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Sobibor - Holocaust Propaganda And Reality - Unity of Nobility ...

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332 J. GRAF, T. KUES, C. MATTOGNO, SOBIBÓR<br />

their passage through the disinfestation chamber, even if steam was being<br />

used there, so that the goods could be identified as they came out.<br />

The detainees would be given a token as a receipt with a corresponding<br />

number, as some witnesses have stated. On this point Louis de Jong declared:<br />

1016<br />

“The luggage [<strong>of</strong> the deportees] had to be left in the luggage barracks;<br />

in exchange the arrivals were generally handed numbered<br />

metal tags.”<br />

From the “<strong>Holocaust</strong>” point <strong>of</strong> view, which de Jong shares, the<br />

“metal tags” could be explained as being fake “receipts” handed out to<br />

deceive the victims, but this would not apply to the cement disks as<br />

well. <strong>And</strong> even if they, too, were fake “receipts,” why would one have<br />

produced over 66,000 <strong>of</strong> them? Such a high number makes sense only if<br />

the disks somehow related to people. Were they dead or alive? From the<br />

perspective <strong>of</strong> mainstream historiography it would have been useless to<br />

number the corpses by means <strong>of</strong> cement tags. If anyone had wanted to<br />

count the victims, a simple list would have been enough. The only instance<br />

where a similar system <strong>of</strong> identification is described is the case<br />

<strong>of</strong> the “Schamotte-Marken,” disks made <strong>of</strong> refractory material and carrying<br />

a number that would be placed into the c<strong>of</strong>fin to enable the identification<br />

<strong>of</strong> the ashes after incineration in civilian crematoria. Initially<br />

this method was also in use at Auschwitz.<br />

In a letter dated 3 June 1940 the firm I.A. Topf & Söhne <strong>of</strong> Erfurt<br />

<strong>of</strong>fered to SS-Neubauleitung <strong>of</strong> Auschwitz “500 pcs. refractory tags<br />

numbered consecutively 1 – 500” for the sum <strong>of</strong> 65 Reichsmark. 1017 But<br />

in the camps <strong>of</strong> Aktion Reinhardt such a procedure would not have<br />

made any sense in the eyes <strong>of</strong> “<strong>Holocaust</strong>” historians, both because<br />

most <strong>of</strong> those camps didn’t have crematories to begin with (Beec, Sobibór,<br />

Treblinka) and because it would have been absolutely foolish, if<br />

not close to impossible, to later on try to identify the remains <strong>of</strong> corpses<br />

in mass graves or incinerated in open pits.<br />

Hence, the only explanation we are left with is that the tags concerned<br />

persons that were still alive. They were no doubt a means <strong>of</strong><br />

identification based on the ID numbers as were used by all concentration<br />

camps. At Mauthausen, for example, a detainees would be given<br />

cloth tags with numbers, to be sewn on their uniforms, plus “a metal tag<br />

1016 L. de Jong, op. cit. (note 244), pp. 24f.<br />

1017 RGVA, 502-1-327, pp. 226-227.

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