Arthur R. Butz – The Hoax Of The Twentieth Century

Appendix D: The Belsen Trial
Josef Kramer’s two statements, as they appear in Phillips, ed., Trial of Josef
Kramer:
“Statement Of Josef Kramer
I was born on 10th November, 1906, at Munich. I am married and have
three children. I volunteered for the S.S. in 1932; I had no training whatsoever,
and was detailed for duty in a concentration camp. I did not volunteer
for this specific kind of duty. When war broke out the S.S. was taken over by
the Army and I volunteered for active service, as I would have preferred a
fighting job, but I was told that I would have to do the job for which I was detailed.
My first rank was Unterscharführer and my promotion to Scharführer
and Oberscharführer was in 1934 and 1935. I cannot remember the dates.
Dachau. In 1936 I was in the office of the concentration camp at Dachau.
The Kommandant of that camp was Standartenführer Loritz. There were only
German prisoners in the camp. I cannot be absolutely certain, but as far as I
can remember, they were all German. The S.S. Unit was Wachttruppe, Ober-
Bayern. There were only political prisoners, criminals and anti-socials in this
camp. Anti-socials are people like beggars and gypsies and people who do not
want to work. No death sentences were carried out in the camp. The only cases
in which people were killed was when they were trying to escape, in which
case the guard had orders to shoot. In the case of any shootings, whilst prisoners
were trying to escape, investigations were made by the Police. I left this
camp at the beginning of June 1937.
Sachsenhausen. From Dachau I went to Sachsenhausen Concentration
Camp. I had been promoted to commissioned rank, outside the establishment,
to Untersturmführer. When I went to Sachsenhausen I was on the establishment
there. The prisoners at Sachsenhausen consisted of the same three types
as at the previous camp. The Kommandant of the camp was Standartenführer
Baranowsky. There were no death sentences carried out in this camp. I was in
charge of the mail department and therefore did not know everything that was
going on, but have heard occasionally that people have been shot while trying
to escape.
Mauthausen. My next concentration camp was Mauthausen in Austria. This
camp was just being built when I arrived. The Kommandant was Standartenführer
Ziereis. Here I had the same rank as before. Whilst in this camp I was
promoted to Obersturmführer. I think this was in January, 1939. I was a sort
of adjutant in charge of the office and at the disposal of the Kommandant. The
prisoners were all Germans and of the same three types as I have described
before. The last type, i.e. rogues and vagabonds, were mainly Austrians, as
there seemed to have been many when Austria was taken over by Germany.
There were between 1500 and 2000 prisoners and they were all men. This in-
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