MORE RAVENSBRUCK HORRORS

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5292, 3 January 1947, Page 6

MORE RAVENSBRUCK HORRORS

( Press Assn.—

2400 WOMEN GASSED THREE BRITISH WOMEN PARACHUTISTS SHOT

-Rec. 9.S0 -p.m.)

HAMBURG, Jan. 2. The shooting of three British women parachutists and the gassing of nearly 2400 women in Ravensbruck concentration camp under the Nazi regime was described before the War Crimes Court which is trying 16 men and women guards. Major Stephan Stewart, the prosecutoi*, read a deposition by Joh'ann Schwarzhuber, deputy - commandant of the camp, giving the names of the parachutists who were shot as Mrs, Vilette Szabo, who was posthumously awarded the George Cross, Lillian Rolfe and Danielle Williams. The deposition added that among the punishments were beatings of 25 blows with sticks. This was so severe that Himniler's consent had first to be obtained. ■Schwarzhuber blamed Fritz Suren, the camp commandant, who escaped from prison while awaiting trial, for starvation and bad conditions in the camp. Schwarzhuber said 150 women, who were too sick to work, were gassed because shooting was too slow. "They were made to disrobe and enter the gas chamber on the pretext that they were to be deloused," he said. "The door v/as locked and a Uor 0f ,t,he staff climbed on the roof and threw gas containers through the window for two' minutes. I heard whimpering and moaning. Then all was quiet. The bodies were taken immediately to the nearby crematorium and burned. I do not know whether the women were all dead, but at least they were unconsciousness." Short rations, beatings, injections to induce semi-consciousness and the binding of prisoners in crouching positions were the methods Ludwg Ramdour, in his deposition, admitted using to obtain confes-. sions. Ramdour, who was the political interrogator of the camp, said the prisoners, after the last-named method were usually wilHng to confess. Heinrich Peters, one of the accused who was in charge of the men's camp, stated in his deposition that he witnessed mass shootings of women who were tied to a stake and shot in the back.