They were mainly persecuted by members of their own race, their foremen or room seniors. Eschen, their block senior, distinguished himself in this respect. He was to hang himself later, because he feared punishment on account of some homosexual affair in which he had become involved. This block senior used every possible means, no matter how low, to terrorize the other prisoners, not only physically but above all mentally. He kept the screws on the whole time. He would entice them into disobeying the camp regulations, and then report them. He goaded them into acts of violence against one another, or against the Capos, so as to have an excuse to report them for punishment. He would not send-his report in at once, however, but would keep it hanging over their heads as a means of blackmail. He was the “Devil” incarnate. He showed a repulsive zeal toward the members of the SS, but was ready to inflict any kind of iniquity on his fellow prisoners and members of his own race.
I wanted to sack him more than once, but it was impossible. Eicke himself insisted on his retention.
Eicke invented a special form of collective punishment for the Jews. Each time an atrocity propaganda campaign about the concentration camps was inaugurated abroad, the Jews would be forced to lie in bed for anything from one to three months, and would be permitted to get up and leave their block only at mealtimes and for roll call.
They were forbidden to ventilate their quarters and the windows were screwed down. This was a cruel punishment, with particularly severe psychological effects. As a result of this compulsory staying in bed for long periods, they became so nervous and overwrought that they could no longer bear the sight of each other, and could not stand one another’s company. Many violent brawls broke out in consequence.
It was Eicke’s opinion that responsibility for the atrocity propaganda campaigns must lie with those Jews who had emigrated after being in Dachau, and that it was therefore only right that the remaining Jews should suffer this distressing collective punishment.
In this connection, I must make the following statement. I was opposed to Der Stürmer, Streicher’s anti-Semitic weekly, because of the disgusting sensationalism with which it played on people’s basest instincts. Then, too, there was its perpetual and often savagely pornographic emphasis on sex. This paper caused a lot of mischief and, far from serving serious anti-Semitism, it did it a great deal of harm. It is small wonder that after the collapse it was learned that a Jew edited the paper and that he also wrote the worst of the inflammatory articles it contained.[60]
As a fanatical National Socialist I was firmly convinced that our ideals would gradually be accepted and would prevail throughout the world, after having been suitably modified in conformity to the: national characteristics of the other peoples concerned. Jewish supremacy would thus be abolished. There was nothing new in anti-Semitism. It has always existed all over the world, but has only come into the limelight when the Jews have pushed themselves forward too much in their quest for power, and when their evil machinations have become too obvious for the general public to stomach.
But in my opinion the cause of anti-Semitism is ill-served by such frenzied persecution as was provided by Der Stürmer.
If one wished to combat Jewry spiritually, then better weapons would have to be used. I believed that our ideas would prevail because they were both better and stronger.
I had no hope that Eicke’s collective punishments would have the slightest effect on the foreign newspaper atrocity campaigns. These would go on, though hundreds or even thousands were shot on that account. Nevertheless, I thought it right that the Jews we had in our power should be punished for the dissemination of these atrocity stories by their racial fellows.
Then came the “Crystal Night,” staged by Goebbels in November 1938, when, as a reprisal for the shooting of von Rath in Paris by a Jew, Jewish shops throughout the country were destroyed or at least had their windows smashed, and when fires broke out in all the synagogues and the fire-fighting services were deliberately prevented from putting them out. “For their own protection, and to save them from the wrath of the people,” all Jews who played any part in the trade or industry or business life of the country were arrested and brought into the concentration camps as “protective custody Jews.”
Thus did I first learn to know them in the mass.
Up to then Sachsenhausen had been almost free of Jews,[61] but now came the Jewish invasion. Hitherto bribery had been almost unknown in Sachsenhausen. Now it was widespread and took every form.
The “green” prisoners welcomed the Jews with delight as objects to be plundered. Their money had to be taken away from them, since otherwise it would have been impossible to prevent the camp from falling into a state of chaos.
They did their best to do each other in the eye whenever they could. Each tried to wangle a little position for himself and, with the tacit consent of the Capos they had won over, even invented new posts for themselves so as to avoid having to work. They did not hesitate to get rid of their fellow prisoners by making false accusations against them, if this would enable them to obtain a nice, easy job. Once they had “got somewhere,” they proceeded to harry and persecute their own people quite mercilessly. They far surpassed the “green” prisoners in every way.
Many Jews were driven to despair by this behavior and in order to escape further persecution they “ran into the wire,” or attempted flight, hoping to be shot, or hanged themselves.
The numerous incidents of this nature were duly reported to Eicke by the commandant. Eicke merely remarked: “Let them carry on. The Jews can quietly devour each other.”
I must emphasize here that I have never personally hated the Jews. It is true that I looked upon them as the enemies of our people. But just because of this I saw no difference between them and the other prisoners, and I treated them all in the same way. I never drew any distinctions. In any event the emotion of hatred is foreign to my nature. But I know what hate is, and what it looks like. I have seen it and I have suffered it myself.
When the Reichsführer SS modified his original Extermination Order of 1941, by which all Jews without exception were to be destroyed, and ordered instead that those capable of work were to be separated from the rest and employed in the armaments industry, Auschwitz became a Jewish camp.
It was a collecting place for Jews, exceeding in scale anything previously known.
Whereas the Jews who had been imprisoned in former years were able to count on being released one day and were thus far less affected psychologically by the hardships of captivity, the Jews in Auschwitz no longer had any such hope. They knew, without exception, that they were condemned to death, that they would live only so long as they could work.
Nor did the majority have any hope of a change in their sad lot. They were fatalists. Patiently and apathetically, they submitted to all the misery and distress and terror. The hopelessness with which they accepted their impending fate made them psychologically quite indifferent to their surroundings. This mental collapse accelerated its physical equivalent. They no longer had the will to live, everything had become a matter of indifference to them, and they would succumb to the slightest physical shock. Sooner or later, death was inevitable. I firmly maintain from what I have seen that the high mortality among the Jews was due not only to the hard work, to which most of them were unaccustomed, and to the insufficient food, the overcrowded quarters, and all the severities and abuses of camp life, but principally and decisively to their psychological state.
60
It is not known on what grounds Hoess makes this assertion, for which no evidence can be found.
61
The actual word is