The Nizkor Project: Remembering the Holocaust (Shoah)

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Archive/File: imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-06-58.18
Last-Modified: 1997/10/21

                                                  [Page 336]
                                                            
I submit to the Tribunal four photographs of German origin
as Exhibit USSR 345. Each of these photographs was taken by
Germans; time and place are indicated. One photograph shows
the distribution of food; the third and fourth are pictures
of the prisoner of war camp at Uman.

THE PRESIDENT: Where are the pictures?

COLONEL POKROVSKY: If I am not mistaken, you have been given
the photostat of the statement, but not the photographs.

THE PRESIDENT: This is not a copy of the photographs; these
are the signatures of the 60 German prisoners.

COLONEL POKROVSKY: The photographs will be submitted
immediately. They have evidently, by an oversight, not been
included in the document book.

THE PRESIDENT: Go on.

COLONEL POKROVSKY: It is obvious from the first picture that
the food distributed is insufficient. Men are practically
fighting for the right of getting at it. The second
photograph shows hungry Soviet prisoners of war wandering
round an empty barn and eating the oil cakes stored for
cattle food which they had discovered. As to the third and
fourth photographs, I can submit to the Tribunal important
testimony by the witness, Bingel. Excerpts from his
testimony have a direct bearing on the question of the
treatment of Soviet prisoners of war.

I interrogated Bingel, and I now submit the minutes of his
interrogation to the Tribunal as Exhibit USSR 111, dated
27th December, 1945. Bingel, who formerly commanded a
company in the German Army, testified (I quote an excerpt
from Page 8 of the minutes of his interrogation) as follows:

     "I have already made one statement concerning the
     regime inside the prisoner of war camp at Uman.  This
     camp was guarded by a company of our sub-section of the
     783rd Battalion, and I was therefore familiar with
     everything which occurred in the camp. It was the task
     of our battalion to guard the prisoners of war and to
     control the highways and railroads.
     
     This camp was calculated to hold, under normal
     conditions, from 6,000 to 7,000 men; at that time,
     however, it housed 74,000 men.'
     
     Q. Were there barracks?
     
     A. No. It was formerly a brickyard and consisted
     exclusively of low sheds for drying bricks.
     
     Q. Were the prisoners of war housed there?
     
     A. It can scarcely be said that they were housed, since
     each shed, at the utmost, could not contain more than
     200 to 300 men; the rest had to sleep in the open.
     
     Q. What was the regime like at that camp?
     
     A. The regime in that camp was definitely peculiar. The
     existing conditions gave one the impression that the
     Camp Commander, Captain Bekker, was quite unable to
     handle and feed so large a number of men. There were
     two kitchens in the camp, although they could hardly be
     called kitchens. Iron barrels had been placed on stone
     and concrete floors, and the food for the prisoners was
     prepared in these barrels. But the kitchens, even if
     operating for 24 hours on end, could only prepare food
     for approximately 2,000 people. The usual diet of the
     prisoner, the daily ration for 6 men, consisted of one
     loaf of bread which, again, could scarcely be described
     as bread. Disturbances frequently arose during the
     distribution of the hot food, for the prisoners -- and
     there were 70,000 of them in the camp -- struggled to
     get at the victuals. In cases like these the guards
     resorted to clubs -- a usual procedure in the camp. I
     obtained the general impression that in all the camps
     the club was inevitably the foundation of all things."
     
                                                  [Page 337]
                                                            
Please forgive the digression, but I have been told, Your
Honour, that two photographs are attached to the record and
that their authenticity is certified. I am now submitting
them to the Tribunal. The other two will be handed to you
very shortly. I continue to quote from the record:

     "Q. Do you know anything about the death rate at the
     camp?
     
     A. 60 to 70 men died at the camp daily.
     
     Q. From what causes?
     
     A. Before the epidemics broke out one mostly spoke of
     people being killed.
     
     Q. Killed during the distribution of food?
     
     A. Both during the distribution of food and during
     working hours; generally speaking, people were being
     killed all day long."
     
Bingel was interrogated by us for the second time, and he
was shown the photographs of the camp at Uman. He was then
asked the following question:

     "The camp shown here, is it the one you spoke about, or
     some other camp?"
     
After this he was shown photographs from two negatives of
14th August, 1941. Bingel replied:

     "Yes, this is the camp of which I spoke.
     
     As a matter of fact, this is not the camp proper but a
     clay pit belonging to the camp; here the prisoners were
     housed as soon as they arrived from the front. Later on
     they were assigned to various sections of the camp."
     
     Q. What can you tell us about the second photograph?
     
     A. The second one shows the camp photographed from
     another angle, i.e., from the right side. The buildings
     shown here were practically the only brick buildings in
     the camp. These brick buildings, though quite empty and
     undamaged, with excellent and spacious quarters, were
     not used for housing the prisoners of war."
     

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