“I was the first doctor they had seen for at least a fortnight. There was no doctor in attendance at the camp. There was no medical supplies in the camp. They had no shoes and went about in their bare feet. The sole clothing of each consisted of a sack with holes for their arms and head. Their hair was shorn. The camp was surrounded by barbed wire and closely guarded by SS guards.
“The amount of food in the camp was extremely meagre and of very poor quality. The houses in which they lived consisted of the ruins of former barracks and they afforded no shelter against rain and other weather conditions. I reported to my superiors that the guards lived and slept outside their barracks as one could not enter them without being attacked by 10, 20 and up to 50 fleas. One camp doctor employed by me refused to enter the camp again after he had been bitten very badly. I visited this camp with a Mr. Green on two occasions and both times we left the camp badly bitten. We had great difficulty in getting rid of the fleas and insects which had attacked us. As a result of this attack by insects of this camp, I got large boils on my arms and the rest of my body. I asked my superiors at the Krupp works to undertake the necessary steps to de-louse the camp so as to put an end to this unbearable, vermin-infested condition. Despite this report, I did not find any improvement in sanitary conditions at the camp on my second visit a fortnight later.
“When foreign workers finally became too sick to work or were completely disabled they were returned to the Labour Exchange in Essen and from there, they were sent to a camp at Friedrichsfeld. Among persons who were returned over to the Labour Exchange were aggravated cases of tuberculosis, malaria, neurosis, career which could not be treated by operation, old age, and general feebleness. I know nothing about conditions at this camp because I have never visited it. I only know that it was a place to which workers who no longer of any use to Krupp were sent.
“My colleagues and I reported all of the foregoing matters to Mr. Ihh, Director of Friedrich Krupp A. G. Dr. Wiels, personal physician of Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach, Senior Camp Leader Kupke, and at all times to the health department. Moreover, I know that these gentlemen personally visited the camps.
“(Signed) Dr. Wilhelm Jager.” (D-288)
The conditions just described were not confined to the Krupp factories but existed throughout Germany. A report of the Polish Main Committee to the Administration of the Government-General of Poland, dated 17 May 1944, describes in similar terms the situation of Polish workers in Germany (R-103):
“The cleanliness of many overcrowded camp rooms is contrary to the most elementary requirements. Often there is no opportunity to obtain warm water for washing; therefore the cleanest parents are unable to maintain even the most primitive standard of hygiene for their children or often even to wash their only set of linen. A consequence of this is the spreading of scabies which cannot be eradicated * * *
“We receive imploring letters from the camps of Eastern workers and their prolific families beseeching us for food. The quantity and quality of camp rations mentioned therein—the so-called fourth grade of rations—is absolutely insufficient to maintain the energies spent in heavy work. 3.5 kg. of bread weekly and a thin soup at lunch time, cooked with swedes or other vegetables without any meat or fat, with a meager addition of potatoes now and then is a hunger ration for a heavy worker.
“Sometimes punishment consists of starvation which is inflicted, i.e. for refusal to wear the badge, ‘East’. Such punishment has the result that workers faint at work (Klosterteich Camp, Gruenheim, Saxony). The consequence is complete exhaustion, an ailing state of health and tuberculosis. The spreading of tuberculosis among the Polish factory workers is a result of the deficient food rations meted out in the community camps because energy spent in heavy work cannot be replaced * * *.
“The call for help which reaches us, brings to light starvation and hunger, severe stomach intestinal trouble especially in the case of children resulting from the insufficiency of food which does not take into consideration the needs of children. Proper medical treatment or care for the sick are not available in the mass camps. * * *”