the strange case of Martin Sommer, the “Hangman of Buchenwald”

I am currently reading a new book entitled “The Beasts of Buchenwald” written by Flint Whitlock, which has just been published.  You can read about the book here.  A lot of research has gone into this book and it has lots of good information and rare photos. The author reveals the real name of Ilse Koch’s son, who was conceived while she was a prisoner at Dachau, awaiting trial by the American Military Tribunal. He also reveals the name of the alleged father of her son.  I’m not going to tell you the names.  Get your own copy and read it yourself.

One thing that caught my attention in the book was this sentence on page 263:

Martin Sommer: The sadistic warden of the Bunker at KL Buchenwald volunteered for combat duty.

Martin Sommer, the hangman of Buchenwald

The urns used for ashes at Dachau and other concentration camps

This morning, I was looking at the blog of a former German soldier which you can read here.  He mentioned the clay pots, which resembled flower pots, that the Germans used for the ashes of the prisoners who were cremated at Dachau.  Hundreds of these pots were found at Dachau by the American liberators, but for some reason, the pots are nowhere to be seen now.  A picture is worth a thousand words, so I thought I would show you what the urns found at Buchenwald and Natzweiler looked like.

Clay pots for the ashes of prisoners who were cremated

According to stories that I have read, the clay pots at Dachau were red, just like the pots shown in the photo above; I took this photo at the Natzweiler Memorial site at Natzweiler in Alsace, which is now in France.  

Two German admirals in World War II — one was a war criminal and one was a hero

There were two famous admirals in World War II, both of German heritage:  Admiral Karl Dönitz and Admiral Chester Nimitz.  Admiral Dönitz fought for Germany and he was one of the war criminals in the dock at the Nuremberg IMT.  Admiral Nimitz was an ethnic German from the German-American town of Fredericksburg in Texas, but Nimitz was not a war criminal because he fought for the winning side. (You can read about Fredericksburg, TX here.)

There is an anecdote about Admiral Dönitz that I heard years ago, but I don’t know if it is true or not.  The story is that Admiral Dönitz was told that he could have anyone of his own choosing to defend him in the proceedings of the Nuremberg IMT.  To this offer, Dönitz allegedly replied that he wanted Admiral Nimitz to defend him.  His request was not granted, of course. 

Anthony Lawson and his excellent video about the Holocaust

I just finished watching the mind-blowing video, called Holocaust, Hate Speech & Were the Germans so Stupid? produced by Anthony Lawson.   This is a fantastic video, with a wealth of little-known information, which you can see here. There is almost too much in the video for the mind to process; I had to watch the whole thing twice to take it all in.  I really enjoyed listening to Lawson’s beautiful voice and his perfect English.

Update March 29, 2011 7 a.m. I have just learned that You Tube has taken the video down, due to a copyright complaint.  When I viewed the video, I noticed that two of the photos that I took are in the video.  Since I approve of the video, I did not make a complaint, but this is something that Lawson should have anticipated.  I get lots of e-mails from people who want to use one of my photos in a book or video.  I am surprised that Lawson did not know that you need permission to use material that is not in the public domain.  You can read all about the copyright controversy here.

Continue reading my original post:  

My second response to Paolosilv’s Blog

Paolosilv’s Blog which you can read here is an attack on literally every word that I have ever written on my blog, including my comments in answer to the comments of readers.  His last update on August 23, 2010 included a long list of statements made by me, which Paolosilv thinks is grounds for accusing me of being a “Holocaust denier,” meaning a criminal that is far worse than an axe-murderer.  I have held off for months, hoping that his blog would go away, but today I finally decided to answer his accusations.

Paolosilv’s attack on me reminds me of two episodes on the Seinfeld show in which a young comedian, played by Kathy Griffin, had a whole comedy show that was nothing but an attack on fellow comedian Jerry Seinfeld.  Similarly, Paolosilv’s blog is nothing but an attack on my blog.  

Geraldine Ferraro dead at 75 from blood cancer (multiple myeloma)

Yesterday, I was reading a book about Macrobiotics and watching the news on TV at the same time, when I heard that Geraldine Ferraro had died of “blood cancer” or multiple myeloma. Just at that moment, by some strange coincidence, I had been reading about blood in the human body in the Macrobiotics book.  I dropped everything and rushed to the Internet to look up multiple myeloma.

I learned that cancerous plasma cells in the blood can form a tumor in the bone marrow, called myeloma; tumors in several sites is termed multiple myeloma. I also learned that multiple myeloma seems to start in people between the ages of 65 and 70. Oh, oh, sounds like a problem caused by failing kidneys.  The kidneys are always to blame, according to the wisdom of my Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor.   

the fate of the Bialystok ghetto children who were sent to Theresienstadt

In researching the history of the Jews in the Bialystok ghetto who were transported west to Treblinka to be killed, I came across the story of the Bialystok children who were orphans after their parents were killed during an uprising in the ghetto in 1943.  I had previously learned of the Bialystok children when I visited Theresienstadt, now known as Terezin.

Gate into the Theresienstadt ghetto

the trains that traveled WEST to Treblinka

Treblinka was one of the three Operation Reinhard camps in Poland.  On January 20, 1942 at Wannsee, a suburb of Berlin, a conference was held to plan “The Final Solution to the Jewish Question” for Europe’s 11 million Jews. Reinhard Heydrich, who was the head of RSHA (Reich Security Main Office), led the conference. The protocols from the conference contained the expression “transportation to the East,” a euphemism that was used to mean the genocidal killing of all the Jews in Europe.

17,000 stones in Treblinka cemetery

the Brausebad sign over the door to the Dachau gas chamber

One of the readers of this blog made a comment recently that the word Brausebad over the door into the Dachau gas chamber was stenciled on later by the American liberators.

Door into the gas chamber at Dachau

(Click on the photo to enlarge)    

the Zyklon-B gas chutes on the outside wall of the Dachau gas chamber

Two chutes on the outside wall of Dachau gas chamber

The photograph above shows the wall on the East side of the Dachau gas chamber building. On the wall are two bins which have hinges on the bottom so that they could be opened or closed; in the center is a small hole that has been closed up. These bins were allegedly used as chutes to pour Zyklon-B gas pellets onto the floor of the gas chamber. The inside wall behind the bins has two screened openings, through which the gas pellets fell onto the floor.