Doctors Of Infamy: The Story Of The Nazi Medical Crimes

Alexander Mitscherlich, Fred Mielke, Heinz Norden

• Publisher: Normanby Press
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781786257147
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Jewish History
• Index: History

With 16 pages of photographsOne of the most shocking aspects of the Nazi treatment of their prisoners was the wanton cruelty of the doctors assigned to the concentration camps that were dotted throughout occupied Europe. In an ironic perversion of their Hippocratic oath doctors, such as the infamous Mangele, carried out horrendous experiments on their captive victims in the name of science. As part of the Nuremberg trials the Nazi medical establishment was called to account for these crimes against humanity. Alexander Mitscherlich was the doctor assigned to carry out a full investigation into the crimes across all of Europe; in his report embodied in this book, reported on the awful scale and complicity of the Nazis. The terrible details have to be read to be believed in this shocking book.

THE EUTHANASIA PROGRAM. DIRECT EXTERMINATION OF RACIAL GROUPS AND UNDESIRABLE PATIENTS. EXPERIMENTAL WORK IN MASS STERILIZATION

Hitler’s interest in “eugenic” measures was in keeping with, the whole program of the Nazi Party.

As early as 1933—on July 14 of that year, in fact—the “Law for the Prevention of Progeny With Hereditary Disease” was proclaimed. By March 1934 Messrs. Gütt, Rüdin, and Ruttke had already presented their comprehensive commentary on the law.

This became the starting point for a line of development that inexorably led to enforced “mercy death” for the incurably insane on the one hand, and, during the war, on the other, to plans for exterminating races declared to be inferior—Poles, Russians, Jews, and gypsies.

It is from this frame of reference that the concept of “special treatment”{21} must be approached. Even more than the concept of “mercy death,” it puts to the fore purely utilitarian considerations, as against a humanitarian ideology.

These efforts on behalf of “national health” and the “integrity of the German people” can thus be classified under three main headings:

1. The euthanasia program for the “incurably sick.”

2. The direct extermination, by means of “special treatment,” of racial groups and patients considered undesirable.

3. Preliminary experimental work in mass sterilization.

The Euthanasia Program

In testifying on his own behalf, the chief defendant, Karl Brandt, pointed out that as early as the Nazi Party Convention of 1935, Gerhardt Wagner, at that time Nazi Medical Leader, had seized upon the problem of euthanasia, having a film produced which was to show the life of mental patients.{22}

Karl Brandt testified that in 1935 Hitler expressed himself to Dr. Wagner to the effect “that if war came, he would pick up and carry out this question of euthanasia,” since “the Führer was of the opinion that such a program could be put into effect more smoothly and readily in time of war, that in the general upheaval of war the open resistance to be anticipated on the part of the Church would not play the part that might otherwise be expected...”

Certain petitions that reached Hitler seem to have played a part in making up his mind. Thus, according to Brandt, in 1939 the father of a malformed child appealed to Hitler, requesting authority for a mercy death.

Brandt testified on this point:

“At the time Hitler ordered me to look into the matter and to go at once to Leipzig—the locale of this affair—to confirm the situation on the spot. It was the case of a child that had been born blind, that appeared to be an imbecile, and that in addition lacked one leg and part of one arm...The physicians were of the opinion that it was not really justifiable to keep such a child alive. It was pointed out as quite natural that under certain circumstances physicians in lying-in hospitals administer euthanasia on their own initiative, with nothing further being heard of the matter.”

The whole problem of malformation and euthanasia had been studied and discussed along general lines by Reich Health Leader Conti, Philipp Bouhler, Chief of Hitler’s Chancellery, and Dr. Linden, Councilor in the Reich Ministry of Interior and in charge of all mental institutions. After the conclusion of the Polish campaign, Hitler told Karl Brandt “that he proposed now to put into effect a definitive solution to the euthanasia problem.” Late in October 1939 he signed a decree dated back to September 1, 1939, that ran as follows:

“Reich Leader Bouhler and Dr. Brandt are charged with the responsibility for expanding the authority of physicians, to be designated by name, to the end that patients considered incurable in the best available human judgment, after critical evaluation of their state of health, may be granted a merciful death.”

With the help of three camouflaged organizations, Philipp Bouhler and Dr. Linden’s office in the Reich Ministry of Interior put this “euthanasia program” into effect. The “Reich Association, Hospital and Nursing Establishments,” as the first agency, undertook to locate patients by sending out and processing questionnaires. The “Charitable Foundation for Institutional Care” was charged with the financial arrangements. And the “Non-Profit Patient-Transport Corporation” took care of moving the patients. Three consultants, independently of one another, received a photostat each of the questionnaires, sent to them by the Reich Association, Hospital and Nursing Establishments. When these consultants had put their comments on the photostats, these went to the chief consultants, Prof. Heyde and Prof. Nietsche—and according to the statement of the witness Dr. Mennecke, still other university professors—he remembered Prof. de Crinis by name. They had the final decision on the transfer of a patient to an observation institution. The chief purpose of these observation institutions was to assemble the patients before shipping them by groups to the euthanasia institutions (chiefly Hadamar in Hesse, Hartheim near Linz, Grafeneck in Württemberg, Brandenburg-on-Havel, Sonnenstein near Pirna). Neither the patients themselves nor their next of kin were given an opportunity to make the decision.

Preparations for enactment of the program emerge from the statements of Dr. Fritz Mennecke, former chief of the Eichberg Observation Institution, sentenced to death in the Eichberg trial. He tells of a conference held at Berlin early in February 1940:

“Some ten or twelve physicians unknown to me had been asked to attend this conference, in addition to myself. We were advised by Drs. Hevelmann and Bohne and by Herr Brack that the National Socialist Government had decreed laws under which socially unfit lives{23} could be extinguished. The assembled physicians were asked whether they cared to function as medical consultants. We were urgently enjoined not to discuss these matters, since they were classified ‘top secret.’ During the conference Herr Brack read a communication, the precise content of which I do not recall. In my recollection it gave assurances that the physicians cooperating in the program would be immune from penalties. The discussion then turned to the work we were expected to do—rendering medical opinions on institutional patients, that is, mental patients. The other physicians assembled were all gentlemen of mature years, including some eminent figures, as I learned later. Since all these gentlemen consented without hesitation, I joined in this decision and offered my services as a consultant.”

The former senior Attending Physician of the Eichberg Institution, Dr. Walter Schmidt, now sentenced to the penitentiary for life, testified about the same conference:

“...The legal gentlemen in Berlin told us that this task was a legitimate matter, that it was a law of Hitler’s, a decree having full legal force. The question as to whether Hitler was empowered to issue such decrees was likewise discussed by the lawyers and answered in the affirmative. We were told that the matter was a legitimate concern of the state, that it had been planned as early as 1932, that other countries had made similar plans, that we would in no way make ourselves liable, that, on the contrary, sabotage of this order by Hitler would be punishable. The question of secrecy was also discussed at length. It was stated that this was a new type of law, that for this reason patients must not have prior knowledge of the measure since otherwise they might become too agitated, that this was probably the crucial reason why the law had not been made public. Besides, we were at war at the time, and such measures on the home front had to be kept secret...[We were told] that only incurable patients, suffering severely, were involved, though I was not quite clear on where the line was to be drawn.”

In order to insure secrecy for the program, only such consultants and institutional executives were enlisted as were tried and tested Nazis and SS leaders.

Excerpts from the more than hundred documents available give a clear picture of the extent and character of the euthanasia program. We quote from the sworn statement of a nurse, P. Kneissler:

“...In 1939 I received a summons from the Chief of Police to report on January 4, 1940, at the Ministry of Interior, located in the building of the Columbus House. There a gentleman by the name of Blankenburg addressed our group, which consisted of twenty-two or twenty-three persons. He explained the importance and the secrecy of the euthanasia program and told us that Hitler had worked out a law on euthanasia which had not been made public on account of the war. He told us it was entirely up to us whether we wished to volunteer for work on this program. None of those present had any objections to the program and Blankenburg swore us in. The oath included obedience and secrecy and Blankenburg called our attention to the fact that any violation of the oath was punishable by death...

“After the conference we took a bus to Grafeneck Castle, where we were received by Dr. Schumann, its director. Our work at Grafeneck did not begin until March 1940, but the male personnel began work there earlier. One of my jobs was to go to the various institutions, in company of Herr Schwenniger, who was also a member of the ‘Charitable Foundation for Institutional Care,’ in order to pick up patients and bring them to Grafeneck. Herr Schwenniger, who was our transport chief, had lists naming the patients to be moved...The patients we moved were not necessarily severe cases. They were mentally ill, true enough, but often in very good physical condition. Each transport consisted of about seventy persons, and we had such transports almost daily...When the patients had arrived at Grafeneck they were assigned to the barracks there, where Dr. Schumann and Dr. Baumhardt gave them a cursory examination on the basis of the questionnaires. It was up to these two physicians to say the final word on whether a patient was to be gassed or not. In individual cases the patients were exempted from gassing. In most cases the patients were killed within twenty-four hours of arriving at Grafeneck. I was in Grafeneck for almost a year and know of only a few cases in which the patients were not gassed. In most cases the patients received an injection of 2 cc morphine-scopolamine before the gassing. These injections were administered by the physician. Gassing itself was accomplished by certain picked men. Dr. Hennecke performed autopsies on some of the victims. Idiot children between the ages of six and thirteen were also included in the program.

“When Grafeneck was closed, I was assigned to Hadamar, where I remained until 1943. At Hadamar the same work was continued, but with the difference that instead of gassing, the patients were killed with veronal, luminal, and morphine-scopolamine. About seventy-five patients a day were killed.

“From Hadamar I was transferred to Irrsee near Kaufbeuren, where I continued my work. Dr. Valentin Faltlhauser was the head of this institution. There the patients were killed by injections as well as with tablets. This program was carried out down to Germany’s collapse.”{24}

The next document represents one of the questionnaires sent out:

*Of German or kindred blood (of German blood, Jewish, first or second degree, Jewish half-breed, Negro [half-breed], gypsy [half-breed], etc.).

The path taken by the questionnaires, as shown in the following documents, at once reveals the organizational background of the program. The then Reich Health Leader himself initiated the action by means of a round robin order:

Reich Minister of Interior Berlin, October 24,1939

NW40, Königsplatz 6

To the Director…………………………………………………………………………….....

“In view of the necessity for planned utilization of hospital and nursing institutions, I request that you promptly fill out the en-closed report forms, in accordance with the enclosed instructions, returning them to me. In the event you are not yourself a physician, the report forms for the individual patients are to be filled out by the physician in charge. The report forms are to be filled out on the typewriter, if at all possible.

“To accelerate processing, the report forms for the individual patients may be returned in several installments. The final shipment, however, must have reached this Ministry no later than December 1, 1939. I re...

Table of contents

• Title page
• TABLE OF CONTENTS
• STATEMENT BY ANDREW C. IVY, M.D.
• STATEMENT BY TELFORD TAYLOR
• STATEMENT BY LEO ALEXANDER, M.D.
• A NOTE ON MEDICAL ETHICS BY ALBERT DEUTSCH
• TWENTY-THREE DOCTORS: THE INDICTMENT
• EXPERIMENTS INVOLVING HIGH ALTITUDE (SUBJECTION TO LOW PRESSURE). LOW TEMPERATURE, AND THE DRINKING OF SEA WATER
• EXPERIMENTS WITH TYPHUS AND INFECTIOUS JAUNDICE
• EXPERIMENTS WITH SULFONAMIDE, BONE-GRAFTING, CELLULITIS, AND MUSTARD GAS
• COLLECTION OF SKULLS OF JEWS FOR STRASSBURG UNIVERSITY
• THE EUTHANASIA PROGRAM. DIRECT EXTERMINATION OF RACIAL GROUPS AND UNDESIRABLE PATIENTS. EXPERIMENTAL WORK IN MASS STERILIZATION
• PUBLISHER’S EPILOGUE: SEVEN WERE HANGED
• APPENDIX: THE MEANING OF GUILT