The Odessa File

Miller looked stunned. “They haven’t arrested him?” he asked.

“Who?”

“The police of Hamburg, of course.”

For answer Simon Wiesenthal rummaged in a drawer and produced another sheet of paper. He folded it neatly down the center from top to bottom and laid it in front of Miller so that only the left side of the sheet was facing upward.

“Do you recognize those names?” he asked.

Miller scanned the list of ten names with a frown. “Of course. I’ve been a police reporter in Hamburg for years. These are all senior police officers of the Hamburg force. Why?”

“Spread the paper out,” said Wiesenthal.

Miller did so. Fully expanded, the sheet read:

Name	Nazi Pty. No.	SS No.	Promotion Rank	Date
A.	-	455,336	Capt.	1.3.43
B.	5,451,195	429,339	1st Lt.	9.11.42
C.	-	353,004	1st Lt.	1.11.41
D.	7,039,564	421,176	Capt.	21.6.44
E.	-	421,445	1st Lt.	9.11.42
F.	7,040,308	174,902	Major	21.6.44
G.	-	426,553	Capt.	1.9.42
K.	3,138,798	311,870	Capt.	30.1.42
L.	1,867,976	424,361	1st Lt.	20.4.44
J.	5,063,331	309,825	Major	9.11.43

Miller looked up. “Christ,” he said.

“Now do you begin to understand why a lieutenant general of the SS is walking around Hamburg today? They can’t arrest him. He was their commanding officer once.” Miller looked at the list in disbelief. “That must have been what Brandt meant about inquiries into the former SS not being very popular in the Hamburg police.”

“Probably,” said Wiesenthal. “Nor is the Attorney General’s office the most energetic in Germany. There’s one lawyer on the staff at least who is trying, but certain interested parties have tried to have him dismissed several times.”

The pretty secretary poked her head around the door. “Tea or coffee?” she asked.

After a lunchtime break, Miller returned to the office. Simon Wiesenthal had in front of him a number of sheets spread out, extracts from his own Roschmann file. Miller settled himself in front of the desk, got out his notebook, and waited.

Simon Wiesenthal began to relate the Roschmann story from January 8, 1948.

It had been agreed between the British and American authorities that after Roschmann had testified at Dachau he would be moved on to the British Zone of Germany, probably Hanover, to await his own trial and almost certain hanging. Even while in prison in Graz he bad begun to plan his escape.

He had made contact with a Nazi escape organization working in Austria called the Six-Point Star, nothing to do with the Jewish symbol of the six-pointed star, but so called because the Nazi organization had its tentacles in six major Austrian cities, mainly in the British Zone.

At 6:00 a.m. on the eighth, Roschmann was awakened and taken to the train waiting at Graz station.

Once he was in the compartment, an argument started between the Military Police sergeant, who wanted to keep the handcuffs on Roschmann throughout the journey, and the Field Security sergeant, who suggested taking them Off.

Roschmann influenced the argument by claiming that he had diarrhea from the prison diet and wished to go to the lavatory. He was taken, the handcuffs were removed, and one of the sergeants waited outside the door until he had finished. As the train chugged through the snowbound landscape Roschmann made three requests to go to the lavatory. Apparently during this time he prized the window in the lavatory open, so that it slid easily on its runners.

Roschmann knew he had to get out before the Americans took him over at Salzburg for the last run by car to their own prison at Munich, but station after station went by, and still the train was going too fast.

It stopped at Hallein, and one of the sergeants went to buy some food on the platform. Roschmann again said he wanted to go to the lavatory. It was the more easygoing FSS sergeant who accompanied him, warning him not to use the toilet while the train was stationary. As the train moved slowly out of Hallein, Roschmann jumped from the window into the snowdrifts. It was ten minutes before the sergeants beat down the door, and by then the train was running fast down the mountains toward Salzburg.

He staggered through the snow as far as a peasant’s cottage and took refuge there. The following day he crossed the border from Upper Austria into Salzburg province and contacted the Six-Point Star organization. It brought him to a brick factory, where he passed as a laborer, while contact was made with the Odessa for a passage to the south and Italy.

At that time the Odessa was in close contact with the recruitment section of the French Foreign Legion, into which scores of former SS soldiers had fled. Four days after contact was made, a car with French number plates was waiting outside the town of Ostermieting and took on board Roschmann and five other Nazi escapers. The Foreign Legion driver, equipped with papers that enabled the car to cross borders without being searched, brought the six SS men over the Italian border to Merano and was paid in cash by the Odessa representative there, a hefty sum per head of his passengers.