My photo of a woman shopper in the town formerly known as Theresienstadt
My photo of the Gate into Theresienstadt
Today, I am answering a comment made on my blog at 2 o’clock in the morning [California time] by Wolf Murmelstein, who was a prisoner at Theresienstadt when he was a child.
In my humble opinion, I believe that Wolf was too young to understand what was going on at Theresienstadt, where his father, Benjamin Murmelstein, was the last Jewish Elder.
The Bauhof building at Theresienstadt was near the alleged gas chamber
According to the Theresienstadt Ghetto Museum, in 1945, a homicidal gas chamber was built in a corridor of the town’s fortifications wall near the Litomerice gate, which is right by the Bauhof building, shown in the photograph above. (Click here to see a map of the ghetto. The Bauhof building is number 14 on the map.) According to Holocaust historian Martin Gilbert, this gas chamber was never “activated.”
Here is the comment, made by Wolf Murmelstein, with some corrections in English grammar, made by me:
Begin quote:
Commenting on the [Holocaust denial] case of the old German woman [Ursula Haverbeck] convicted for neo-nazi propaganda, I have simply remembered how the aged Jews of Vienna had been driven to deportation in September 1942 and visitors present that Saturday afternoon had been selected to be deported too.
At Theresienstadt, the aged persons dwelled in the Kavalier barrack and also in many other buildings. Many passed away because of the bad conditions and also because of their advanced age.
However, in January 1945, Eichmann and his staff could see that the death rate had not been high enough, and in order to hasten the destruction of the Jewish inmates, they ordered to adapt, inside the wall around the camp, a room inside the wall, in a strange way without written design – only oral instructions — a room inside the wall.
My photo below shows the double wall around the camp.
My phjoto of the double walls around Theresienstadt
The outside of the double wall around Theresienstadt
Just as at the arrival, in December 1944, of a group from Slovakia, the first alarming news arrived, that the purpose of that room inside the [double] wall seemed to be for a dangerous purpose.
At a certain moment, the Elder Benjamin Murmelstein – after having left instructions for the inmates, in the case of his arrest – faced the German Commandant of the camp, Karl Rahm, who spoke vaguely about a bomb safe warehouse, but then left for Prague.
Commandant Rahm returned after three days with the order to stop the work which only SS General Karl Hermann Frank had the authority to give. The Commandant [Karl Rahm] had tried to reach a personal deal with the Allies and wanted to use Theresienstadt in his negotiations.
From a statement, made by SS Captain Heinrich Joeke in the People’s Court, the gas chamber at Theresienstadt had been built to exterminate the political prisoners in the camp.
It is noteworthy that Commander Karl Rahm, at his trial, did not mention his trip to Prague where he obtained the order of SS General Frank to stop work on the gas chamber, although the key witness Benjamin Murmelstein mentioned this.
I believe that he feared revenge on his family at Vienna when speaking about the responsibility of [Adolf] Eichmann and staff members who managed to escape at war’s end. So he spoke always about the phantom bomb safe warehouse.
It is noteworthy that not even Rahm spoke about delousing and similar nonsense. Indeed the Nazis considered the lice as a useful instrument for provoking mortal diseases, [such as typhus] among the inmates.
That old German Neo-nazi woman [Ursula Haverbeck] will certainly live better during her last years than the aged Jews who were deported to Theresienstadt.
Today, events in Paris [attacks by ISIS] show that laws, against Holocaust denial and other racist hatred spraying, ought to be harder. . .
Scrapbookpages Blog 
That place was to bump off politcal prisoners. Why are the Jews worried about it? They just worry about themselves. I’ve yet to hear them take up for political prisoners,gays or gypsies. I’ve yet to see something like that on here where the Hebs prosecuted someone because he was involved with killing gypsies or gays. It’s all about the Jews . That’s why I’m not crying over them. From what I’ve seen on here,when it comes to the Jews,it’s always me,me,me. So when are the Krauts gonna fork over some scratch to the gypsies or gays? Never. Jews have got their self serving hands out. The shit wasn’t pretty,but get the f–k over it and move on. Quit running around with the ,”I’m a poor abused Jew . Feel sorry for me”. Attitude. Move on.
Comment by Tim — March 14, 2016 @ 5:42 pm
I wrote about the “gays” and the gypsies on this blog post: https://furtherglory.wordpress.com/2013/08/08/hitler-started-with-the-gays-say-what/
Comment by furtherglory — March 15, 2016 @ 6:11 am
Reading your info. about Theresienstadt, I was surprised that today it is still a habitable, functioning Czech town called Terezin. But surely if it was this horrific ghetto that we’ve all been told about – and which formed an integral part of the holy “Holocaust”, then wouldn’t it have been left untouched as a pristine memorial site for posterity.
But obviously the Czechs after the war didn’t bother too much about regarding it as a sacred site, and so they simply commandeered the buildings for their own homes and businesses.
Comment by Talbot — November 15, 2015 @ 8:53 am
TALBOT! The Czechs turned Terezin in a tourist attraction,
Comment by Wolf MURMELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 12:36 pm
I have added a new photo which shows a woman, who lives in Terezin. She was out shopping early in the morning.
Comment by furtherglory — November 15, 2015 @ 1:02 pm
Good for you, FG – you actually visited Theresienstadt, and took some photos of the place. Quite a formidable fortress it would seem – built like a citadel, of the type that was standard military practise throughout Europe from the 17th to the 19th centuries.
Mr Murnelstein still needs to explain to us where this homicidal gas chamber stood. Was it built in a room off a corridor inside one of these double walls, or in purpose-built facility which lay in the moat between the two walls. He should really be able to tell us the exact location where the chamber stood, otherwise we will have to dismiss his assertions as nothing more than hearsay and rumour.
Comment by Talbot — November 14, 2015 @ 10:58 am
I wrote about the history of Theresienstadt on my website at http://www.scrapbookpages.com/CzechRepublic/Theresienstadt/TheresienstadtGhetto/History/TheresienstadtHistory.html
Comment by furtherglory — November 14, 2015 @ 11:26 am
I went through the tunnel at Theresienstadt and wrote about it on my website at http://www.scrapbookpages.com/CzechRepublic/Theresienstadt/SmallFortress/smallfortress06.html
The “escape ledge” is shown on this page of my website: http://www.scrapbookpages.com/CzechRepublic/Theresienstadt/SmallFortress/smallfortress05.html
Comment by furtherglory — November 14, 2015 @ 11:50 am
TALBOT! Things had been made certain in People Court of Litomerice.so by the Investigating Magistrate in the Murmelstein case as in the trial of last Commander SS Lt. Rahm. It is not my use to base my statements – not assertions – on hearsay and rumor and in this comment You are defaming me.
Comment by o — November 14, 2015 @ 12:42 pm
I wrote about the People’s court in Litomerice on this page of my website: http://www.scrapbookpages.com/CzechRepublic/Theresienstadt/TheresienstadtGhetto/History/GhettoHistory.html
Begin quote:
According to Martin Gilbert in his book “Holocaust Journey,” [Karl] Rahm told the Red Cross that he had received orders from Berlin to kill all the inmates in the ghetto before the Russians arrived, but he had disobeyed the order. Because of this, Gilbert wrote, Rahm was allowed to leave the camp unmolested on the day before the Russians arrived on May 8, 1945. He was later captured and tried in a Special People’s Court in nearby Litomerice; he was held in the Small Fortress until he was executed in 1947.
End quote
I think that the “People’s Court in Litomerice” was probably biased in favor of the Jews.
Comment by furtherglory — November 14, 2015 @ 12:55 pm
but he had disobeyed the order…he was executed in 1947
No good deed goes unpunished.
Comment by eah — November 14, 2015 @ 1:07 pm
There was no order to kill all the prisoners. Karl Rahm said that he had “disobeyed the order” because if he had said that there was no order, he would have been accused of lying. He was tried in a Jewish court and convicted.
Comment by furtherglory — November 14, 2015 @ 1:11 pm
FURTHERGLORY: 1. There had not been any Jewish Court to try anyone, 2. The People Court of Litomerice like others certainly had not been biased in favour of the Jews.
Comment by Wolf MURNELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 7:46 am
I wrote about the trials after World War II on my website here: http://www.scrapbookpages.com/DachauScrapbook/DachauTrials/Introduction.html
This quote is from the website page cited above:
BEGIN QUOTE;
Between November 1945 and December 31, 1947, there were 489 cases brought before the American Military Tribunal at Dachau. There was a total of 1,672 persons who were tried; 1,416 of them were convicted and then sent to War Criminals Prison #1 at Landsberg am Lech for execution or incarceration. There were 297 death sentences, and 279 sentences to life in prison. Between 1946 and 1951 there were 284 death sentences carried out at Landsberg, which included the death sentences at the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal.
The 1,672 accused war criminals who faced the American Military Tribunal at Dachau had been selected from a group of 3,887 people who were initially accused. The last of those who were not put on trial were finally released from their imprisonment in War Crimes Enclosure No. 1 at Dachau in August 1948. By 1958, the last of the German war criminals, convicted at Dachau, had been released from the War Criminals Prison #1 in Landsberg.
END QUOTE
Comment by furtherglory — November 15, 2015 @ 8:14 am
Karl Rahm
It’s always interesting to see what kind of info is available on people like Rahm, ie Germans put on trial after the war — from the Wikipedia page on Rahm:
During his time as Kommandant, Rahm oversaw mass deportations of Jews from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz concentration camp…8,000 people were deported within one month.[citation needed]
Despite the fact that no evidence — a source — is given for this, a Wikipedia editor would never allow its removal — probably in part due to the assumption they were gassed on arrival in Auschwitz, and this is part of the ‘evidence’ against Rahm.
Rahm was known for his cynical and rash character; he frequently beat prisoners himself and oversaw torture sessions.
No citation or evidence for this either.
Rahm was executed on April 30, 1947, four hours after his guilty verdict had been handed down by the Czech court.
One wonders what ‘evidence’ was presented at his trial — whatever it was, it must have been very convincing. Perhaps some kind of record of this trial is available.
Comment by eah — November 14, 2015 @ 1:23 pm
On this page of my website, I wrote about Karl Rahm being put on trial for his crime of sending Jews from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz: http://www.scrapbookpages.com/CzechRepublic/Theresienstadt/TheresienstadtGhetto/GhettoTour/Tour12.html
Comment by furtherglory — November 14, 2015 @ 2:59 pm
FUTHERGLORY, EAH. 1. Rahm together with the last SS man still at Theresienstadt left in the afternoon of Saturday May 5 obeying a regular March Order – Marsch Befehl – of Prague SS Command and wearing uniform and bearing arms. 2. No one could prevent him from leaving or even arrest him as he had handed out the Ghetto, obeying order of SS General and Governor – Reichsminister . of Protectorate Bohemia Moravia Karl Hermnn Frank. 3. The Red Army reached Theresienstadt at the eve of May 7 at German general surrender. 4. At Litomerice People Court cases where there was not special interest of the Comunist Party had been handled by professional magistrates according to establishe legal standards. 5. Rahm had been denounced at Vienna by a person of whom until war edn it had been wise to stay at distance. 6. Rahm of working class origin was not so a fanatical nazi as his “more educated predessors” and had understanding for technical problems. 7. At Rahm trial the crown withness Benjamin Murmelstein in his evidence told about things as they occured and is blamed for having stated “… but not so bad.” 8. In the evidence of Murmelstein there had been some points a real defence could have used to plea for a prison sentence but Rahm did not., going on stating some non sense. In my analisys I believe he feared revenge on his family when telling about the responsability of Eichman, Rolf and Hans Guenther and other SS officiers who at that time had not been captured.
Comment by Wolf MURNELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 1:48 am
There was a small concentration camp at Litomerice. When I visited Theresienstadt, I tried to go there, but I could not find anyone willing to take me. I was told that there was nothing left of the Litomerice camp and nothing to see there.
Comment by furtherglory — November 15, 2015 @ 6:43 am
FURTHERGLORY. There had been the KZ RICHARD, a subcamp of another Great KZ.
Comment by Wolf MURNELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 7:36 am
I did a search on “KZ Richard” but could not find any camp by that name. Where was this camp located?
Comment by furtherglory — November 15, 2015 @ 8:06 am
FURTIHERGLORT! The KZ RICHARD at Litomerice was a subcamp; I do not remember of which Great Camp.
Comment by Wolf MURNELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 12:27 pm
Yes, the camp at Litomerice was a sub-camp. I did some research after I visited Theresienstadt and learned that it was a sub-camp.
Comment by furtherglory — November 16, 2015 @ 5:24 am
The works to adapt that room in the Wall as a Gas Chamber had started but then stopped on order of SS General Karl Hermann Frank – High SS and Police Chief and Minister for the Protektorate Bohemia-Moravia , the only one having the proper authority. I am a special child survivor as the son of the last Elder of Theresienstadt and at anyway better informed about things, Indeed about the Gas Chamber and a place for mass shooting I got explanaition from my late Father suddenly after Liberation. Beside my late Father had been furious about a lot of non sense written about that matter by persons in non way in position to know things. Clear?
Comment by Wolf MURNELSTEIN — November 14, 2015 @ 10:45 am
@Wolf Murnelstein
Is there any documented evidence that SS General Karl Frank ordered the halt of the construction of the gas chamber, or is that something you’ve just heard by word of mouth. Do you know the date that the order was given?
You say that not only was there a “gas chamber” at Theresienstadt, but there were mass shootings taking place also. Once again, is there any credible evidence, apart from verbal assertions and overheard rumours, of these shootings? Where exactly did the shootings take place. Could you tell us the name, or names, of the military units who carried out the executions, and whether this evidence was documented and produced for military trials after the war. Is there any evidence or documents in existence that indicate the number of victims who were shot; their names; and where the remains were buried?
It would appear to us – Mr Murnelstein – that most, if not all of your information, is simply unproven – but is handed down information that has not been verified by any official body, court or tribunal.
Comment by Talbot — November 14, 2015 @ 11:29 am
TALBOT! I wrote that works to set up so a Gas Chamber as a place for mass execution had started, without a written design but oral instructions only. The only one having the proper authority to order the stop of works had been SS General Karl Hermann Frank.In such a matter there could never been written documents or orders. I never said the there gassings and mass shootings.actually occured. You, when questioning and commenting, seem to be a fussy puritan fault searcher. Furthermore, where stood You at that time of darkness when I wore the Yellow Star and stood as inmate at Theresienstadt?
Comment by o — November 14, 2015 @ 12:32 pm
Talbot had probably not yet been born when you “wore the Yellow Star and stood as inmate at Theresienstadt”.
I was alive at that time, and living in a miserable hovel in a small town in Missouri, where I had to use an outhouse, and bathe in a metal washtub. You were living in luxury with indoor plumbing and a shower. You were not in any danger because your father was in charge of the camp. You were playing soccer — I didn’t know what soccer was. You might have been afraid, but I was also afraid — that the “Japs” might invade the USA and kill me.
Comment by furtherglory — November 14, 2015 @ 1:05 pm
FG is quite correct when he says I wasn’t born back then, but my mother and her parents were. It was certainly a scary time in 1940 during the Blitz on London, when they had to spend night after night in air raid shelters, and then emerge next morning to find out what the damage was, and who had perished. It was psychologically worse over the summer and autumn of 1944 during the V1 and V2 Rocket-Bomb attacks – because there was no realistic defence against these terrifying weapons. Anyone could be obliterated without warning.
But they didn’t keep going on about their plight long after the conflict was over. They didn’t receive any compensation or sympathy. They just brushed themselves down, and gone on with life. They understood – just like everybody else did – that it was a devastating war in which everyone suffered in one way or another. Now it was time to build a brand new world.
So my advice to people like Wolf Murnelstein, is to pull yourself together, put your yellow star in the disused clothes box, stop pretending that you are still living in the year 1945, and wake up to 2015.
Comment by Talbot — November 14, 2015 @ 1:52 pm
FG
I am somewhat taken aback if not amazed to read on another blog that there was to some extent hardship to the average American including yourself during the war years and in some cases even poor. This was not the impression any of us received or were told by GI’s after the war ended in 1945 and Germany was occupied. They (the Americans) lived the high life and in abundance of luxury, while we suffered. The impression we had and the stories we were told that America was the land were milk and honey flowed, A country of unlimited opportunities.
I was born 1928 and lived on a very large Agriculture Estate until 1943 when the leasehold run out. The hamlet (Dorf) itself had about 300 inhabitants. Neither was rich nor poor. With the exception of one family they all lived for free in their mainly four room cottages that included livestock like two cows as well as pigs under the same roof. All had electricity which was the only part they had to pay for. Sufficient land was allotted to them to maintain their lifestyle, but to earn money they were under contract during the Hitler years to work on the Estate. (The Party slogan was: Wer nicht arbeiten will, soll nicht essen) Who does not want to work, neither shall he eat. -Off to a KZ-perhaps-?
None had running water, which was fetched from a communal well on a daily basis. All had outhouses, sewage was non-existent. During the war years there were no shortages of any kind, with the exception of clothing, which was compensated with the issue of Clothing Coupons.
As to my own family, we had a surplus of food, (we also had to feed about 60 POW’s French and Russians) as we were able as others to live off the land (it was all ours) and it was I, who had to make perilous train journeys to relations and friends in the cities with suitcases of smoked food stuff as far away as Berlin-Neuköln, Weigandufer 8.
The Gestapo did check contents of what passengers carried, but not that of children. Besides I was coached by my parents what to tell them in case I was searched, ‘that I returned from a stay in the country (Kinderlandverschickung) and going back to my school’.
To summarize, we lived pretty comfortably during the war years until the tide turned.
Trust I did not bore you.
Comment by Herbert Stolpmann — November 27, 2015 @ 5:30 pm
@Wolf Murnelstein
I am not defaming you at all, but asking legitimate questions that you seem to be unable or unwilling to provide answers.
It is you who initially brought up the subject of homicidal gas chambers and mass shootings at Theresienstadt, when you submitted a post to this website some while back.
The reason that I questioned these alleged methods of mass killings, is because the official Holocaust narrative does not indicate that these ever took place there. You have now confirmed this yourself, but before you did so – you made a great hullabaloo about the Nazis planning, building and preparing gas chambers and execution sites for which you provide not a scrap of evidence – but instead took refuge once again behind your yellow star.
After 70 years, we really need to carry out a thorough re-investigation of this Holocaust, and sift out all the old stuff which is merely wartime propaganda, hearsay, vengeance, lies, embellishments and rumour.
Comment by Talbot — November 14, 2015 @ 1:18 pm
TALBOT! . I did not make any hullaballoo: 1.. I said that works to adapt a room within the wall to a Gas Chamber and a garden placed in a moat in a place of mass shootings. 2. Then I said that works had been stopped. 3, It is easy to advise to put the Yellow Star in box of disused cloths but … as even nowadays events show we are always called to remember that IN ANY GENERATION THEY WILL RISE TO OUR DESTRUCTION. 4. There is a difference between what Your parents and relatives passed through in war time but had not been targets of persecution and what we had to suffer in those times of darkness – defamation, discrimination, violences, deportation; very few survived among those who had been sent to the Death Camps. 6. I wanted to know thinngs suddenly after liberation when I was nine years old an the I continued to study events, circumstances, causes, baskground. I could not present a doctor dissertation about economic and social causes of WWII as in 1962 Professor of Economic History was an anti Semite. Before replying to the present kindly read my essays on the Web Page of this site and, if necessary, ask me about. .
Comment by Wolf MURNELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 8:20 am
@Wolf Murnelstein
I just wonder if any of your essays cover the period between September 1939 and June 1941, when the Soviet Union invaded the Baltic States, Eastern Poland, and parts of Rumania. We are all very eager to learn how much persecution and violence the Jews who formed a sizeable proportion of the communist party – as well as Soviet enforcement agencies – employed towards the local populations there.
In addition, how many Jews living in those regions willingly joined up with the new Soviet administration and its overt and covert enforcement agencies during that period?
Do you think that the ugly massacres carried out by the local inhabitants against Jews in the Baltic States just after the Soviets had retreated in June/July 1941 had something to do with the terror handed out to them by their Jewish Brethren who had served under this savage regime?
Comment by Talbot — November 15, 2015 @ 10:21 am
TALBOT! Kindly read my essays and then we can go on arguing. At any rate when the Soviets in 1939 entered Lvov my relative had been deported to Alma Ata where my Grand Mother passed away. Her graves is near that of a Polish nationalist.
Comment by Wolf MURNELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 12:32 pm
I have put some of the essays written by Wolf Murmelstein on my website at http://scrapbookpages.com/Contributions/Murmelstein/index.html
Start with this one: http://scrapbookpages.com/Contributions/Murmelstein/Theresienstadt01.html
I have put recent essays by Wolf on my blog. You can find them with a google search.
Comment by furtherglory — November 15, 2015 @ 1:07 pm
OK, fair enough – I won’t go on anymore about Theresienstadt. I can appreciate that it is an emotional and probably painful subject for Wolf Murnelstein. It is to his credit that he has done research into the subject, and I will in due course get round to reading some of his essays.
Comment by Talbot — November 15, 2015 @ 2:03 pm
TALBOT! In my essays I am eager to write without emotional factor but showing things occured considering the historical background following the way my late Father wrote. A methog not suitable for the two divisions of Shoah Business: 1 The tearpressing lecturing and writing. 2. The negationsim. So I can understand why the book of my Father could never find a pubblisher in UK or USA for an English version. Besides the film THE LAST OF THE UNJUST by Lanzmann showing parts of interviews granted in 1976 earned critical reviews in certain press. I myself am considered a special child survivor and had been interviewed by German scholars doing research on the German rule in Protectorate Bohemia-Moravia.
Comment by Wolf MURMELSTEIN — November 15, 2015 @ 11:24 pm
I like the exasperated “Clear?” closing each baseless allegation by Wolf. 😉
The members of the race of psychotic wackos called Jewry are always very outraged and irritated when Unchosen animals dare to doubt their extravagant stories. Funny sight…
Comment by hermie — November 14, 2015 @ 6:33 pm
People who speak German are fond of ending every sentence with Klar? which means “Clear?” or “Is that clear” in English.
Also, German speakers like to end every sentence with “nicht wahr?”
http://www.yourdictionary.com/nicht-wahr
Comment by furtherglory — November 15, 2015 @ 6:52 am
FURTHERGLORY: HERMIE. As English is not my first language I am always afraid to have not expressed clearly my opinion. Officially my first language is German but that I know best so in writing as speacking is Italian. Almost all of my essays had been first written in Italian.Thanls to the “ideas” so hailed by Hermie I could not attend a German school nor had the right educational opportunities. Clear?
Comment by Wolf MURMELSTEIN — November 16, 2015 @ 10:04 am
How many people in the world can speak 3 languages? Virtually no one can speak three languages in America.
Most young people in America cannot even speak correct English. So you are doing very well. Don’t worry, we can understand your comments just fine.
Comment by furtherglory — November 16, 2015 @ 11:47 am
FURTHERGLORY! At first moment I had been flattered by Your repply. But then I feel that You explained here the reason of the presence of many Jews of European origin in the staff of US Prosecutor at the Nuerenberg trial. Those Jewish staff members could read the many papers written in German. I wonder however whether those gentlemen know the special Nazi-Deutsch in which many orders and statements had been expressed.
Comment by Wolf MURMELSTEIN — November 16, 2015 @ 11:24 pm