“To all commandants of the concentration camps:
“According to a statement received from the Reich Security Main Office, parcels of clothing were sent from the concentration camps mainly to the Gestapo administration in Brünn and in some there were bullet holes and blood stains on the articles. Some of the parcels were damaged, so that outsiders could see what was inside them.
“As the Reich Security Main Office will in the near future issue regulations concerning the utilization of articles of property belonging to the deceased inmates, the sending of these articles is to cease immediately until definite regulations have been issued as to the disposal of property belonging to internees who have been put to death.
“Signed: Glücks, SS Brigadeführer and major general of the SS.”
I pass on to the presentation of evidence, depicting the scale of the crimes committed.
In only two camps of death the criminals exterminated 5½ million people. In proof of this I quote the conclusions of the Extraordinary State Commission for Auschwitz. I will quote only a short excerpt. It is preceded by a detailed calculation. The Tribunal will find this reference on Page 356 of the document book, second column of the text, fourth paragraph. I begin the quotation:
“However, employing rectified coefficients for the part-time use of the crematorium ovens and for the periods when they stood empty, the technical expert commission has ascertained that during the period of time that the Auschwitz Camp existed the German butchers exterminated in this camp not less than 4 million citizens of the U.S.S.R., Poland, France, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Holland, Belgium, and other countries.”
I quote the corresponding passages from the Polish-Soviet Extraordinary Commission’s report on Maidanek. The Tribunal will find this quotation on Page 66, reverse side, of the document book, second column of the text, Paragraph 6. I begin the quotation:
“The Polish-Soviet Extraordinary Commission has ascertained that during the 4 years’ existence of the extermination camp at Maidanek the Hitlerite hangmen, following the direct order of their criminal government, exterminated by mass shooting and mass killing in gas chambers approximately 1.5 million persons: Soviet prisoners of war, prisoners of war of the former Polish Army, and nationals of various countries—Poles, Frenchmen, Italians, Belgians, Dutch, Czechs, Serbs, Greeks, Croats, and a great number of Jews.”
With this document I conclude that section of my statement which concerns the concentration camps and pass on to the last section entitled, “Concealment of Traces of Crimes.”