Category Archives: Mengele

The Remarkable Story of the Ovitz Family—The Dwarfs of Auschwitz

I did post about the Ovitz family before but because it is such a remarkable story, I thought it a good idea to do another one. Before I get into the main story, I have to explain that I mean no disrespect with the title— it was how the family gained recognition.

The Ovitz family was a Jewish Romanian family. The seven dwarf siblings had formed the Lilliput Troupe, known for singing and playing music using small instruments throughout Romania, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia in the 1930s and 1940s. The taller family members had backstage roles. The performers consisted of Rozika, Franziska, Avram, Freida, Micki, Elizabeth, and Perla. The Ovitzs lived a communal life in one big house in the village.

When any one of them got married, the spouse moved in and joined the enterprise.

At the start of World War II, there were twelve family members—seven of them were born with Pseudoachondroplasia, a form of dwarfism. Hungary seized Northern Transylvania in September 1940, and the new racial laws banned Jewish artists from entertaining non-Jews. Even though the Ovitz family were observant Jews, they obtained papers that omitted the fact that they were Jewish and continued going on their tours until 1944. On May 12, 1944, all twelve family members were arrested and deported to Auschwitz. One average-sized brother, Arie, escaped the roundup. Arie was married to Magda, and they had a little girl. He never met her because he was arrested and executed in 1944. Magda and her family were deported to Auschwitz and perished in the gas chambers.

Once the Ovitz family arrived in Auschwitz, they attracted the attention of Dr. Mengele. He housed them in better conditions within the camp, only to keep them healthier for his unethical research and experiments. Mengele wanted to decipher the secrets of human growth, especially as the family included two normal-sized sisters. Although Mengele was actually kind in his words when it came to the dwarfs—his actions in the name of science were horrific.

Throughout their time at Auschwitz, all of the members of the family (short and tall, blood-related, related by marriage, and fake-related) were subjected to almost daily blood tests, bone marrow sampling, blinding chemical tests, constant teeth and hair pulling, ear drip torture, and repeated showcases where they were told to strip in front of audiences and researchers during lectures and analysis.

“The most frightful experiments of all were the gynecological experiments.” Elizabeth Ovitz would later write, “They injected things into our uterus, extracted blood, dug into us, pierced us and removed samples… It is impossible to put into words the intolerable pain that we suffered, which continued for many days after the experiments ceased.”

Eighteen-month-old Shimshon Ovitz was put through the worst ordeals because he had taller parents and was prematurely born; Mengele drew blood from the veins behind his ears and his fingers daily often, causing weakness. The Ovitzes also witnessed two newcomer dwarfs killed and boiled so their bones could placed on exhibit in a museum. Mengele filmed them but after the war, the film was never found. It is possible that he kept it when he fled. Amid the other invasive procedures, Mengele poured boiling water into their ears, followed by ice water. He put chemicals in their eyes that blinded them. There were no moral boundaries restricting Mengele’s irrelevant experimentation. They thought the pain would drive them mad.

Despite all the torture and abuse, the family survived and was liberated from Auschwitz on January 27, 1945.

In March 2013, the Actor Warwick Davis presented an episode of the ITV series Perspectives, Warwick Davis—The Seven Dwarfs of Auschwitz.

In the documentary, reference was made to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which was Adolf Hitler’s favorite movie. Though Snow White may have been a fairy tale written by the Brothers Grimm—the story of the Ovitz Seven Dwarfs was far from a fairy tale. It was more of a grim tale of horror.

Later, Perla Ovitz, the last surviving member of the family (she died in 2001), acknowledged the horrifying details of their imprisonment—but still maintained a tiny shred of gratitude toward their captor.

“If the judges had asked me if he should be hanged, I’d have told them to let him go,” she recalled. “I was saved by the grace of the devil; God will give Mengele his due.”

The Ovitz family traveled on foot for seven months to their home village. Upon arrival, they found their home had been looted. They moved, first to the town of Sighet and later to Belgium. In May 1949, they immigrated to Israel, settled in Haifa, and began their tours again, being quite successful and packing large concert halls. In 1955, they retired and bought a cinema hall.

Descendants of the men of the family were born taller; the women did not become pregnant due to their small pelvises. The firstborn, Rozika Ovitz, died in 1984 at the age of 98.

I am surprised that no one has turned their story into a movie.

Sources

https://allthatsinteresting.com/ovitz-dwarfs-auschwitz

https://historyofyesterday.com/the-7-dwarfs-from-auschwitz/

The Ovitz Family

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/mar/23/the-dwarves-of-auschwitz

https://www.kpbs.org/news/arts-culture/2021/08/27/warwick-davis-and-seven-dwarfs-auschwitz

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/16872009/arie-ovitz#source

View at Medium.com
The Dwarfs Who Survived Auschwitz

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Karin Magnussen—Mengele’s Willing Assistant

Somebody once told me, “Evil acts can only be committed by men.” I disputed that notion. History has many examples of women who are just as evil—if not even more evil than men.

Anyone who knows me knows how important eye health is to me. In 2011, I lost my right eye, and in 2015, I nearly lost the left one.. For the best part of a year, I was basically blind. When I see something about eye health or care—it immediately catches my attention.

Karin Magnussen was a German biologist, teacher and researcher at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity and Eugenics department during the Third Reich. She is known for her 1936 publication, Race and Population Policy Tools, and her studies of heterochromia iridium (different-coloured eyes) using iris specimens supplied by Josef Mengele from Auschwitz Concentration Camp victims.

Mengele sent blood samples from about 200 patients of various races to the Berlin Institute. Karin Magnussen received human parts (such as eyes taken from a deceased Sinti family) from the notorious concentration camp—Auschwitz.

This is from a colleague—she received the information that more twins and family members with Heterochromic irises would be found in the Sinti family in Mechau from northern Germany. Karin Magnussen had adrenaline eye drops administered to inmates from Auschwitz Concentration Camp. The Sinti family had a high prevalence of heterochromia iridium and was forced to participate in this study. Members of this family, as well as other victims, were later killed, had their eyes enucleated and sent to Magnussen for examination. Magnussen articulated the findings of these events in a manuscript that has never been published.

No fewer than 40 pairs of eyes were received by Magnussen from Auschwitz-Birkenau. The Hungarian prisoner pathologist Miklós Nyiszli noted after the autopsy of the Sinti twins that they had been killed, not due to illness but because of a chloroform injection to the heart. Nyiszli had to prepare their eyes and send them to the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute.

Mengele was not an ophthalmologist, but he did work in close collaboration and complicity with Karin Magnussen and Otmar Von Verschuer at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute. The eye colour protocol objective was to demonstrate hereditary differences in iris structure determined by race and ostensibly to cure heterochromia. Mengele sent heterochromous Gypsy eyes to Magnussen, extracted from the bodies of inmates who died (or he killed). Mengele injected adrenaline into the children’s eyes, in an attempt to change eye colour and to study environmental influences. Magnussen was fully aware of Mengele’s methods.

At least until spring 1945, Magnussen was working in Berlin. After the end of World War II, she moved to Bremen and continued to complete her research. She was published in 1949. She was later de-nazified in Bremen.

In 1950, Magnussen taught at a girls high school in Bremen. She worked as a study counsellor and official, including teaching biology. She was considered a popular teacher who prepared interesting biology lessons. Her pupils could examine, for example, living and dead rabbits from their breeding. Until 1964, essays in scientific journals were published by her. She retired in August 1970. Even in old age, she justified the Nazi racial ideology. She noted in 1980, in a conversation with the geneticist Benno Müller-Hill, that the Nuremberg Laws were not fair enough. She also denied until the last minute that Mengele would have killed children for their scientific studies. She was entangled by her cooperation with Mengele, the supply of human materials, and mired deep in concentration camp crimes that she claimed to know nothing about.

In 1990, Magnussen moved into a nursing home and died in February 1997 in Bremen

Sources

https://www.dw.com/en/skeletons-in-the-closet-of-german-science/a-1587766

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32387532/

http://www.estherlederberg.com/Eugenics%20(Anecdotes)/Karin%20Magnussen.html

Playing music for Mengele and the SS.

Gustav Mahler is one of the most famous classical music composers and conductors of all time. Yet, his music was considered as degenerate by the Nazi regime, and was therefore banned in Germany and all the occupies territories. It was not because Mahler was a bad composer but because he was Jewish.

However the Nazis had no issues being musically entertained by Mahler’s niece, Alma Rosé. In fact Alma was selected to play in and conduct the Women’s Orchestra of Auschwitz.

The orchestra was formed in April 1943 by SS-Oberaufseherin Maria Mandel, supervisor of the women’s camp in Auschwitz, and SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer Franz Hössler, the women’s camp commandant. The Nazis wanted a propaganda tool for visitors and camp newsreels and a tool to boost camp morale.

Rosé’s arrival at the camp’s railway siding was in bitter contrast to her previous engagements in nearby Krakow, Poland, just a 45-minute drive away. She had appeared there at least twice – as a violinist appearing with her former husband, the Czech violin virtuoso Váša Příhoda, and in 1935 as a conductor of her celebrated women’s orchestra, the elegant Wiener Walzermädeln which she founded and led throughout Europe.

The orchestra had 20 members by June 1943; by 1944 it had 42–47 musicians Its primary role was to play (often for hours on end in all weather conditions) at the gate of the women’s camp when the work gangs left and returned. They might also play during “selection” and in the infirmary.

They would rehearse for up to ten hours a day to play music regarded as helpful in the daily running of the camp. They also held a concert every Sunday for the SS.

For the orchestra’s concerts the women wore blue pleated skirts, white blouses and lavender-coloured kerchief head coverings.

Anita Lasker-Wallfisch was a cellist in the orchestra and she recalled in her memoirs, and in a documentary called “We want the light” the orchestra being told to play Schumann’s Träumerei for Josef Mengele.

According to one report of a concert in the bath-house, a number of SS women were joking and interrupting the performance in which Alma Rosé was playing a solo. She stopped and angrily said: ‘Like that, I cannot play.’ Silence followed; she then played, and no one disciplined her.

Alma Rosé was even able to convince the Nazis to spare her musicians from selections for the gas chambers. When mandolin player Rachela Zelmanowicz was in the infirmary with typhus,which would be a death sentence for any other prisoner,Josef Mengele was prepared to send her to the gas chambers. “What’s with this one?” he asked during his rounds. “She’s from the orchestra.”

Mengele continued on his way without any further discussion. As a member of Rosé’s orchestra, Zelmanowicz was untouchable even by him. Her life was spared.

Alma Rosé died suddenly on 5 April 1944, possibly from food poisoning, after a birthday celebration for a kapo

On 1 November 1944, the Jewish members of the women’s orchestra were evacuated by cattle car to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany, where there was neither orchestra nor special privileges.Three members, Charlotte “Lola” Croner, Julie Stroumsa and Else, died there.

sources

https://holocaustmusic.ort.org/places/camps/death-camps/auschwitz/camp-orchestras/

https://www.facinghistory.org/music-memory-and-resistance-during-holocaust/birkenau-womens-camp-orchestra

https://www.thestrad.com/alma-rose-the-violinist-who-brought-music-to-auschwitz/341.article

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0074r0r

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Holocaust Testimonies

There are millions of Holocaust stories I could write, but none will be as powerful as the testimonies of those who survived the darkest era.

Following are some of those testimonies.

Written by Zdeněk and Jiří Steiner, born 20. 5. 1929 in Prague, residents of Prague, former prisoners in the concentration camps of Theresienstadt and Auschwitz, residing in Prague XI., Vratislavova 13, Czech nationality.

“We left Prague bound for Theresienstadt on 22. 12. 1942 together with our parents and a great number of relatives. We spent 8½ months Theresienstadt, where things had been so-so for us. We left Theresienstadt on September 6th, 1943, and, after a miserable two-day journey, we finally arrived at the Neu-Berun train station. From there, they took us to the concentration camp in Birkenau. We were told that it was only a quarantine. After the usual procedures, such as a bath and a getting a tattoo (we were given the numbers 147742 and 147743), we were clothed in old rags (children in adult clothing) and housed in camp B II b, where we spent 6 whole months. We experienced so much in this place. Through the efforts of Fredy Hirsch, a children’s home was established. We children were better off than the adults because we didn’t have to work, our food was a little bit better, and, later, our clothes were better as well. Such was our life in the Birkenau children’s camp under extremely harsh conditions. A doctor arrived in December (each camp had a building for the sick and a single German doctor, who generally didn’t know how to do much else besides sending as many people as possible to their graves, served several of these buildings). With a wave of his fingers, Dr. Mengele decided who lived and who died, just like Nero did in ancient times. This renowned doctor was very interested in us twins, which was actually what saved us despite the fact that we came down with so many illnesses. Once, Dr. Mengele took a closer look at us, but then he contracted spotted typhus. In addition to him, we were tortured by the SS man Buntrock, who had a preference for beating children.

Another SS man, probably a Russian spy, who helped one of our people escape, was shot by other SS officers after he returned.

In the meantime, the fateful month of March began. This month took away our parents and all of our closest friends — the only thing that we still had in our lives. At the start of the month, it was rumored that the entire transport that had arrived in September 1943 would be taken to the labor camp in Heidebreck. And that’s exactly what happened. On March 5th, postcards on which we were supposed to write to our relatives that we were healthy and doing fine were handed out. These cards were sent dated March 25th-27th. We weren’t allowed to write about our departure. On the morning of March 6th, as usual: Blockälteste antreten — an order for the entire transport to go to the lower section of the camp immediately. From there they took us to camp B II a. There were so many rumors going about, for example that it wasn’t a labor transport, but a chimney. We didn’t believe it because we thought it was impossible. We waited all day, and in the evening we were told that the transport couldn’t depart because 100 persons were to be reclaimed. This news greatly disturbed us. A terrible sleepless night wreaked havoc with our nerves. The people, who were now extremely distraught, didn’t pay attention to anything; everyone just wished for this uncertainty to end. Midday, on March 7th, a call: Ordnung am Block, Raportführer Buntrok geht. And he really came, read the names of several doctors, and then we heard our names. We became very frightened, because father’s name wasn’t read, and mother wasn’t present on the block. Buntrok assured father that we would see one another in the evening, and we were taken to the Krankenbau of camp B II b. There, we found out what it was really all about. There were 32 of us in total, twins and doctors combined. Mengele reclaimed us twins because he was interested in us, as we’ve already mentioned. He came to see us the next day. When we told him that our parents had left on the transport, he said: Schade. In the meantime, we found out that the cars had driven off during the night ¨

“In the direction of the crematorium. The camp was empty; flames shot up from the crematorium. We will never forget this scene. But we didn’t believe that our parents were dead. However, we soon found out the truth from a doctor who was a member of the Sonderkommando, who was forced to do this work. Mengele arrived the following day, and took us by car to the Roma camp, which was where his station was. There, he precisely measured and weighed us, measured the length and width of our fingers and nails, the length and width of our noses, and anything else that could be measured and weighed. He also took down the color of our hair and skin. He carefully inspected us. He took fingerprints of our hands and feet. He worked alone; he never entrusted anyone else with the tasks he was performing. Then they brought us to the Krankenbau and life went on. We received 2 liters of soup per day, otherwise the food was the same as before. We were also photographed and x-rayed. Jewish doctors, who guaranteed the correctness of the examinations with their lives, had to examine our nerves, eyes, teeth, and ears.
The first labor transport from camp B II b left on 1. 7. In the meantime, another transport from Theresienstadt with 7½ thousand people arrived in May. This brought the number of people in the camp to 12,500, 3,000 of whom left to work. The rest were incinerated within 2 nights. We were taken to B II f. In this new camp, they drew our blood, which made our weakened bodies feel even worse. There is one horrible experience that we will never forget: one of our torturers, the camp doctor Thilo, was making a selection, i.e. choosing the people who would be sent to the crematorium, and he took our names down. What we felt when he did this cannot be described. Fortunately, Mengele heard this and saved us because he still needed us.

The front was approaching and the mood in the camp lifted. During this time, I became a Pipel in the Krankenbau, i.e. a runner, and so I was slightly better off. But then came winter and a new year, which was happier because we could hear the thunder of cannons. A rumor went around that the camp was going to be liquidated, but nothing happened. Finally, on January 16th, they led the first transport on foot out of Birkenau. The following days were extremely vexing, because one transport after another departed. Everyone left voluntarily and we children were the last to leave, partly because we didn’t want to go. People had to walk 60 km in the cold and frost, poorly clothed and hungry. We expected to be told that trains would come pick us up. We finally got what we wanted on January 20th, the day the last SSman left the camp. This was a wonderful time for us. We went wherever we wanted, ate whatever we wanted, did whatever we felt like doing. We roamed around the SS camp. In short, we were having a great time. We went without supervision for 5 days. Then, a group of SDmen arrived. They wanted to do us in, but didn’t get the chance. They, too, fled, and so we stayed until January 27th, when the victorious Red Army took over.

On March 27th, the Czech Svoboda’s Army took charge of us and brought us to Prague. Out of our family of 18, only 3 of us survived.”

Letter from Gerta Sachsová addressed to family friends. Gerta was deported with her husband from Prague to the Theresienstadt Ghetto in July 1943, from where she was sent to Auschwitz in autumn 1944. Her parents and husband were murdered . Gerta describes their fate and her difficult postwar adaptation..

“My Dears,

We are overjoyed that we are finally in written touch with you and that we can write to you in our mother tongue. We have so much to tell you that there isn’t enough paper in the world that could contain it all. Unfortunately, it’s mostly all bad news. So little of it is good. As you have perhaps already learned from Maruška, out of our whole family only Hanka and I returned, but we are happy that at least the two of us were reunited. I must tell you all about our departure from Prague. As you know, Kurt and I were transported to Theresienstadt in July 1943 to be with our parents and Hanka. We were together there for 1 ¼ years. We were doing rather well, all told. Kurt and my parents worked in the office, Hanka in the bakery, and I mostly did nothing because I was sick. Then, in the fall of 1944, we were gradually transported — father left separately, mother with Hanka, and I with Kurt. All of the transports went to Auschwitz. You cannot imagine what we suffered through. I don’t want to describe our experiences and so it’s perhaps a little cruel of me to write and tell you so directly that our dear mother died there. Father, who successfully made it past the selection process, was shot on the Czech border on May 3rd, 1945, just 5 days before the end of the war, during the evacuation of the labor camp where he was sent. Kurt was separated from me in Theresienstadt near the train and it was only when I returned to Prague that I learned that he was held for about 3 weeks in the Small Fortress and was supposedly shot there. We are positive regarding father since he was with Hanka’s young man, who returned. Jirka also returned and we’re living together with him now. I ran into Hanka by happy chance in Prague. She had come back one month earlier than I and she no longer believed that I would return. I’m sure you can imagine what our life is like now. Our financial situation is miserable; we don’t have enough clothes to wear.

I’ll likely find an office job. Hanka is graduating in September and then she’ll probably make her living as an illustrator. In short, this is all that we wanted to tell you about what we went through. We don’t know what the future holds. We are in touch with Maruška. Her little Jana is so adorable. We have visited them several times. Please write us soon and let us know if you are coming. We would love to see you, we have so much to tell. You can’t imagine how we are faring. But at least we are happy that you will come and see us.

sources

https://candlesholocaustmuseum.org/learn/mengele-twin-stories.html?page=3

https://early-testimony.ehri-project.eu/

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Josef Mengele-Angel of Death

Josef Mengele was born in Günzburg on 16 March 1911, the oldest of three sons of Walburga (née Hupfauer) and Karl Mengele. His two younger brothers were Karl Jr. and Alois.

There is an eerie coincidence here, Alois was also the name of the Father of the man he came to admire and serve, Adolf Hitler.

I will not go too deep into the crimes of Josef Mengele as such, because so much has already been written about him, even I have done several pieces in the past. His Father Karl Mengele, a prosperous manufacturer of farming implements. In 1935 Josef got a PhD in physical anthropology at the University of Munich. He also held a doctoral degree in genetic medicine.

A privileged and educated man and yet he could not see how inhumane he was. Or maybe he didn’t want to see. With a slight flick of the finger he would decide who would live or die. Even those who initially were selected to live were subjected to medical experiments or slave labour, eventually often resulting in death.

The most disturbing fact about Mengele is that he died a free man. I have no doubt that he was helped escape Germany after the war and not necessarily only by fellow Nazis. It would not surprise me if he actual had surrendered to the allies, he would have been part of Operation Paperclip, the operation which ensured that many of the Nazi scientists got jobs in the USA and other countries, and not just mediocre positions but highly paid jobs within the scientific fraternity.

But the fact that many of his crimes were well documented and used as evidence during the International Military Tribunal, probably meant that the allies could not be seen endorsing this Angel of Death. Having that said if they would have been serious in capturing him, it would have been very easy to do so because he wasn’t really that hard to find.

The death of Mengele

It is said to you speak not ill of the dead, but in this case I am willing to make an exception. Jospeh Mengele was beyond the shadow of doubt one of the most evil men who ever lived.

Although as a Doctor he was supposed to look after people and first do no harm. The Hippocratic Oath is the oath the Medical Students take, although the actual quote “First do no harm” actually isn’t a part of the Hippocratic Oath at all by the Greek physician Hippocrates . It is actually from another of his works called Of the Epidemics. One line of the Hippocratic Oath states “The physician must be able to tell the antecedents, know the present, and foretell the future — must mediate these things, and have two special objects in view with regard to disease, namely, to do good or to do no harm.”

Either way Mengele’s duty as a physician was to after the well being of those he treated. However he used his position in Auschwitz to fulfill his own twisted ideology and for his own sick gratification.

But as the title states this blog is about the death of Mengele. He had evaded prosecution . He had actually been in US custody. Unaware that Mengele’s name already stood on a list of wanted war criminals, US officials quickly released him. From the summer of 1945 until spring 1949, using false papers, Mengele worked as a farmhand near Rosenheim, Bavaria. His prosperous family then aided his emigration to South America. He settled in Argentina. He became a citizen of Paraguay in 1959. He later moved to Brazil, where he met up with another former Nazi party member, Wolfgang Gerhard.

After Wolfgang Gerhard moved back to hi native Austria it is believed the Mengele assumed his identity. The pair had sent several letters to each other. Some of the letters reveal Mengele’s lack of any remorse and how he felt sorry for himself , he complained how ‘bad’ his life was in Brazil, ironically I do agree with his notion of his ‘bad’ life in Brazil. He really should not have fled but should have faced the consequences of his actions and crimes, rather then fleeing like a cowardly dog with his tail between his legs. He should have been executed.

On February 7th, 1979 Mengele went for a swim in near a holiday resort near Bertioga, Brazil, during the swim he had a stroke and drowned. He died age 66 which is a lot older then many of his victims.

In 1985, a multinational team of forensic experts went to Brazil searching for Mengele. The experts established d that a man named Gerhard had died of a stroke while swimming in 1979. Dental records and a DNA test conducted in 1992, revealed that Mengele was the man who had drowned.

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Sources

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Josef-Mengele

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/23/secondworldwar

https://www.dw.com/en/a-german-town-and-josef-mengele-auschwitz-angel-of-death/a-52114089

The Twisted Evil Mind of Mengele

Capture

People sometimes think that Mengele was the only doctor at Auschwitz, but in fact, there were more than 30 physicians working there. Mengele, however, was the most notorious one. He also seemed to be the most enthusiastic scientist. He had a particularly evil mind. I will not write about his experiments because I have written about those, as have others. I am more interested in that evil twisted mind, a mind that could show kindness and extreme evil at the same time.

One survivor once said of Mengele.
“He was capable of being so kind to the children, to have them become fond of him, to bring them sugar, to think of small details in their daily lives, and to do things we would genuinely admire. And then, next to that, the crematoria smoke, and these children, tomorrow or in a half-hour, he is going to send them there.”

In the documentary The Last Laugh, Renee Firestone recalled her encounter with Mengele, where he examined her and her sister Klara. Mengele had seen Renee had some issues with her tonsils and told her to get that seen whenever she got the chance. At the same time, he sent her sister Klara to the gas chambers.

Even when Mengele showed up for the ramp selections when the transports arrived, some survivors recalled “the impression of a gentle and cultured man who had a cheerful expression on his face, almost like he had fun, he was very playful.”

On the other hand, he turned into extremely evil within seconds, especially when his rules were broken. One time, a mother refused to be separated from her teenage daughter. And she scratched the face of an SS guard—who was tasked to enforce Mengele’s decision. Mengele drew his gun and shot both the woman and her daughter. Still fuming with anger, he ordered that all the people from that transport whom he had previously selected as workers were to be sent to the gas chamber to be murdered.

One question I often ask myself is if the Nazis had never come to power, what kind of physician would Mengele have been? I believe the evil he displayed in the camps he worked in was already in him. That being a Nazi gave him the opportunity to carry out his evil acts and experiments legally.

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I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

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Sources

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0039625720300734

https://candlesholocaustmuseum.org/file_download/inline/25d72a3f-bb51-4c0c-9c72-ac1ed390e57e

https://repository.library.georgetown.edu/handle/10822/553409

Mengele

Mengele

There are few people that intrigue and disgust me simultaneously in similar measures, but Mengele is one of them. I deliberately am not calling him Doctor because he failed to honor or even pledge to the Hippocratic Oath.

One line of that oath states the following “I will use treatment to help the sick according to my ability and judgment, but never with a view to injury and wrong-doing.”

oath

I will not go into great details regarding his evil acts because so much has already been written about it.

But even in his ‘good’ acts there was a menacing threat connected to it. One of his survivors Renee Firestone(nee Weinfeld) recalled in the documentary “The last laugh” how one time Mengele had examined her and had diagnosed an issue with her tonsils. He advised Renee to get that seen to whenever she got a chance. Shortly after he murdered Renee’s sisters while conducting experiments on her.

Mengele was trained as a physician by Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer, a German born member of the Dutch nobble family Verschuer,( originally van der Schuer). But like Mengele there was nothing noble about this man, and like Mengele he also got away with his crimes.

(Von Verschuer pictured at the rear of the photograph below)schuer

Verschuer worked at the Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene in Frankfurt, where Mengele would become one of his students Verschuer was a leading scientist widely known for his research with twins. In in 1927. he had already become head of department for human genetics at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics.

He would also rely at ‘research’ conducted by his former pupil. Research taken from the experiments by Mengele in Auschwitz. In 1944 Verschuer talked about  Mengele’s help in providing  the KWIfA(Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics.) with  “scientific material” from Auschwitz.

“My assistant, Dr. Mengele (M.D., Ph.D.) has joined me in this branch of research. He is presently employed as Hauptsturmführer and camp physician in the concentration camp at Auschwitz. Anthropological investigations on the most diverse racial groups of this concentration camp are being carried out with permission of the SS Reichsführer Himmler; the blood samples are being sent to my laboratory for analysis.”

Mengele in return would rely on the ‘aid’ of  medical professionals among the prisoner population , when I say ‘aid’ it was really a matter of survival of those who were forced to help him Dr. Miklos Nyiszli was one of those medical professionals forced to assist Mengele. He wrote a book called “A Doctor’s Eyewitness Account” about his experiences.

Although many other ‘doctors’ at Auschwitz were reluctant to be present or to take part in the selections. Mengele took great joy in it.

selections

The only bit of consolation we have is that although he did escape justice, he suffered a stroke and drowned while swimming at a vacation resort near Bertioga, Brazil, on February 7, 1979.

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Sources

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/josef-mengele

https://www.yadvashem.org/education/educational-materials/lesson-plans/auschwitz-birkenau-learning.html

https://candlesholocaustmuseum.org/file_download/inline/25d72a3f-bb51-4c0c-9c72-ac1ed390e57e#:~:text=Ren%C3%A9e%20Firestone%20(n%C3%A9e%20Weinfeld)%20was,Mau%2D%20ritius%20and%20Julia%20Weinfeld.

 

A•B•C—The Boys from Argentina

ABC

Tripadvisor in September 2018 had a review of the A•B•C restaurant in Lavalle 545, Buenos Aires, Argentina, from Paddy M., which paraphrased read:

Mengele and Eichmann Tour
Last year, I was here due to the Nazi hunt my father began in the 1950s. It is a lovely small restaurant. I met a man in his 90s who personally knew many Nazis. I had dinner with him one night in the corner where Mengele and Eichmann once sat. You will not find anything from the past inside, like old tables or chairs, but instead, you could find an idea of what people were talking about back then—intriguing.

abc rest

I was always surprised why there were never any sanctions against Argentina and other South American countries. Argentina appeared to have harboured and still does provide a haven for escaped Nazi war criminals.

The A•B•C Restaurant is a prime example where Nazis dined and wined in plain sight. In 1950 Adolf Eichmann escaped with help from the Red Cross to Argentina. By 1952 his family followed him. Eichmann, at the time, had changed his name to Ricardo Klement.

ricardo

Joseph Mengele also moved to Argentina after he had been hiding, more or less in plain sight in Germany. In 1949 he fled to Argentina via Genoa in Italy, using the alias Helmut Gregor, and was assisted by the Red Cross, which obtained a passport and Visa for him. Now I don’t want to be too critical of the Red Cross because the whole civil administration was chaos in the late 1940s in Germany.

Mengele, though, soon started using his own name again, be it with a slight Spanish angle to it as Jose Mengele.

In 1953, both men met in the German-style A•B•C Restaurant, where they held a party for another Nazi, the propagandist Johann von Leers, who worked for Goebbels and was a propaganda writer for Juan Perón. Johann von Leers was moving to Egypt, so Mengele and Eichmann threw him a goodbye party.

There were so many Nazis who received refuge in Argentina, in a small town called Bariloche, which made international headlines in 1995  when it became known as a haven for Nazi war criminals, such as the former SS Hauptsturmführer Erich Priebke and SS officer Reinhard Kopps, known in Argentina as Juan Maler. Priebke had been the director of the German School of Bariloche for many years.

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I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

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Sources

BBC

https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/the-long-road-to-eichmann-s-arrest-a-nazi-war-criminal-s-life-in-argentina-a-754486.html

The evil of Mengele.

mengele

I could fill this blog with pictures of the experiments Joseph Mengele conducted in Auschwitz, but I think most of the readers would not be able to stomach the images. I know I can’t ,therefore I am just going to quote some eye witness reports to illustrate how truly evil this man was. He had a particular interest in twins.

Vera Kriegel

Vera and her twin sister Olga were only five years old when they were taken from their village in Czechoslovakia and deported to  Auschwitz.

. “I was looking at a whole wall of human eyes. A wall of blue eyes, brown eyes, green eyes. These eyes they were staring at me like a collection of butterflies and I fell down on the floor.”

In one experiment Vera and her sister Olga and more than 100 other twins were given injections of bacteria which causes Noma disease also known as cancrum oris which is an infection of the mouth or genitals, which causes boils and often turns gangrenous and has a high mortality rate.

Miklós Nyiszli

Miklós Nyiszli testified  thatt on one occasion , Mengele personally killed fourteen twins in one night by injecting chloroform in to the heart. If one twin died of disease, Mengele would then kill the other twin, in order  that comparative reports could be prepared after their deaths.

Vera Alexander

2020-03-13 (8)

Vera Alexander testifies in the Eichmann trial, she recalled one experiment by Mengele.  He sewed the hands of two gypsy twins together,a sin he sewed one hand of one child to the hand of the other child.

The truly sickening thing is that he died a free man and had lived quite a comfortable life after the war.

mengel family

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

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Sources

https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn1001717

https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30933718