[Ditlieb Felderer was the first witness called by the defence. He testified on March 2, 3, 4 and 7, 1988.]
Ditlieb Felderer, 46, first met Zündel in 1979. Both had an interest in what Felderer defined as the "extermination theory," the belief that during the Second World War, in Poland, millions of people had been exterminated in gas chambers. (18-4225)
Felderer's interest in the subject had been aroused during his years as a researcher for the Jehovah's Witness publication Awake!, during which time he prepared a research paper for the Witnesses' governing body on the history of the Jehovah's Witnesses during World War II. Members of the sect were incarcerated in virtually every camp in Nazi Germany during the war and also in such countries as Canada because they refused to bear arms. (18-4225 to 4229) In the beginning, the Jehovah's Witnesses claimed that 60,000 of their members were killed in the Nazi concentration camps. Felderer's research on the question, which took him to the headquarters of the Jehovah's Witnesses in New York, as well as to archives in Toronto, Switzerland and Scandinavian countries, convinced him that the actual number was far lower, and that only about 200 Jehovah's Witnesses were killed. Felderer's research put him on a collision course with the sect; the leadership in New York warned members that they were not allowed to speak to him. In a subsequent Yearbook published by the Jehovah's Witnesses, however, they conceded that only 203 people were killed during the war. Felderer had told Zündel about this research. (18-4226 to 4229; 4645)
In 1976, Felderer received an English language edition of the booklet Did Six Million Really Die? by Richard Harwood from an anonymous sender. Felderer, who was Swedish, could also read Danish, Norwegian, German, French and English. As a result of reading the booklet, he decided to delve into the issue and visit all of the camps that he possibly could. (18-4230, 4231)
Felderer subsequently published a Swedish language edition of Did Six Million Really Die? in 1977. Under Swedish law, he was required to submit the booklet to the Attorney General's department, which had a special department where publications were scanned to determine whether they were lawful. No complaint or prosecution was ever brought against Felderer for the booklet. It was mailed to all major newspapers in Sweden and schools and was still available in Sweden today. (18-4233) In total, he distributed about 10,000 copies in Swedish. (19-4620; Dog Verkligen Sex Miljoner? entered as Exhibit 74, 18-4231)
Felderer had never found anything substantially wrong with Did Six Million Really Die?. He testified that, to the contrary, it had proven to be more true as the years progressed. In 1974, when the booklet was first published, it was believed there was a Hitler order. Did Six Million Really Die? was the first publication Felderer saw which claimed otherwise. The exterminationists had now moved to a position closer to that of the booklet. (19-4601)
After publishing the booklet, Felderer saw a book produced by a Jewish group in South Africa which he believed was the only book ever published to attempt to refute Did Six Million Really Die?. Felderer pointed out that he had mailed his material to historians in Sweden with the request that if they found any error in the material, they should let him know. He did not for a moment believe any book to be perfect. Each book had its faults and mistakes, but it was not for him, as a publisher, to start cutting out views and ideas. It was up to the purchaser of the material to find out the truth. (19-4618, 4619)
Asked if he was part of some conspiracy to rehabilitate Nazism and Hitler, Felderer stated that Nazism was dead and a past issue, and that it was pure fantasy for someone who even nurtured that viewpoint. He felt history should be a non political matter where each individual, without threat of having authorities stopping their research, could research freely and in that way come to the truth. (19 4620, 4621)
The first camp Felderer visited was Dachau in West Germany. He discussed this visit with Zündel, as he regarded Dachau as an essential element in understanding exterminationism. He pointed out that in exterminationalist literature published between 1947 and the Frankfurt trial in 1964, the focus for the gas chamber allegation was Dachau. Later, the focus switched to Poland. (18-4234)
At Dachau, Felderer investigated the entire area, looking at the crematories and the alleged gas chamber. While claims were once made that over 200,000 people died at Dachau, the sign at the camp today indicated that no one was gassed there; they had been "sent away." Felderer questioned why the "stupid Germans" would ship people around in the midst of a war to be executed when they already had a place to execute them in Dachau. The Dachau authorities, when asked about this, replied that nobody had ever asked them that question before. (18-4235)
To prepare himself for his visits to the camps in Poland, Felderer interviewed people who had been in the camps, asking about smells, locations and buildings; he studied books such as those by Raul Hilberg and Gerald Reitlinger. (18-4236, 4237) Felderer made a special note of the people who wrote exterminationist literature and asked the guards at the camps in Poland whether any of them had done research there. He had pictures, for instance of Raul Hilberg, in order to ask guards if they recognized him and whether he had ever been there. The guards replied that they had never seen the man. For Felderer, it confirmed an essential point, that the exterminationists did not do any real research. (18-4238)
He corresponded with such people as German historians Wolfgang Scheffler, Martin Broszat and the staffs at Yad Vashem and the Encyclopaedia Judaica, the Red Cross, major academics in Poland, and historians in the Soviet Union. (18-4239, 4240)
In Poland, Felderer visited all of the alleged extermination camps: Chelmno, Belzec, Treblinka, Sobibor, Auschwitz, Birkenau, Gross-Rosen, Stutthof, and Majdanek. He took photographs of the camps and interviewed people who lived in the area. On the whole, he made at least thirty trips to Birkenau and Auschwitz. Felderer later showed to Zündel the photographs and tapes of interviews he had made with such people as Dr. Szymanski, the Director of Artifacts of Auschwitz. (18-4243, 4244, 4451)
Felderer got to be on speaking terms with the administration of the Auschwitz Museum. He believed that many doors were opened to him because the Polish officials believed his Filipino wife was Vietnamese. They invited him to see their libraries, archives and the special buildings where they kept artifacts which were not open to the public. (18-4243, 4245) These people included Dr. Szymanski, Kazimierz Smolen, then Director of Auschwitz, Piper, Director of Artifacts, and Madame Danuta Czech, the head historian of Auschwitz. (18-4246, 4247) The Auschwitz Museum also had an extensive library which included the revisionist writings of Dr. Arthur Butz, Thies Christophersen and Felderer himself. (18-4247)
The Auschwitz officials showed Felderer original material including what was alleged to be the handwritten material of former Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Hoess. Felderer noted that this writing was in pencil with no errors or corrections. He asked one of the Auschwitz historians, Mr. Tadeusz Iwaszko, if the Museum had the original draft made by Hoess with his corrections. Iwaszko checked with the Director of the Museum, who in turn had to check with Mr. Pilichowski, the person in charge of the General Commission for Investigating Nazi Crimes in Warsaw. Felderer discussed this incident with Zündel; it showed the necessity of obtaining original source material, since documents could easily be falsified or altered. (18 4247, 4248, 4249)
Felderer later published his book Auschwitz Exit (Exhibit 75), a book which he gave to Zündel in 1979 when Zündel and Felderer were planning to go to Poland together. (19-4515) He also made available to Zündel an extensive bibliography which he prepared on the subject. (19- 4519, Exhibit 76). Felderer and Zündel made both video and audio cassettes together on the subject, (18-4251) including the video Genocide by Propaganda. (19-4569)
Felderer showed to the jury a series of about 300 slides made in the Nazi concentration camps in Poland which he had shown to Zündel. The slides were taken using Nikon and Pentax cameras and primarily three types of film. Infrared film was also used in order to detect alterations that might have been made in buildings. Overall, Felderer took some 30,000 slides of the various camps he visited during the years 1978 to 1980. (18-4252 to 4254, 20-4633; slides entered as Exhibits 80 to 84, 19-4558).
Aerial photographs of Auschwitz:
Aerial photographs taken of Auschwitz by the Americans during the war were released by the CIA in 1979 in a book entitled The Holocaust Revisited: A Retrospective Analysis of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Extermination Complex. Using slides of these photographs, Felderer pointed out to the jury the main buildings in the camp, including the electrified fence, the alleged gas chamber, Commandant Hoess's house, the administration buildings, the swimming pool, the hospital block, the gynecological block (as children were born at Auschwitz), the SS hospital, blocks where inmates learned a trade such as sewing and the two largest buildings in the camp, the kitchen, and the theatre. (18-4255 to 4259) Close-up slides of the aerial photographs indicated that the alleged gas chamber in Auschwitz I was about 30 metres from the SS hospital building. (18-4260) Felderer was told by people in the town of Auschwitz that during the war people could obtain special permission to take tours of the camp on special days. (18-4323; The Holocaust Revisited entered as Exhibit 85, 19-4605)
Auschwitz I Map:
A map taken from a book by former Auschwitz inmate Maximillian Kobler was, to Felderer's knowledge, the only map of the camp to indicate the theatre as a theatre, and to label the alleged gas chamber, not as a gas chamber, but as a crematory, which, in Felderer's opinion, it actually was. (18-4263)
Auschwitz I Kitchen:
The kitchen in Auschwitz I, one of the largest buildings in the camp, had twelve chimneys and included a dietary section, a bakery and a butchery. The kitchen also had flush toilets which were unknown to that part of Europe at the time. Soviet soldiers who captured the camps thought they were places to wash their hands because they had never seen flush toilets before. Felderer told Zündel that it didn't make sense that one of the biggest buildings in an alleged extermination camp was a kitchen. (18-4267, 4268)
Auschwitz I Theatre and Orchestra:
The theatre in Auschwitz I was used by the inmates to put on plays and contained a stage and musical instruments. Felderer decided to investigate the large building after an Auschwitz tour guide told him the building was unimportant and was only used by the Germans to put garbage into. Museum officials Piper and Czech later confirmed to Felderer that the building was used as a theatre during the war. Survivor accounts such as Fania Fenelon's Playing for Time also spoke of the Auschwitz orchestra. A large blow-up of a photograph of the orchestra playing during the war was displayed at the Auschwitz Museum at the main entrance. Felderer also showed a slide of a Ukrainian choir singing in what Felderer believed was the theatre building. The photograph was taken from the Dürrfeld file of the United States Archives. Dürrfeld, who had worked at Monowitz, was later charged with war crimes and entered the photographs in his defence.1 (18-4270 to 4273)
Auschwitz I Swimming Pool:
The swimming pool at Auschwitz I was located inside the electrified fence and measured 25 metres long, 6 metres wide, and 3 metres deep. Slides depicted the two starting blocks, the mount for the springboard and the showers. Piper told Felderer that the pool had been used to rehabilitate inmate patients and as recreation. There was never any denial by the Auschwitz Museum administration that the pool was there during the war and aerial photographs taken by the Allies confirmed its existence. Felderer requested Auschwitz officials to provide him with the blueprints of the pool but without success. Some literature of Holocaust survivors referred to this swimming pool and how it was used for water polo. One such survivor who had written about the pool was a person named Kreuz. (18-4258, 4275 to 4278; 20-4713)
Inmates were sometimes also allowed to swim in the nearby Sola River. Felderer obtained this information from interviews with Jehovah's Witnesses who had been interned in the camp and from "survivor" accounts. (18-4264)
Auschwitz Cinema:
At Auschwitz today tourists were shown documentary films taken by the Soviets at the liberation of the camp in the same room where inmates had watched films during the war. Piper told Felderer that the seats in the cinema were identical to those used by the inmates. (19-4413)
Auschwitz I Brothel:
Just inside the main gate of Auschwitz was a building used during the war as a brothel for the inmates. It was not a secret that the camp had a brothel; it was mentioned in books and its existence was confirmed by the Auschwitz Museum officials. Felderer first heard about the brothel during his work for the Jehovah's Witnesses. Today, the building housed the museum's archives and library. Felderer joked with Piper, whose office was in the building, about how it felt to work in a brothel. Piper had blushed and laughed about it. (18-4266, 4267)
Auschwitz I Crematory and Alleged Gas Chamber:
Felderer was assured by museum officials that nothing had been altered in Auschwitz since its capture by the Soviets at the end of the war. (18-4280, 4281) Tourists on guided tours of the camp were also told that what they saw was exactly the way it had been at the time of liberation. (19-4474) However, comparisons of photographs of the gas chamber exterior taken after liberation and of the gas chamber as it appeared when Felderer was there indicated that alterations had been made. Piper explained that since many visitors to Auschwitz could not read, alterations were made to help them "understand" the crimes. (18-4280, 4281)
The alleged gas chamber was located next to the SS Hospital building and the Gestapo buildings. There were two entrances to the alleged gas chamber. (18-4279) The first door, which had a peephole in it, opened into a small vestibule. Anyone looking through the peephole did not see into the alleged gas chamber, but saw only a concrete wall approximately one and a half metres away. (18-4294, 4299) Felderer testified that the peephole had significance in exterminationist literature because the Nazis were supposed to have watched with great pleasure as the people died. (18-4295)
The doors to the alleged gas chamber were not iron or airtight as was also claimed in exterminationist literature. The doors were made of wood with simple handles and locks. One door had a pane of thin glass in it. (18-4295, 4296) Both doors opened inward. Felderer pointed out that the exterminationist literature described people rushing to the doors in an attempt to escape death, and piling up to the ceiling. He questioned how the Nazis could have opened the doors after each gassing when they opened inward - the pile of corpses would have prevented it. "It was to me not a very ingenious way of building and making a door," said Felderer. (18-4296, 4297)
Felderer asked Auschwitz Museum officials why people about to be gassed inside the room never broke the glass in the door to get out. The usual answer was that no one had ever asked them those types of questions before. To Felderer, these things indicated that the room was not one where millions of people were gassed. (18-4296)
Slides of the vents on the roof of the alleged gas chamber, through which the Zyklon B was allegedly thrown, showed them to be very shoddily made wooden contraptions. (18-4282) Photographs of these four vents from the inside of the alleged gas chamber indicated very rough workmanship; the reinforcement iron bars in the concrete roof were clearly visible in some slides. Felderer testified that this shoddiness flew in the face of exterminationist literature which insisted that these vents were scientifically devised airtight openings. When asked about the vents, Piper later conceded that they were made around 1947. (18-4290, 4291)
There were no shower heads in the alleged gas chamber at Auschwitz although it was claimed that the gas in most instances entered through shower heads. (18-4287) There were drainage openings, however, which seemed to indicate that two toilets were once located in the room. (18-4289) Infrared film showed that there were once several partitions in the room. (18- 4299, 4300) Felderer received blueprints from the Auschwitz officials which showed how the building looked at different stages. In the beginning, it had actually been a crematory with two furnaces and a morgue. After Birkenau was completed, cremations were carried out at the crematories in that camp while the crematory at Auschwitz I was converted into a hospital shelter in the case of an air raid. Partition walls were put up in the morgue (the alleged gas chamber) to create four small rooms, one of which was a surgery room. (19-4354, 4355)
In a room adjoining the alleged gas chamber was the crematory, which today contained two furnaces. There was no door in the doorway between the two rooms. (18-4288, 4302) Felderer discovered that the huge, free-standing chimney presently located beside the alleged gas chamber and the crematory was not connected by any smoke channel to the crematory. Mr. Szymanski later told Felderer that the fake chimney was placed there for symbolic reasons. (18-4283) Piper also admitted that the furnaces presently in the crematory were placed there in 1947, also for symbolic reasons. Felderer discovered that the location of the original furnaces and the real smoke channel was across the room. (18-4308)
Behind the room containing the furnaces were two rooms, one of which Felderer believed had been an autopsy room. Every crematory in Germany had an autopsy room and such a room was mentioned in survivor testimony such as that of Dr. Nyiszli in his book [Auschwitz: A Doctor's Eyewitness Account.] The officials at Auschwitz were still not willing, however, to reveal the location of this room. (18 4302, 4303)
A slide taken by Felderer of the crematory furnaces showed flowers which people placed on the ovens. Felderer told Zündel that the religious aura which surrounded the whole place was one reason why people did not ask questions. Every day tourists would come with bouquets of flowers and candles which they placed in the room. Judge Thomas interjected at this point to tell Felderer that he really did not need to hear about "the flowers and the religion." (18-4304)
Felderer showed slides of the "dirty" side of the crematory ovens where the ashes were removed, placed in a special parcel and mailed to relatives if an address was available. Felderer later saw the tags and the special parcels in which the ashes were shipped in a private collection of artifacts kept at the Museum. (18-4307)
Museum officials eventually admitted to Felderer that the entire "gas chamber" at Auschwitz I was rebuilt in various stages to "help" tourists understand what occurred. (18-4298) Felderer concluded that there had never been any gas chamber at Auschwitz I and that the building had been nothing more than a crematory and morgue, later altered in 1943 to an air-raid shelter with a surgical room. Felderer advised Zündel of his conclusions. (19-4356)
The Auschwitz I Black Wall:
The Black Wall at Auschwitz I was allegedly where about 20,000 people were shot by the Nazis. Felderer checked the wall and discovered that it was constructed of one set of bricks with no indications of bullet holes. (18-4305, 4306)
The wall was located between Blocks 10 and 11 which were used during the war as special barracks for the criminals at Auschwitz. Felderer pointed out that there were many ordinary criminals in the camp as well as Jehovah's Witnesses and so on. (18 4310 to 4312)
At this place also, there was a religious aura. When tourists were taken to the Black Wall, the Museum guide asked them to be silent for one minute. Again, the tourists placed flowers at the wall which they could buy at the Auschwitz flower shop. (18 4312)
Standing Cells:
Felderer showed a series of slides of the so-called standing cells where the prisoners allegedly had to stand up in the cell. Tourists, who were asked to follow a certain path while looking into the standing cells, would find that the windows in the cells became smaller and smaller with less and less light. Felderer discovered by going outside the building and around the back that the windows had been patched over to make them consecutively smaller to provide for this more dramatic effect. (18 4315, 4316)
Auschwitz Museum Private Artifacts:
Felderer was allowed by Dr. Szymanski to view and photograph the private artifact collection located inside Block 25. (18-4316) This collection included crafts made by the inmates while they were recovering from sickness (18-4320); sheet music played by the orchestra (18- 4321); posters which were displayed in the barracks, warning the inmates that if they did not keep themselves clean, they would die. One poster illustrated a large louse with a caption in German and Polish warning inmates that "One Louse Means Your Death." This referred to the louse which carried typhus. (18-4321, 4322)
Also included in the private collection were gas masks and filters used by the Germans while fumigating the camp with Zyklon B. Felderer indicated that Zyklon B was sold in Sweden prior to the Second World War as an insecticide to kill lice, rats and bugs. In Auschwitz, it was used for the same purpose. Piper told Felderer that the camp had copies of the special instructions which the exterminators followed during the fumigation process, such as how the gas mask was to be worn, the complications of the gas and the required airing of the room. Felderer was very curious as to why the gas masks and other related items were not in the main display at Auschwitz. His conclusion, which he related to Zündel, was that when one talked about gassing, one did not want the people to realize that there were technical problems involved with it. Instead, one wanted to portray to the people that there was really nothing much to it and that it could be done very quickly. (18 4317, 4318)
In this private collection, Felderer was astonished to discover that the cremations carried out at Auschwitz were done in a manner no different than was done in Sweden today. The body to be cremated was identified by a numbered tag placed on the body before cremation. After cremation, the ashes were placed in a plastic bag and the tag tied to the bag. The bag was then placed in an urn and either placed in a wooden casket or mailed to next-of-kin. Felderer showed slides of the bags, urns and tags held in the private collection. These were shown to Felderer and the procedure explained to him by Dr. Szymanski. (18-4318, 4319)
Inmate Sporting Activities:
Felderer showed a slide of inmates fencing. This photograph was another which came from the Dürrfeld records in the American archives. Dürrfeld believed that the camp had been a decent place where inmates could, in their free time, pursue sports such as fencing, boxing and swimming. To Felderer, the idea that Auschwitz was also a death camp, as well as a place where sporting events were carried on, was ludicrous. (19-4406, 4407)
Auschwitz Mass Grave:
Felderer showed a sign at the only mass grave at Auschwitz, that of 700 prisoners of the camp who died in the last days of the camp's existence and those who were beyond recovery and died after the liberation by the Soviets in 1945. (19-4360)
Monowitz:
Monowitz was located about 6 km. from Auschwitz and was the industrial complex where many of the inmates worked. Today, it was Poland's largest chemical factory and spewed pollution over the countryside. At times, Auschwitz was enveloped in this poison, said Felderer. He noted that Communist countries such as Poland had absolutely no pollution controls. (19- 4361, 4362)
Birkenau (Auschwitz II) Aerial Photographs:
Birkenau was located about 3 km. from the mother camp of Auschwitz I. Using slides of the CIA aerial photographs taken during the war and a map of the camp, Felderer pointed out Kremas II and III (which were the buildings claimed to be the gas chambers), the railway line into the camp, the ramp where prisoners disembarked, the delousing buildings, the male and female sections of the camp, the Sauna, the hospital section, the kitchens, the sports field, and the sewage plant. (19-4363 to 4369)
Using the aerial photographs, Felderer explained how the gassing procedure allegedly took place. Prisoners arriving by train disembarked at the ramp, and were then allegedly selected for either work or immediate gassing. Those selected for gassing were walked up to the crematory buildings where both men and women undressed in a large room below ground. The alleged gassings took place in an adjacent room. (19-4370 to 4372)
Felderer refused to speculate on how many prisoners were in the camp during the war. The number could only be known, he testified, if the authorities allowed access to camp records still kept secret in Moscow. (19-4447)
Birkenau Monuments:
As the tourist entered Birkenau, he went up a road which led to the main Birkenau monument. On several large stone tablets in front of the monument were written, in several languages, the words:
FOUR MILLION PEOPLE SUFFERED AND DIED HERE AT THE HANDS OF THE NAZI MURDERERS BETWEEN THE YEARS 1940 AND 1945.
Most tourists ended their visit to Birkenau by looking at this monument and without making any further inspection of the camp. For the tourist, the monuments were proof of the mass murders allegedly committed at the camp. (19-4403, 4404)
Birkenau Hospital Buildings:
Next to Krema III was the place where the hospital section at Birkenau had been located. The hospital buildings were no longer standing today because around the 1960s (Felderer had been unable to ascertain the exact date) the buildings burned down. (19-4405)
Birkenau Delousing Buildings:
Felderer discovered two delousing buildings in Birkenau, which he testified, were probably kept secret and off-limits to the public because they explained the so called "selection" procedure at the ramp by Dr. Mengele and other camp doctors. Males were sent to delouse in a separate building from the women and children. (19-4378 to 4381) The selection procedure also involved a visual determination of the health of incoming prisoners. It was in the interest of the camp authorities not to spread disease. If people were sick and needed to be treated, the camp had hospitals. (20-4765 to 4768)
The Auschwitz Museum today did not deny that incoming prisoners were deloused. Hair was cut off from both males and females because it harboured lice. It was also saved and used for various manufacturing needs during the war. (19-4381) Hair on display at Auschwitz today, however, was depicted as being the hair of gassed victims. (19-4381, 4382)
Felderer showed a slide of an outside wall of the delousing building in the women's camp which indicated a significant blue colour. Felderer was told by Auschwitz officials that the blue staining resulted from the use of Zyklon B. (19-4383) Felderer believed the colour got on the walls when mattresses which had been deloused inside the building were then taken outside for airing, leaned against a wall and beaten for a length of time to get any Zyklon B out of the material. The powder material which was the inert carrier of the Zyklon B would stick to the wall and produce the distinct blue colouration. Felderer noted that this blue colour was not found in the alleged gas chamber at Auschwitz at all. (19-4383, 4384)
The delousing buildings, which were not open to the public, contained autoclaves used to decontaminate materials using steam. (19-4384, 4385) Rooms inside the building also indicated blue staining, which Felderer concluded was authentic and not simply painted on afterwards. Felderer told Zündel that the discovery of the delousing buildings was a tremendous step in their investigation. The blue staining was the Zyklon B mark and it was astonishing that this colour was not found in the buildings where it was claimed people were gassed to death using Zyklon B. (19 4376, 4387, 4388)
Posters on the walls of the delousing building warned inmates that "One Louse Means Your Death" and "To be Clean is Your Duty." Felderer testified the Nazis were very fearful of lice because they brought great epidemics into the camps. (19 4392)
Birkenau Kitchens:
The kitchens were also buildings closed to the public. Auschwitz officials told Felderer the kitchens were not accessible to the public to prevent vandalism and to preserve the buildings. Slides indicated several extremely large cooking vats still inside the buildings. (19-4394)
Birkenau Wash Barracks:
One barrack in each of the women's and men's camps contained wash facilities, including running water, for personal hygiene. The walls were decorated with paintings of razors, paste and toothbrushes. Signs warned inmates that to make the drinking water impure would result in a stiff sentence. Drawings and sayings painted on the wall said: "Sun, Air, Water Maintains Your Health." Felderer told Zündel that the personal hygiene of the inmates was important not just for the inmates but also for the camp administration, since typhus struck both inmates and Nazi camp personnel alike. (19-4394, 4395, 4398)
Birkenau Barracks:
Inmates drew sayings and paintings on the walls, including ships, birds, windmills, a child underneath an umbrella, children playing, a boy going to school, a church nestled in a wooded countryside. Felderer testified that he never expected to find such drawings in a "death camp." Nobody wanted to be in prison; he himself had been in prison and knew what it meant. But the inmates, to cheer their life up, decorated the walls. It indicated to Felderer that their life was not as severe as they had made it out to be. (19-4400 to 4402)
Birkenau Crematoria (Kremas) and Alleged Gas Chambers:
Felderer was certain that the buildings marked on plans of Auschwitz as crematories (called Kremas)were indeed used as such. He did not believe they were used as gas chambers. (19- 4374) Auschwitz-Birkenau needed crematories because the camps were engulfed by extreme epidemics of typhus, caused primarily by lice. Epidemics were so severe that at times the authorities prohibited people from entering Auschwitz or the surrounding area for a radius of some 40 km. in efforts to contain the disease. For the same reason, it was necessary to dispose of the corpses by cremation. (19-4409, 4410) The crematories were built at the same end of the camps as the sewage plants and water purification plants. (19-4433, 4434)
Krema II at Birkenau contained five furnaces with three retorts each. The rooms below ground alleged to be gas chambers were shown as morgues on the original blueprints obtained by Felderer from Auschwitz officials. They required cool places to store the corpses, thus the rooms were below ground. (19-4409)
The Auschwitz Museum stated that the victims would go down the stairs into the undressing room, undress and wait their turn to be gassed. The actual gassings were alleged to have taken place in an adjoining room. The Zyklon B was said to have been discharged into the gas chamber through seven holes in the roof. After the gassing, the victims were allegedly taken up to the crematory and burned.
Felderer testified that he told Zündel there were two major problems with this account: first, the crematories at Auschwitz were not much different from those still used in Sweden which took an hour and a half to two hours to incinerate a body. This meant that the bodies of the allegedly gassed would have piled up considerably since the furnaces would not have been able to handle the volume. Secondly, since Zyklon B was so dangerous to handle, it would have meant that the entire staff of the building and those waiting to be gassed would have been gassed in any event. Felderer found the whole theory "ridiculous." (19-4421, 4422)
Felderer examined and measured the roof over the alleged gas chamber at Krema II. He found only a natural crack and two holes chiselled into the concrete with twisted reinforced steel sticking out. Neither hole was in the position on the roof that the Auschwitz authorities alleged they should have been. A heavy concrete lid lying by one of the holes did not fit. Felderer believed the holes were chiselled out after the war to support the gassing allegation. (19-4423, 4424) The alleged gas chamber was 70 metres long, 30 metres wide and 2 metres 20 cm. high. (19- 4479)
Inside the alleged gas chamber of Krema II, Felderer found and photographed drains on the floor. Extermination authors such as Reitlinger claimed that the gas chamber had no drainage. (19-4425) There was no evidence on the inside of the alleged gas chamber of the bluish stain characteristic of Zyklon B. Nor was there any evidence of facilities for the shower heads which extermination literature also claimed were used for the discharge of the gas. The pillars in the room were of solid concrete; this contradicted extermination stories of hollow pillars down which the Zyklon B was allegedly thrown.(19-4426, 4427) Felderer found no evidence of an opening for ventilation to exhaust the gas. (19-4477) Neither Krema II nor III, upon examination by Felderer, showed any indication of the blue stain associated with Zyklon B. (19-4430)
Very little remained of Kremas IV and V, and Felderer was not convinced that these buildings had, in fact, been used as crematories. He speculated that, given the size of the camp, they might in fact have been garbage incinerators. He pointed out that, given the severe typhus epidemics at the camp, the Germans would not have taken the garbage out of the camp thereby risking the spread of the disease. Felderer showed a slide of a wagon he found beside Krema IV which looked very much like the wagons used in incinerators in Sweden to take away ashes. (19- 4445, 4448) Krema IV was allegedly destroyed during a mutiny of prisoners on October 7, 1944. (19-4447) As with many other things concerning the camp, the Auschwitz officials were not forthcoming with information concerning these buildings. (19-4446)
Felderer discussed with Zündel the problems which would have arisen in any attempt to gas people in underground rooms such as the alleged gas chamber at Krema II. There was the danger of explosion; the requirement of a tremendous ventilation to get the gas out so that a new batch of victims could be put into the room. He came to the conclusion that the building was never used as a gas chamber, but was used as a crematory and morgue, as indicated on the original German blueprints where the alleged gas chamber was labelled a Leichenkeller - a place where corpses were stored. (19-4477 to 4480)
Birkenau Sports Field:
Close to the Kremas was a sports playing field which was used by the inmates to play soccer and other sports. One of the first people to tell Felderer that it was used as a sports ground was one of the guards of the artifacts, a Mr. Urbaniek. Felderer found it very peculiar that one would put a sports ground close to the very places where it was claimed that millions of people were gassed to death. Felderer showed a slide of a map in one of the main guidebooks of Auschwitz which indicated that the field had been a sports stadium. He believed it was the first map presented by Auschwitz authorities which identified the field as a sports field. (19-4375, 4376)
Birkenau Sewage Plant:
Also near the Kremas were the Birkenau sewage facilities where the toilet water and so on was purified and channelled into what was called the Kiesgruben for filtration. Felderer told Zündel this indicated that the camp was intended to last for many years and was not made "just for a twinkle of an eye." A great deal of engineering and planning was involved. Felderer pointed out that functions such as the sewage plants and the crematories were placed at the top part of the camp away from the barracks. (19-4433, 4434)
Birkenau Sauna:
The Sauna was built in 1943; this became the new place where delousing took place. Today it was not open to the public although it was the largest building in the Birkenau camp. Exterminationist literature also had very little to say about this building. (19-4434, 4435)
The Sauna contained defumigation chambers where either hot air or steam was used to defumigate clothing or other materials. Clothes were placed on wagons on the "dirty" side of the chamber and pushed into the chamber on rails. These chambers clearly had air-tight doors which were sealed by heavy sprockets. No allegation, however, had ever been made that this building was used to gas people. After defumigation, the clothes were pushed out the other end to the "clean" side of the chamber. (19-4436 to 4439)
The Sauna also contained a special room where hair was cut prior to the prisoners being deloused. The largest room in the Sauna was used on special occasions as a dance hall. Felderer assumed that this was the room referred to by Fania Fenelon. (19-4442, 4443) Smolen promised to provide Felderer with a blueprint of this building but never did so. (19-4436)
To Felderer, the building indicated that there was a kernel of truth to the extermination allegation: there were gas chambers but they were used for defumigation and cleansing purposes, not to exterminate people. (19-4439)
Birkenau Burning Pits:
Felderer examined the area where such former inmates as Filip Müller claimed that large pits were dug for the burning of corpses. Felderer found it to be very swampy and wet and close to a forested area. He told Zündel that such pits would have filled very quickly with water. (19- 4450, 4451)
Majdanek Crematory and Alleged Gas Chamber:
The crematory and alleged gas chamber at Majdanek were in separate buildings and were approximately 1 km. distant from each other. A monument, which was supposed to depict an urn, contained sand to symbolize the ashes of the people. These monuments were paid for by the West German government; they were maintained by Christian youth groups who were sorry about all the people allegedly gassed there. (19-4463, 4464)
Felderer believed the furnaces at Majdanek to be authentic. (19-4482) The crematory contained an autopsy room and a washroom. (19-4467, 4469) Like Auschwitz, Majdanek also suffered from epidemics of typhus. Felderer was shown the Majdanek death books by a camp official, which indicated that in May of 1942 about 1,500 people had died of the disease. (19-4468)
The delousing buildings at Majdanek were the places where the alleged gassings occurred. (19-4489) The gas was allegedly discharged through openings into the gas chamber by an SS man from an attic above the chamber. Felderer examined the attic and found it extremely difficult to maneuver in because of the proximity of the roof and the number of nails. (19-4491, 4492) After the gassing, the bodies were allegedly taken 1 km. to the crematory for burning. (19- 4489) Since the gassings were supposed to be done in total secrecy, Felderer believed this claim was, even for exterminationists, far-fetched. (19-4496) Felderer believed the room could very well have been used as a fumigation chamber but not as a gas chamber to kill people. The walls had the distinctive blue staining of Zyklon B. (19-4495)
Guards at the camp showed Felderer a new gas chamber under construction in Disinfection Number 1, a building closed to the public. The room was to be a symbolic reproduction. (19-4499, 4500)
Majdanek had displays of shoes and several-sized cans (1-2 litre) of Zyklon B. (19 4484, 4485) The officials held that the Zyklon was used to gas people; Felderer believed it was used for the purpose it had long been used for, that of fumigation. (19-4486)
Treblinka:
Treblinka was claimed to be one of the death camps. Very little could be seen there, however, except for monuments and stones. (19-4502, 5403) Felderer conducted tests on the trees to determine when they were planted. Exterminationists claimed the trees were planted by the Nazis to camouflage the camp; Felderer found that the trees had been planted in about 1966 to 1968. (19-4505) While exterminationists claimed that prisoners were unloaded from the trains and taken very quickly to the gas chambers, Felderer pointed out that the area alleged to be the camp today was several kilometres from the railroad. (19-4506)
Belzec:
As with Treblinka, there were no authentic buildings remaining of this alleged death camp and it was located away from a railroad line, contrary to exterminationist accounts. (19- 4508)
Sobibor:
Felderer found no material evidence at Sobibor to support the death camp allegation. He again made tests of trees alleged to have been planted by the Nazis, and found them to have been planted in the late 1960s. This was later confirmed by a general who lived in the area. (19-4510)
Gross-Rosen:
Felderer showed the jury a photograph of the swimming pool at Gross-Rosen concentration camp. (19-4514)
This ended the show of slides which Felderer took on his investigations of the Nazi concentration camps. Felderer testified that he was arrested in Poland near Sobibor after distributing leaflets about the Katyn massacre of about 14,000 Polish officers during the war. While the official version claimed the officers were murdered by the Nazis, the Poles interviewed by Felderer claimed that it was the Soviets who murdered them. (19-4523, 4524) He was warned that he could be liable to a prison sentence of up to 15 years for distributing such material. Felderer had not been back to Poland since that trip, but hoped that he would be allowed in if he returned. (19 4526)
Felderer was upset that people were being deliberately conned and fooled into believing the extermination story. He noted that the fact that one could be imprisoned for challenging the story did not make people very free to conduct investigations. It would make them fearful. This fear, said Felderer, was what the authorities wanted because without fear they could not control people. (19-4528)
Felderer believed he had done his homework; he had walked over these places, talked to the people, looked at the original documents to the extent that he could. He had gotten his feet dirty unlike the exterminationists who ran around with red ribbon documents like prima donnas2, who looked down at the guards at the camps and said "You are just a guard here, but I am from the United States, I am a professor!" To Felderer, the exterminationists lacked the human touch and failed to do their research. They lived on their titles and tried to impress people with their titles but they didn't impress Felderer. He mocked his opponents, asking how they could write about this subject without ever having visited the camps. (19-4541, 4542)
Felderer published a book showing that the Anne Frank diary was a hoax3; his research included examining the building where the Anne Frank Museum was located today, samples of the girl's handwriting and the internal contradictions within the diary itself. Felderer wrote to Otto Frank, Anne Frank's father, requesting the opportunity to examine the actual handwritten diary. This request was denied. Felderer suggested in his book that an analysis of the diary ink should be made to determine authenticity; this was later done on part of the manuscript in a West German court proceeding. This analysis found that certain parts of the diary were written in ball- point pen and therefore must have been written after the war since ball-point pens were not sold during the war. Although Felderer was investigated in 1979 by the Swedish Attorney General concerning this book, no cause for any charge was found. Zündel was aware of the book and the investigation. (19-4529 to 4532)
In 1979, after the showing of the film Holocaust in Sweden, Felderer began receiving threatening telephone calls night and day. Stones were thrown through his windows and he was attacked and hit over the head with an iron bar outside his apartment. Felderer himself believed in non-violence as he believed truth could never be obtained through violence. (19-4579, 4580,4581)
Felderer was charged in 1983 (19-4537) as a result of publishing a flyer entitled "Please Accept This Hair of a Gassed Victim!." (19-4542; entered as Exhibit 78, 19 4552). The flyer was addressed to the Auschwitz Museum authorities, telling them that their exhibits of hair were as much proof of gassings as his own garbage at home. The flyer encouraged people to send their garbage to Auschwitz to enlarge the museum's collection of faked exhibits. (19-4537) The flyer was meant as satire, and reflected Felderer's disgust with the many faked aspects of the Auschwitz Museum. (19-4538) He intended to make people think about the exhibits and to question what exhibits of hair and snuff boxes had to do with the alleged murders of many people. The flyer also emphasized the environmental problems in Poland. Auschwitz today, said Felderer, was a "veritable gas chamber" because Polish authorities would do absolutely nothing about pollution control at nearby Monowitz. (19-4539)
To penetrate the belief in the extermination theory, a theory which had so much state power and money behind it, it was necessary in Felderer's view to use satire. He pointed out that Zionists made many movies satirizing Adolf Hitler and made money out of it. (19-4548) Felderer believed that the state of Israel had, to a large extent, built itself upon this hoax and he communicated this view to Zündel. (19 4541)
Zündel had disapproved of the flyer, but Felderer felt that it was a serious thing to accuse the German people of having committed a terrible crime and then to use deceptive methods to prove it. Felderer thought the concentration camps were more humane than the prisons of today where the prisoners sat in concrete buildings staring at concrete walls with only a short period outside for exercise. At Birkenau, the prisoners could come out of the brick barracks and see the sky. (19 4546, 4547)
The second flyer which formed part of the charge against him in Sweden was "Dokumentationszentrum No. 468 - The Call for Volunteers" (Exhibit 79, entered 19 4555)), in which Felderer reproduced a letter he had obtained anonymously. The letter, addressed from a Christian Zionist group (Gesellschaft für christlich-jüdische Zusammenarbeit Heidelberg) to a government Minister in Bonn, called for Felderer's political persecution in Sweden. To Felderer, it proved that freedom of speech was being suppressed through means no different from that of the Soviet Union. As a result of publishing these flyers, Felderer was convicted on the criminal charge of agitating against an ethnic group and received a ten month prison sentence. Felderer testified both pamphlets were not anti-Jewish but anti-Zionist. After three hunger strikes, Felderer was finally allowed to have a paper and pen in his cell. (19-4546, 4552 to 4556)
Felderer considered his writings to be true and correct, but was not dogmatic about it. He had mailed his material to persons such as Raul Hilberg, Simon Wiesenthal and others and requested such opponents to find errors in it. If they found any errors, Felderer said he would be the first one who would change them. "I am not like my opponents, rigidly sticking to a dogma and not change my views when I know I cannot hold on to them." (19-4550) He had attempted many times to get an open debate on the extermination going. (19-4613 to 4616)
Felderer believed the CIA booklet The Holocaust Revisited (Exhibit 85) to be one of the most important booklets published on the extermination theory because of the photographs. He did not agree at all with the text. (19-4605)
A tape of an interview between Zündel and Felderer which took place in Sweden in 1981 concerning the mass extermination and gas chambers was played to the jury. (19-4606, 4607, 4621; entered as Exhibit 86, 19-4632))
Felderer testified that during the war his family had lived in different places. His mother was more or less forcibly interned at various places. At the end of the war the family, with the help of smugglers, escaped into Italy after being accused of being Jewish. The family had boarded in Munich with a Jewish family. The family lived in Italy until 1949 when they moved to Sweden. (19-4609 to 4611)
Felderer wanted the truth to be told because he loved Jews; he believed the truth benefited them and all others as well. It was through a proper understanding of history that racial harmony increased. If people were told, for instance, that the American Indians were the only bad people who did nothing but scalp White men, then people were not getting the truth. (19- 4612, 4619)
On cross-examination, Felderer testified that prior to publication, he did not know that "Richard Harwood" was not the real name of the author of Did Six Million Really Die?. He now understood the author's real name was Richard Verrall, although he had never met him. The pseudonym "Richard Harwood" was subsequently used by author David McCalden and by Felderer himself. Felderer testified he was not interested in the author, but in the contents of Did Six Million Really Die?. (20-4635 to 4638)
His book Auschwitz Exit was published under the pseudonym "Abraham Cohen" because he was doing research in Communist countries which required visas for entrance. He feared that if his real name was associated with the book, he would be denied entry. His fears proved to be entirely justified because in 1981 he was thrown into prison in Poland. (20-4641, 4642) Volume II of Auschwitz Exit, however, was published with his own name on the front cover. (20-4646)
Felderer testified that in 1979 Zündel knew perhaps more than many people about the extermination theory but he lacked knowledge about the geographical aspects of the camps. (20- 4646, 4647) Zündel was searching, trying to find an answer to the question of whether the Nazi regime exterminated millions of Jews. (20-4651)
Felderer first read about the Joint Allied Declaration of the Allies in Dr. Arthur Butz's book, The Hoax of the Twentieth Century in about 1976. (20-4652) He was aware that in a war there was propaganda. His interest was in getting at the central issue of the gas chambers by visiting the places where the crimes themselves were allegedly perpetrated. (20-4654)
Felderer was quite sure Zündel had read literature pertaining to the declarations regarding gas chambers made by prisoners who escaped in 1944 from Birkenau. (20 4655)
Felderer believed he was the person who brought to Zündel's attention the falsification of former Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Hoess's memoirs, since Felderer had actually seen the material in Auschwitz allegedly written by Hoess. This material was written in pencil with no corrections of any sort and was even underlined in areas which Felderer believed to be parts the Communists were interested in as propaganda. (20-4658) Many of the passages were so confused that the reader could not tell which buildings Hoess was referring to. Felderer questioned how Hoess, as the man in charge of the camp, could be so bewildered. Did he really write the memoirs? Was he drugged? (20-4667)
In the transcript of the Nuremberg trials, there was no statement by Hoess that he was tortured, to Felderer's knowledge. He pointed out, however, that Hoess's handwritten memorandum, access to which was being denied, might mention torture. Felderer emphasized the importance of obtaining the original source material. He raised the question of whether Hoess might in fact still be alive since there were no photographs or other confirmations of Hoess's hanging. (20-4663, 4664)
Felderer was quite sure he had made reference, in discussions with Zündel, to the West German Auschwitz trials conducted in the 1960s, in which none of the SS officers denied that the gas chambers at Birkenau were used to exterminate Jews. He told Zündel that the SS men also testified that they bicycled inside the gas chamber in between gassings. The most ridiculous things were said in these trials, said Felderer; he compared them to the witch trials in Sweden, where people admitted they had sexual intercourse with the devil. Judges had accepted this as the truth and burned women at the stake for it. Felderer discussed with Zündel the secrecy of the Auschwitz trials, such as the refusal of the West German government to provide the addresses of the people who testified. He himself had been able to track some of the witnesses down and found their stories to be different from the stories presented in the newspapers. Felderer asked if we were supposed to believe stories such as the bicycles in the gas chamber or the claim that the firmness of female breasts was one of the criteria by which the Nazis decided which women would be gassed and which would not. (20-4668, 4669)
Felderer believed that the Auschwitz trials in West Germany in the 1960s were post war propaganda but did not believe they were part of a "Zionist conspiracy." The Jehovah's Witnesses had hidden the truth from the public and they were not Jews. He believed the Holocaust propaganda was the work of the victors of World War II and of different people who had a vested interest in hiding the truth. The Americans wanted to hide the fact that they were the first to use the atomic bomb at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Zionists used it as an effective way to deflect attention from their terrorization of the Palestinians and to get money. (20-4670, 4671, 4723)
Asked if the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem was part of a "Zionist conspiracy," Felderer pointed out that it was the Israelis who abducted him. (20-4674)
Felderer testified that both he and Zündel were aware of the Wannsee Conference in 1979 and both were asking questions about the conference protocol's authenticity and the accuracy of the translation. Felderer questioned why those relying on the Wannsee Conference protocol did not produce the original document. He himself no longer believed it. Asked if he did not accept documents from the National Archives, Felderer reiterated the importance of going to original source documents. (20-4677, 4678)
Felderer had watched Professor Christopher Browning's testimony in court but had never read Browning's book, Fateful Months, until recently. Browning had never been a big man on the issue, pointed out Felderer, but maybe he was the new star because the others were burned out and useless. Professor Raul Hilberg was afraid of coming to Canada to testify and was hiding somewhere in the United States. (19 4676)
Felderer stated both he and Zündel were aware of the Hans Frank diary as it was mentioned in Did Six Million Really Die?.(20-4678)
Felderer sold Did Six Million Really Die? for eight Swedish Crowns, which was less than the cost of production. Many he gave away free. When some people paid more he would reinvest the money into publishing. Primarily, however, he was supported by his wife. (20-4680, 4681)
Felderer had no formal education in architecture (20-4690); chemistry (20-4691); topography (20-4691); analysis of trees (20-4692); biology (20-4693); analysis of aerial photographs ((20-4693); or history ((20-4695). But he pointed out that most of the people who wrote on the "Holocaust" were not historians either, including Hilberg, Reitlinger and Wiesenthal. (20-4687) Felderer had often quoted specialists in his publications, however, and taught himself many skills, including dendrochronology. He assumed Zündel knew he did not have degrees in chemistry, history and the rest. (20-4691, 4692)
Asked if he was suggesting that the Nazi concentration camps were "holiday camps," Felderer replied that he would rather have been in Auschwitz than in Dresden or Hamburg which were destroyed with incendiary bombs. At least there was some chance of survival in the camps. Felderer did not believe in incarceration, and noted that Canada had incarcerated 3,000 Jehovah's Witnesses in camps during the war, and that the United States had incarcerated up to 170,000 Japanese. He didn't believe it was a holiday for those people either. (20-4720)
The Crown read extensively from the text from The Holocaust Revisited.(20-4752 to 4784)
Felderer's major publisher, besides his own firm, was the Institute for Historical Review (IHR) in the United States, founded by Willis Carto. Carto was also the founder of the Liberty Lobby. (20-4826)
Felderer agreed that the objective of Did Six Million Really Die? was to permit the discussion of the race problem. He did not agree with Harwood's opinion, but did not see that his purpose, as a publisher, was to direct people what to write. (20-4833, 4834) He himself had married a woman of another race. (20-4835)
Asked if David McCalden had the same view, Felderer testified that he had talked with McCalden a few times and he had not been entirely clear on the issue. Felderer pointed out that in the United States, a black man named Farrakhan wanted the black people to identify themselves. It was their choice and Felderer was not a judge of that. (20-4835)
Felderer was on the Editorial Advisory Committee of the Institute for Historical Review and was familiar with a Special Report published by it entitled Nazi Gassings a Myth? A New Look at the Holocaust. (20-4835, 4836; IHR Special Report filed as Exhibit 93 at 20-4897) The front page of the IHR Special Report made reference to an unclaimed $50,000 reward offered by the IHR to anyone who could prove that gas chambers for the purpose of killing human beings existed at Auschwitz. Felderer testified that he was aware that a Mr. Mermelstein made a claim for the $50,000 but stated that he also knew that the claim was not based on anything more than emotional stress simply for being challenged. Mermelstein filed an affidavit indicating that he was a survivor at Auschwitz, and that he was going to produce a dead witness to testify. Felderer had written Mermelstein asking him how it was possible that for the first time in history he would be able to obtain a dead witness to testify as an expert. Felderer was not clear on what happened in the case. By that time, he was getting less and less interested in the exterminationists; he felt he had done his main work and was convinced it was not true. As far as he knew, Mermelstein never produced anything other than claiming that there were some showers inside Krema I. Felderer pointed out there were no showers in Krema I except as a figment of Mr. Mermelstein's imagination. (20-4837 to 4839)
Mermelstein sued Felderer in the United States; the trial proceeded in Felderer's absence when the United States refused him entry. Felderer found it mind-boggling that such things could go on. (20-4839)
Asked if the main objective of the Institute for Historical Review was to deny the Holocaust, Felderer testified that they had come to a consensus that there was a real problem involved with the extermination theory. He agreed it was an objective but was not its whole activity. (20-4842, 4843)
Felderer agreed that the "Bibliography of 'Holocaust' Revisionism" contained in the IHR Special Report included books by Butz, Christophersen, Faurisson, Rassinier, Walendy, Harwood and himself. (20-4843, 4844, 4845)
Felderer was sentenced to ten months in prison in Sweden for one of the RH Bulletins which dealt with sending garbage to Auschwitz. Felderer understood Mr. Wiesenthal was very disturbed at Felderer's offence, that of having thought for himself and not allowing somebody else to think for him. Wiesenthal, of course, did not like that because totalitarians always liked other people to think for you and not to have you thinking for yourself. (20-4847)
Asked if he had testified that he loved Jews, Felderer testified that his biggest problems had been with non-Jews. The extermination theory made Jews into Nazi collaborators and thieves and he believed he was showing love to them and liberating them by his work. (20-4847, 4848)
Upon request by the Crown, Felderer read in full RH305, "Please Accept This Hair of a Gassed Victim," the flyer for which he had been convicted in Sweden.
Please Accept This HAIR OF A GASSED VICTIM!
€ NEXT TIME YOU CUT YOUR HAIR, DO NOT DISCARD IT! NO, MAIL IT INSTEAD TO MR. SMOLEN AT THE AUSCHWITZ MUSEUM OR TO ANY OF THE ADDRESSES FOUND ON THE NEXT PAGE - TO BE EXHIBITED IN THE DISPLAY OF HAIR OF GASSED VICTIMS. YOU HAIR HAS A MUCH BETTER CLAIM TO BE EXHIBITED THERE THAN THE PHONY SAMPLES OF COMMERCIAL WIGS AND HAIR HITHERTO EXHIBITED. ALSO COLLECT TOGETHER THE HAIR OF ALL YOUR FRIENDS, DOGS, AND OTHER ANIMALS. SEND IT ALL IN A PLASTIC BAG TO MR. SMOLEN. HE WILL REMEMBER YOU FOR IT. IT CAN BE MAILED AS "PRINTED MATTER" BY PLACING THE TERM "SAMPLE" ON THE PRECIOUS DELIVERY.
TO: Mr. K. Smolen and Staff, Auschwitz Museum, Oswiecim, Poland
Dear Mr. Smolen,
In appreciation of your deep concern for gassed victims, I am hereby forwarding my personal trophy for your permanent Museum exhibits. I understand that you are intensely involved with the subject of gassing. Personally I feel rather miserable. Not even Zyklon B would cure me! This is much on account of the fact that I am getting gassed to death by a slow poison procedure. Our air is full of filth, poison, gasses, harmful chemicals and other disgusting elements. Matters are no better in your city. Your city is virtually saturated with deadly gasses emanating from your Monowitz chemical factory. In fact the place is not fit even for crows. I urge you to pay it a visit. Surely the Nazis never had a factory in such deplorable condition. But it is not necessary for you to go there as the factory's poison gasses reaches your very own office at Auschwitz which is situated close to the former Nazi brothel. In case of urgency I suggest you to put on a gas mask immediately. You may collect one at the private Museum displays in Block 24. Please be sure that it has the special "J" filter. The poison at Auschwitz is deadly. You need to take the upmost precautions.
My package of hair to you is a very personal proof of the fact that I am being gassed to death. Should you doubt it, I beg your experts to analyze it. I am therefore donating this private gift to you with the hope of that countless of your Museum's avid onlookers may gaze at it in wonder and give a solemn prayer in memory of a victim doomed to extinction due to environmental poison gassing.
With much respect for your stupendous task and your deep concern for gassed victims, I hereby solemnly, and prayerfully, deliver my hair to your loving and tender care. May it inspire you and all your visitors to a multitude of silent moments and intense meditations.
A VICTIM WHOSE DAYS ARE NUMBERED
(page 2)
INTERNATIONAL FRATERNITY OF GARBAGE COLLECTORS FOR A POISON FREE WORLD
The below given, highly acclaimed museums and addresses are in permanent need of documentary evidence and museum exhibits. They would highly appreciate if you could send them any documentary garbage that you may possess so that they can complete and extend their princely exhibits. May we suggest the following items to be considered to be sent to the distinguished gentlemen at your speediest convenience:
Pulled teeth (exhibited as authentic samples from gassed victims), dust, dust from vacuum cleaners, scrap paper, broken spectacles (exhibited as proof of gassed and clobbered victims), cut nails (Nazi examples of pulling nails), used toothbrushes and toothpicks, dirty socks, cigarette butts, used chewing gum, used snuff (snuff cans are exhibited at Auschwitz), fish bones, meat bones, chicken bones and other bones, tin cans (exhibited as contained Zyklon B), old cloth (exhibited as being the cloths of former inmates), old shoes, soap rests (will be exhibited as "Pure Jewish Fat"), dead lice (in memory of former friends or enemies - depending on which side you were on), potato, orange, and apple peelings (as evidence for starved victims), worn-out bedpans (in memory of when Mr. Smolen used to chase around with them in the Hospital just by "gas chamber" No. 3 at Birkenau), additional bedpans (in memory of when Dr. Szymanski used to administer his loving and tender care to the patients in the "death camp"), bundles of swastikas (in appreciation of the fact that Czech, Smolen, Szymanski, Pilichowski, Filip Müller, S. Wiesenthal, J. Wieczorek, Kania and legions of others collaborated with the Nazis) - and countless of other precious items: YOU NAME THEM - THEY TAKE THEM!
[Cartoon of Smiling Woman holding a wrapped gift, saying: "Please send us all your junks. We need them for our authentic exhibits and documentation!"]
THE EXTERMINATION OUTLETS ARE IN CONSTANT NEED OF YOUR PRECIOUS GIFTS. DO NOT DISAPPOINT THEM. SEND YOUR GARBAGE TO THEM AT ONCE!. THEY WILL THANK YOU FOR IT.
Dear Gentlemen and Distinguished Members of the International Fraternity of Garbage Collectors:
€ My personal free gift to your museum and documentary depot. AS ONE OF THE MILLIONS OF GASSED VICTIMS ON THIS EARTH DUE TO ENVIRONMENTAL POISONING, I WANT TO DONATE THIS SAMPLE TO BE DISPLAYED AT YOUR PERMANENT EXHIBITS. I ALSO FEEL THAT THEY SHOULD FULFILL YOUR MOST STRINGENT REQUIREMENTS AS DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE. IN FACT, I KNOW OF NOTHING AS AUTHENTIC AS THIS AMIDST ALL YOUR PRESENT EXHIBITS AND DOCUMENTS.
I UNDERSTAND THAT YOU ARE IN THE HUMANITARIAN WORK OF COLLECTING PRICELESS MEMORIES OF UNFORTUNATE AND DESTITUTE VICTIMS. MAY THIS SMALL TOKEN ON MY PART SPUR YOU TO RENEWED EFFORTS IN THIS HONORABLE AND TIMELESS TASK. IT IS MY SINCERE HOPE THAT I IN THE FUTURE WILL BE ABLE TO MAKE ADDITIONAL CONTRIBUTIONS BY MEANS OF MY AUTHENTIC AND PRICELESS SAMPLES SO THAT YOU CAN USE THEM IN YOUR WORLD ACCLAIMED EXHIBITS.
SIGNED: A Person Who Does Not Regret To Share His Troubles and Precious Possessions With Those In Need.
[Cartoon of Clown saying: "I am an Exterminationist specialist. Kindly send your documents to all of our addresses. You will be remembered for it!]
[List of names and addresses of exterminationist historians: Leon Poliakov, Simon Wiesenthal, Gideon Hausner, Martin Broszat, Anne Frank Huis, Czeslaw Pilichowski, Janusz Wieczorek] (RH Bulletin entered as Exhibit 78)
Felderer testified that the Bulletin was satire and it was clear by reading it that it was satire. (20-4855)
Upon request by the Crown, Felderer read the caption under the cartoon of a male crying crocodile tears which said:
"I Was Gassed 6 Times! No! Ten times, No!...and there are 5,999,999 others like me in Neu Jork!" The six million gassed Jews is a swindle! There never were any gas chambers! For information and literature send us US $3 in an envelope or similar. Order: Anne Frank Diary A Hoax... Subscription to our Bulletins: US $20. (Cartoon entered as Exhibit 91 at 20-4896)
Asked if he still maintained that he loved Jews, Felderer asked what that had to do with the question of the gas chambers. There were Jewish people who did not believe in the gas chambers. Did they hate themselves because they did not believe in it? It was not a question of Jews, but a question of the gas chambers. (20-4856)
The Crown next produced a flyer regarding the Anne Frank Museum with a condom attached. Felderer stated that the flyer and condom had been produced in the 1985 trial and that he had clearly testified then that he had nothing to do with the condom. He had published the actual flyer itself. (20-4857) Upon request by the Crown, Felderer read the flyer. He indicated that the cartoon came from Hustler magazine. (20-4861; re-ex. 20-4886; entered as Exhibit 88 at 20-4862)
Upon request by the Crown, Felderer read another of his flyers entitled "Three Jewish Contributions to Western Civilization." These contributions were the atomic bomb, developed by Robert Oppenheimer, the hydrogen bomb, developed by Edward Teller and the neutron bomb, developed by Samuel Cohen. All three men were Jews. Felderer testified the flyer said a lot about certain people who had developed these terrible weapons. (Flyer entered as Exhibit 89 at 20-4863)
Felderer was shown another flyer of which only one side reflected his own material. He did not know who produced the material on the other side. He had stated in his Bulletin that if people wanted to use his address they could do so; that was why he could not always know what some people might publish in his name. Upon request by the Crown, Felderer read the side of the bulletin he had identified as his own material. It dealt with the sending of garbage to Auschwitz for their displays. (20 4863, 4864, 4865)
Felderer was shown another flyer entitled "Invitation" which he again was requested to read. The flyer dealt with Felderer's incarceration for 6 months in Sweden. (20 4867, 4868; Flyer entered as Exhibit 90 at 20-4895)
Felderer testified that he had been put into custody in a two by three metre bunker where he was not allowed any form of writing or even allowed to keep his watch. He did not know whether it was night or day and was constantly kept awake by radio noises. When he complained, the noise only increased. There was no washroom in the cell. He was escorted to the toilet and locked inside. He was struck several times in prison. Felderer went on a hunger strike three times until he was finally allowed some sort of normal action. He stated that such treatment wasn't given to hard criminals. He had simply published things which were satire, but this apparently was more dangerous than if he had raped a thousand Swedish women. There was no proportion at all to the punishment, and he denounced such actions. (20-4868, 4869)
In the flyer, he had indicated that Sweden was using the same methods as the Soviet Union: if you could not get someone through arguments and reason, you put him in a mental institution and declared him insane. The author Roland Huntford had described [in The New Totalitarians] how Sweden was using its mental hospitals in order to combat their alleged detractors. This method was no different from the Soviet Union. (20-4870)
Felderer had discussions with the staff and doctors at the hospital and asked them how they could justify what they did. He pointed out to them that he had not raped or murdered anybody, but had simply written satire which even they laughed at and thought was funny. (20- 4870) Felderer reiterated that when people could not get you by reasonable arguments, they threw you in their prisons and thereby thought they had won the argument.
"Well, as you can see," said Felderer, "I'm still here. I'm still alive. I'm still kicking. So all their terror and acts of persecution, which they even admitted in their letters... sometimes it works, but many times it doesn't work, and I think I'm a living example that it doesn't work." (20- 4868)
The Crown suggested to Felderer that he couldn't accept the fact that the Swedish authorities thought he was sick and needed help. Felderer replied that he had gone through the tests and had been found perfectly fit and sane, which was more than the Crown attorney could prove regarding his sanity. (20-4871)
On re-examination, Felderer testified that these mental tests had been made during his trial in Sweden and that he had been found fit. (20-4868)
Felderer had not read Martin Gilbert's The Holocaust because in the last few years his interest in the subject had waned. He felt he had done his work. He had stated that if anyone found anything wrong with it, they should let him know. During all of these years nothing had happened. He no longer found the issue to be challenging. It had been confirmed for him that there were no gas chambers for human beings and that the buildings were faked. He wanted to go on to other things. Felderer didn't want to devote the rest of his life to this concocted trash. The earth was too beautiful for him for that. (20-4875)
Felderer testified that the photograph of fencing scenes from Auschwitz came from the Dürrfeld trial. It had been produced as evidence of prisoners having sports. (20 4875)
The CIA report The Holocaust Revisited did not give any indications of the qualifications of either of its authors, Poirier or Brugioni. One of the reasons Felderer wrote to the CIA was to attempt to determine what they were. In Felderer's opinion, the prisoners shown in photograph 4 of the CIA booklet were not going to the gas chambers, as indicated by the text, but were walking to the Sauna. Photograph 6 showed the alleged vents in the roof of the Leichenkeller of Krema II, but Felderer's examination showed there were no holes in those locations. He had written the authors of the report to ask them why these alleged vents could not be found in the roof today. (20-4877 to 4879)
Felderer testified that there were no photographs in the report which indicated that Leichenkeller II was blown up before the camp changed hands, although this was suggested by the text. The CIA was a secret organization with a vested interest in the gas chamber story, so he certainly did not believe they would deny it. (20-4880)
Felderer testified that politically he was totally aloof. He had never voted for a political party in his life and didn't intend to do so. (20-4882)
Felderer himself had received garbage and diapers at his own address before publishing the "Anne Frank Museum" flyer. He took it with a grain of salt and a smile on his face. (20-4886)
The medical examinations which he had undergone were involuntary. (20-4886)
During the past few years, Felderer testified, he had become an instructor of dancing, given music lessons and sold music which he had written. (20-4887)
1 During this testimony, defence counsel Doug Christie had to ask Judge Thomas to advise people in the court room to remain quiet. Thomas told the court room spectators that if they found the testimony "distasteful, unpleasant or emotionally draining", they were free to leave. 2 Documents introduced by Browning from the National Archives of the United States all bore red ribbons. 3 Ditlieb Felderer. Anne Frank Diary: A Hoax? (Taby: Bible Researcher, 1978)