Battled Typhus and Sabotaged the Nazis (59 page)
Authors: Arthur Allen
After the SS
:
“Vernehmung Medizinalrat Dr. Wilhelm Dopheide,” Sept. 22, 1950, BA-Ludwigsburg, B162/2102 ARZ294/1959, Kolonko u.a.
Kurzrock survived for
:
Fleck, “Bericht,” 490n. An alternative version of Kurzrock’s fate is in Drix,
Witness
, 155.
On September 7, the ghetto
:
Stefan Szende,
The Promise Hitler Kept
(New York: Roy, 1945), 83.
Dr. Franciszek Groër, Fleck’s
:
Fleck and F. Lille, “Serologic Studies in Blood Cells: On the Serologic Differentiation on White Blood Cells,”
American Review of Soviet Medicine
3 (1945): 174.
One afternoon in 1942
:
Tomasz Cieszy
ski, “Dzieło Rudolfa Weigla ofiarowane ludzko
ci i Polsce” (Rudolf Weigl’s work for Poland and humanity), 1994, accessed at http://www.lwow.home.pl/weigl/cieszynski.html.
Smuggling vaccine to Jews
:
Danuta Nespiak, “Profesor Rudolf Weigl był Polakiem z wyboru” (Professor Rudolf Weigl—Pole by choice), in
Semper Fidelis
(Wrocław: Towarzystwo Miłoników Lwowa i Kresów Południowo Wschodnich, 1994); M. Sahaydakovskyy and S. Hnatush; “Professor Rudolf Weigl: A Life Dedicated to Science and Humanity” (publication information unknown), accessed at www.lwow.com.pl/weigl/Weigl-ukr.html.
Moser later recalled
:
Meisel to Eyer, Jan. 12, 1957; Meisel to Eyer, Jan. 20, 1972; Eyer to Moser, March 28, 1972; Moser to Eyer, April 4, 1972. All letters are in the possession of Peter Eyer.
Halina Ogrodziska, an activist
:
Ellen Land-Weber,
To Save a Life: Stories of Holocaust Rescue
(Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2000), accessed at http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupid?key=olbp21571.
Felicja ended up
:
Shoah Foundation, 45624 Felicja Mikolajczyk-Meisela; Wójcik interview with Henryk Meisel, Felicja Mikolajczyk-Meisela, Edward Mikolajczyk, June 1979; Danuta Rymkiwicz, “In Memory of Professor Henryk Meisel,” Dec. 15, 1981-dated typescript, courtesy of Peter Eyer; Meisel to Eyer, Jan. 12, 1957; Meisel to Eyer, March 20, 1972.
“
Every physician was
”:
Interview with Peter Eyer.
“
I estimate quite conservatively
”:
Eyer to K. W. Jötten, March 13, 1957, courtesy of Peter Eyer.
The historical record
:
Wilhelm Hagen to Bernhard Kläß, Dec. 16, 1975. Peter Eyer possesses numerous letters from German, Polish, and Ukrainian character witnesses for Eyer’s wartime behavior, and the dozens of testimonies from Weigl laboratory employees support this.
The Gestapo, many of
:
1972 Testimony by former Gestapo officers Herbert Hamann, Rudolf Koerner, and Kurt Heinmneyer in BA-Ludwigsburg, BA-Mil B162/9805; Az 119f Js 2/72 Beschuldigte Prof Dr Hermann Eyer, u.a.
After the war, these same
:
Peter Eyer, interview with author.
Eyer may have been anti-Semitic
:
Hirszfeld,
One Life
, 338–39.
Of all the German
:
Jakob Gilson, “Prof. Dr. Ludwig Hirszfeld” (PhD diss., University of Munich, 1965), courtesy of Peter Eyer.
The Nazis tolerated Weigl
:
The original article, “Das Fleckfieber überwunden; ein Sieg deutscher Wissenschaft in zwölfter Stunde,”
Marburger Zeitung
, April 15, 1943, is BA, R55/20912, as are responses from various officials to the error it contains: April 21, 1943, letter to the
Reichsregierung
press department from Behring; June 16, 1943, RKI, Institut fur Infektionskrankheiten, to Kurzel, press department in Reichministerium für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda; Haubold memo, June 26, 1943; Rundspruch, Propaganda Ministry.
In December 1942
:
Emil-von-Behring-Bibliothek/Arbeitsstelle für Geschichte der Medizin der Philipps-Universität Marburg, Signatur 230; Weindling,
Epidemics
, 236–37.
Weigl was invited
:
Andrzej Wincewicz et al., “Rudolph Weigl, (1883–1957)—A Scientist in Poland in Wartime Plus Ration quam vis,”
Journal of Medical Biography
15 (2007): 113.
Weigl did, however
:
Maria Kordas and Paul Weindling, “Working and Payment Conditions at Production of the Vaccine against Typhus by the Weigl Method in Lvov during World War II,” 1–8, courtesy of Paul Weindling.
Much as the Germans
:
Haas to Weigl, Sept. 10, 1942, Emil-von-Behring-Bibliothek/Arbeitsstelle für Geschichte der Medizin der Philipps-Universität Marburg, Signatur 230.
On February 4, 1943
:
Anna Seeman letter to Schnelle, April 2, 1980, in LFZ, 4.4 Unterlagen und Notizen v. Thomas Schnelle, “Fragebogen,” Signatur 100; Fleck, “Wie wir” 522; Shoah Foundation, 26409 Bruno Seeman.
The SS man shrugged
:
Shoah Foundation, Bruno Seeman; “Testimony of SEMAN Bronislaw, Concentration Camp #103739, provided June 21, 1945,” in Zydowski Institut Historyczny (Jewish Historical Institute, Warsaw).
Thus Fleck saved
:
Anna Seeman letter to Schnelle; Shoah Foundation, Bruno Seeman.
Chapter 8: Armies of Winter
Hitler’s war plan
:
Omer Bartov,
The Eastern Front, 1941–45: German Troops and the Barbarisation of Warfare
(New York: St. Martin’s, 1986); Bartov,
Hitler’s Army: Soldiers, Nazis and War in the Third Reich
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 19–24, 67–77; NA, RG238, ser. M1019, roll 47, Mrugowsky, 1190–94.
To be sure, Germany
:
Arthur Felix memo dated Nov. 17, 1941, Kew, FD1/6614; Herbert D. Chalke, “Typhus: Experiences in the Central Mediterranean Force,”
British Medical Journal
1, no. 4460 (June 29, 1946): 979.
By the time
:
Arthur Allen,
Vaccine: The Controversial Story of Medicine’s Greatest Lifesaver
(New York: Norton, 2007), 141.
But there was
:
Bartov,
Eastern Front
, 112.
The number of
living
:
Nuremberg Doctors’ Trial, Doc 105, letter from President of the Land Labor Office, Dortmund, Feb. 3, 1942, to the Ruhr Coal Mining District Group.
Thousands more
:
Bartov,
Eastern Front
, 107.
Like German soldiers
:
Catherine Merridale,
Ivan’s War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939–1945
(New York: Metropolitan, 2006), 56–59.
In their propaganda
:
Leo Gruliow,
Soviet War-Time Medicine
(New York: Russian War Relief, 1942).
At a POW camp
:
Büttner to Renoldi, Jan. 18, 1942, BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/187 Büttner, Anlage 5.
On a single day
:
Büttner, “Erfahrungsbericht 1. Vierteljahr 1942,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/187.
“
The local difficulties
”:
Ibid.
Some units tried to
:
“Abschrift Nov. 13, 1941,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/414.
One wrote that
:
Gruliow,
Soviet War-Time
; Walther and Vierthaler to “Heeresarzt,” Dec. 18, 1941, BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/414.
Typhus seemed to catch
:
Herbert Assman memo, BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/187; Kurt Lydtin, “Anlage 3 zum Kriegstagebuch v. 3 – 20/6/42 am Armeearzt 16,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/188; Lydtin, “Erfahrungen 1. vierteljahr 1942,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/360.
On January 12, 1942
:
Lydtin, “1942 Okt–Dez Fleckfieber,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/305.
These alarming reports
:
Von Stochert, “Die psychischen Störungen bei Fleckfieber,” BA-Freiburg, RH1/23/246.
Many German doctors
:
“Ergebnisse der zweite Beratendentagung Ost,” 11/30–12/3, 1942, BA-Freiburg, RH1/23/246.
The symptoms reminded
:
Bansi report, 1942, BA-Freiburg, RH 12/23/187.
In recovery, the patients
:
Brinkmann, Heeresgruppe Mitte, “Erfahrungsbericht, 4. Vtlj 1943,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/187; Stochert, “Die psychische.”
To cope with
:
Bogendorfer, 2nd Army, “March 1, 1944, Mikatowitschi,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/187.
The Weil-Felix reaction
:
Eyer, at Tagung der beratenden Ärzte, 4/13/42, BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/214; Heinrich Zeiss, “Sammelbericht über Kriegserfahrungen der beratenden Hygieniker,” from 1/20/1944, ibid., RH12/23/948; Bieling to O. Qu. Gef., 6/27/1942, Betrift: Fleckfiebererkrankungen bei Schutzgeimpften, ibid., RH12/23/187; Karl Schulze, “Erfahrungsbericht 1.3–30.6.43, ibid., RH12/23/188; Schmitz-Formes, “Erprobung eines neuen Fleckfieber Impfstoffes,” ibid., RH12/23/360.
Not knowing whether
:
Lydtin, “Tagebuch März 42 bis 7 April,” BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/305; Bogendorfer, 2nd Army.
Many Wehrmacht doctors
:
Schmitz-Formes, “Erprobung”; Felix von Bormann, experimental report, BA-Freiburg, RH12/23/187; Dr v. Weiss, “Ein Jahr Fleckfieberbehandlung,” dated July 31, 1942, ibid., RH12/23/444.
The German soldiers’ letters
:
Reichspropagandaleitung memo, Jan. 23, 1942, BA-Berlin, NS18/607.
A memo 12 days
:
Memo dated Feb. 5, 1942, BA-Berlin, NS18/607.
To combat typhus at the front
:
Bormann, report.
Germany’s failure
:
Gerhard Rose, NA, RG238, ser. M1019, roll 60; David Kinkela,
DDT and the American Century: Global Health, Environmental Politics, and the Pesticide That Changed the World
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2011), 18–19; Winfried Süss,
Der “Volkskörper’’ im Krieg, Gesundheitspolitik, Gesundheitsverhältnisse und Krankenmord im nationalsozialistischen Deutschland 1939–1945
(Munich: Oldenbourg, 2003), 227; W. Forth et al.,
Men & Fungi: Penicillin Research and Production in World War II German
y (Munich: Zuckschwerdt, 2000); Lukas Straumann, “Nützliche Schädlinge” (PhD diss., University of Zurich, 2005).
In the winter of 1942
:
Albrecht Hase, “Über Entlausung durch Ameisen sowie über die Wirkung der Ameisensäure auf Kleiderläuse,”
Zeitschrift für Parasitenkunde
12 (1942): 665–77.