Irma Grese's Trial

 

The evidence of acts which, if true, would warrant sentence of death under British law at the time, was:

1. Dora Szafran claimed that in Camp " A " in Block 9, Grese had shot two girls who had tried to escape through a window after being selected for the gas chamber, and were lying on the ground outside.

2. Ilona Stein claimed that Grese took part in selections at Auschwitz with Kramer and Mengele. She claimed that Grese pointed out to a guard some prisoners trying to hide, and they were shot. She claimed that Grese ordered one of the S.S. guards to shoot a Hungarian woman who tried to escape.

3. Abraham Glinowieski claimed that when a transport from Hungary arrived Grese sent hundreds of sick and healthy people to the gas chambers.

4. Gertrude Diament claimed that Grese was responsible for selecting victims for the gas chambers at Auschwitz. She also claimed that women kicked by Grese with her heavy boots were likely to die from the injuries sustained, although she had no direct evidence of such deaths.

5. Klara Lobowitz claimed that she had often seen Grese with Dr. Mengele selecting people for the gas chamber and for forced labour in Germany.

6. Erika Thuna claimed that Grese both took part in selections for the gas chamber at Auschwitz.

7. Edith Trieger claimed that in August, 1944, she saw Grese shoot a Hungarian Jewess, aged 30, through the left breast, and that later she went up to the victim and found that she was dead.

8. Helene Kopper claimed that while Grese was in charge of the Strafkommando (Punishment Kommando) working in a sand pit from 1942-1944 (in Court Kopper changed this period to seven months), it was her practice to pick out certain of the Jewish woman prisoners and order them to get something from the other side of the wire, with the result that they were shot by the guard. She claimed that Grese was responsible for at least 30 deaths a day resulting from her orders to cross the wire, but many more on occasions.

These claims fall into four categories:

1. That Grese personally and deliberately killed three prisoners by shooting:

- two girls selected for the gas-chamber who tried to escape through a window;
- a Hungarian Jewess aged 30, in August 1944.

2. That she caused other members of the camp staff to kill prisoners:

- she pointed out to a guard some prisoners trying to escape, and they were shot;
- she ordered a guard to shoot a Hungarian woman who tried to escape;
- she sent prisoners across the wire so that would be shot by the guards as ostensibly attempting to escape.

3. That she caused the deaths of large numbers of prisoners in the gas-chamber by selecting them for that fate.

4. That she may have indirectly caused the deaths of prisoners who may have died from injuries received when she kicked them.

What is the reality behind the above four categories of alleged capital crimes?

The fourth category can be immediately disregarded. There was only one witness to that allegation, Gertrude Diament, and that witness stated that she had no proof that prisoners kicked by Grese had in fact died, only that she thought they might die from the injuries received.

Furthermore, the allegation that Grese kicked prisoners so badly that they might well have died is contrary to the testimony of Miss Lichtheim, a prisoner at Belsen who was not a witness at the Belsen Trial but was later interviewed by David Broder. Miss Lichtheim, who obviously did not like Grese and regarded her as cruel, stressed that the reason why Grese meted out corporal punishment to individual prisoners was for infractions of camp rules, such as the prohibition of cutting up issued blankets to make articles of clothing, and had the purpose of deterring the prisoner being punished from committing any further infractions. Miss Lichtheim also testified that Grese was restrained in the use of her dog against the prisoners, not allowing it to bite them. The blows dealt by Grese therefore had a limited admonitory purpose, and it is unlikely that they would have been severe enough to cause death, given the relative restraint in her meting out of punishment that Miss Lichtheim attested to.

The third category of allegations almost certainly represents a distortion or exaggeration of the truth. Grese herself never denied being present at selections, both for labour and for "Sonderbehandlung", which she confirmed knowing meant death, and indeed it was part of the normal duties of the wardresses to be present at selections of the female prisoners under their control.

However, the role of the wardresses, who were merely auxiliaries employed to carry out the daily management of female prisoners, was limited to accompanying the prisoners to the selections and to guarding them during the process, to prevent any escaping. They had no role in making the decision who would live or die; that was reserved for the camp doctors, ie Mengele in the case of female prisoners, since he was the chief doctor of the Women's Camp. Neither did the wardresses make the decision whether a selection was to be carried out; that was an order issued by the highest level of the camp command, to which no wardress belonged, since they were mere auxiliaries.

Accordingly, it is unlikely that Grese caused the death of any person in the gas chamber by making a decision that a person should be selected for that fate. The role of the wardresses in the concentration camp system did not give her the authority to make any such decision.

The second category of allegations may contain some element of truth. Grese herself testified that her duty at selections was to keep an eye on the prisoners undergoing selection, and to prevent them escaping. Accordingly, it is entirely possible that when she saw prisoners hiding or running away, she pointed them out to (male) guards, and it is possible that in some cases the guard concerned shot at those prisoners, and perhaps wounded or killed them.

However, it is unlikely that she gave orders to a guard to shoot at a prisoner, since the wardresses, as auxiliaries, had no authority to give orders to SS-men of any rank. Furthermore, the one witness who claimed that Grese had given such an order, Ilona Stein, mitigated her claim by stating that she had not heard the alleged order, but had merely seen Grese talk to the guard, who then shot the Hungarian woman trying to escape, and had assumed that Grese had given an order.

A more likely scenario is that in cases where Grese saw prisoners trying to escape and reported that to gurds, the decision to open fire was made by the guard on his own initiative. Accordingly, Grese cannot really be held culpable for any resulting death or injury to the prisoners concerned.

The most serious allegation in this category is the one made by Helene Kopper, that Grese induced prisoners under her control on work parties to cross the security wire, in the full knowledge that those prisoners would then be shot by the guards, and she caused the deaths of 30 prisoners per day by that method.

A brief explanation of that action is called for at this point. According to much survivor testimony, it was a common practice for staff in charge of work parties working under guard or near the boundary fence, particularly by Kapos, to take a prisoner's cap, throw it across the security wire or beyond the line of guards, and send the prisoner to retrieve it; once the prisoner crossed the wire or went beyond the line of guards, it was treated as an escape attempt and the prisoner was shot by the guards accompanying the work party or in the watchtowers.

Since the guards received rewards for preventing escapes, eg extra rations, they had a vested interest in ostensible escape attempts that were easy to prevent, and therefore it is likely that the practice described above was the result of an unofficial agreement or conspiracy between guards and the camp staff (who were separate entities) to stage "escape attempts".

It is entirely possible that Grese was a party to that conspiracy, but to have been so, she would have to have been in charge of work parties, and there is no reliable evidence that she ever had that role, except for a very limited period. The one witness who made the allegation, Helene Kopper, proved to be very unreliable; for example, she intitally claimed that Grese had been in charge of work parties as part of the Punishment Company for a period of two years, and then changed her claim to seven months.

Furthermore, no attempt appears to have been made by the Court to seek corroborative evidence that Grese had been in charge of work parties where she would have been in a position to engage in the criminal practice. Accordingly, this particular allegation against Grese must be regarded as unproved.

The first category of allegations, that Grese with her own hands wilfully killed prisoners by shooting, is the most serious, and the one most deserving of the highest measure of punishment if true.

However, although it is entirely possible that there were occasions when Grese killed with her own hands, there are good reasons for doubting that she in fact killed the three prisoners who two witnesses, Dora Szafran and Edith Trieger, alleged she personally shot.

In the case of the Hungarian woman who Edith Trieger alleged was shot dead by Grese in August 1944, there is a strong complementarity with the allegation by Ilona Stein that Grese ordered a guard to shoot an escaping Hungarian woman. It is entirely possible that these two allegations refer to the same incident.

One very credible explanation for the differences in the versions of Trieger and Stein is that Trieger only saw the dead body of the Hungarian woman who had been shot, and subsequently heard a claim by other prisoners that the woman had been shot on the orders of Grese. In her own mind, she then converted that story into one where Grese herself, rather than the guard, carried out the shooting. It is noteworthy that Grese herself stated that the woman most probably had been shot by a guard, in line with Ilona Stein's version of the event.

As for the allegation by Dora Szafran that Grese shot two prisoners who were lying on the ground after jumping through a window after attempting to escape a selection, it is not prima facie impossible, and cannot be ruled out. However, that allegation must be tested against other evidence as to what Grese did when she discovered prisoners hiding or running away, including her own statements.

There are the statements by witnesses, described above, to the effect that when Grese saw prisoners hiding or running away, she pointed them out to guards who, it is claimed, then shot them. There is other testimony that when Grese discovered prisoners hiding, she beat them and dragged them to the place of selection.

So one has to ask, why on one occasion did she allegedly depart from her normal practice on discovering hiding or escaping prisoners, which was to beat them or report them to guards, and personally shoot two escapees? There is a strong possibility that the allegation by Szafran is a distortion or exaggeration; ie it may be that two prisoners tried to escape and were caught by Grese, who handed them over to guards who then shot them. Or the whole episode may have been fictitious, concocted by Szafran on the basis of incidents where she had seen Grese catching escaping prisoners and beating them or reporting them to guards. Such a conclusion is supported by the assertion made by the Defence during the trial that the windows through which the prisoners were alleged to have jumped could not in fact be opened.

In summary, the conclusion must be that there is no hard evidence beyond reasonable doubt that Grese personally and wilfully committed any act of murder that would have justified the death sentence under the British law of the time. It is apparent that the hysterical campaign against Grese whipped up by the local press immediately after her capture, including dubbing her the "blond beast" and putting her on the same level with camp Commandant Kramer, prejudiced the Court against her, to the extent that it was prepared to believe testimony that under other circumstances it may well have considered unreliable or open to doubt.



 

 

 

 

 

 

It was never my intention to exalt myself in any way. But they will not have the triumph of seeing me demean myself by even a finger's breadth. And whatever they all think, if anybody asks, tell them, my dear Dad: Irma, yes, that was my daughter and always will be! You need not be ashamed of me. For I am doing my duty loyally for my Fatherland! Just as I and others did our duty, so we go to meet our fate!

I do not count, because I was far too small. But those who do count will live on, and hopefully will repay like with like! Even if it takes a certain period of time, there will come a time not to leave injustice unerased.

Dad, hold your head high, even if it is hard. But I believe that both you and my dear Mum will be as strong as your dear daughter Irma.

Tell my dear friends, aunts and uncles, that I send them all my greetings; let them remember me as I was.

Mum and my brothers and sisters, take my last farewell, and think always that though I die physically, I will always be with you.

My life is in the hands of the judges, but not my honour!

Your dear daughter

Irma.

Best regards,

Marius