Walter Dejaco and Fritz Erl, the engineers who designed the gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau

Walter Dejaco and Fritz Erl were mentioned in an article in the Opinion section of The Australian newspaper today.  The article is critical of “the Fuhrer-fawning fringe”. (You know who you are.)

This quote is from the article, written by Nick Cater:

If the revisionists force us to examine yet again the banality of Hitler’s final solution to rexamine, for example, the blueprints for the factories of mass slaughter built at Auschwitz in 1943, and imagine what might have been going on the heads of architects Walter Dejaco and Fritz Erl, we are drawn irresistibly to Hannah Ardendt’s conclusion: “The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be either good or evil.”

I mentioned Walter Dejaco in a previous blog post, which I wrote at  https://furtherglory.wordpress.com/2012/01/16/the-woman-who-slid-down-the-chute-into-an-auschwitz-gas-chamber/

Ruins of the alleged underground gas chamber in Krema III at Auschwitz-Birkenau

Note the concrete posts, which were designed to hold up the roof of the alleged gas chamber, which was 5 feet below ground.  The alleged perforated metal columns, where the Zyklon-B gas pellets were poured into the  room, are not there.

Walter Dejaco and Fritz Erl were both put on trial as war criminals because of their work in designing the two main gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau, which are known as Krema II and Krema III.  You can read about their trial at http://www.whale.to/b/1972_vienna_auschwitz_trial.html

This quote is from the website, cited above:

Between January 18 and March 10, 1972, two architects responsible for the design and construction of the crematoria [Krema II and Krema III] in Auschwitz-Birkenau, Walter Dejaco and Fritz Ertl, were put on trial in Vienna, Austria. During the trial, an expert report on the possible interpretation of the blueprints of the alleged gas chambers of the Auschwitz and Birkenau crematoria was presented to the court. The report concluded that the rooms in question could not have been gas chambers, nor could they have been converted into gas chambers.

My photo below shows a sign that is located at the ruins of Krema III. (Krema II was a mirror image of Krema III.)

Sign near the ruins of Krema III at Auschwitz-Birkenau

The words on the sign, shown in the photo above are as follows:

A – Entrance to undressing room; C – undressing room; D- underground gas chamber; E – holes on roof for Zyklon-B pellets; F – five cremation ovens; G – chimney for the ovens; M – the International Monument built in 1967; K – gate on the main camp road which goes into the courtyard of Krema III. The dotted line across the bottom of the diagram denotes the main camp road. The five cremation furnaces, shown on the right on the display board, were triple muffle ovens with a total of 15 doors for shoving three bodies inside, so that 45 corpses could be burned at the same time. The ovens in Krema II could also burn 45 corpses at a time.

Note that the sign says “E-holes on roof for Zyklon-B pellets”.  Krema II and Krema III are now in ruins and no holes in the roof have been found by several revisionists who have examined the ruins.  That is the reason for the Holocaust denier cry of “No holes, no Holocaust.”

Location of the poster at Krema III at Auschwitz-Birkenau

The photo below shows Krema III, as it looked in 2005 when I photographed the ruins.

Door into the ruins of Krema III which was used by the SS men

The photo below shows a door, in the center of the photo, which was used by the SS men at Auschwitz Birkenau to enter the building without going through the undressing room.  This door was not included on the original blueprint.

Krema III was originally planned to be built at Auschwitz I, the main camp. The crematorium in the Auschwitz I camp had no morgue because the room, where a morgue was supposed to be, was a gas chamber.

The original blueprints for Krema II and Krema III called for corpse cellars that were completely underground and included a corpse slide which ended in front of the Leichenkeller [corpse celler] doors; this slide was never built. The SS entrance was built instead, but not in the same location as the originally planned corpse slide.

Ruins of Krema III — the ruins of the SS basement entrance are on the right

The photo above shows the ruins of the Vorraum [the underground vestibule] in the foreground of the photo, with the SS basement entrance on the right. This entrance allowed the SS men to enter the underground rooms in Krema III without going through the undressing room.

Ruins of the undressing room in the foreground with the ruins of the oven room in the background

Notice the tour group, on the left hand side, in the photo above.

The ruins, shown in the photo above, are what is left of Krema III.  The building was called a Krema by the Nazis. Krema is the German word for crematorium.  Although this building was called a crematorium, not a gas chamber building, it had no morgue to hold the bodies, after 2,000 people had been killed at one time in the so-called gas chamber.  According to the True Believers of the Holocaust, the bodies were piled up outside the building to await burning in the 15 ovens, which could cremate 45 bodies at a time. The weather in Poland is extremely cold, and the bodies would have been frozen solid, if they had to be kept outside.  Allegedly, architect Walter Dejaco designed a crematorium with no morgue.

Don’t mention what you have read here in any of the 19 countries, now including Russia, where Holocaust denial is against the law, or you will find yourself confined to a prison cell for 5 years or longer.

How long did it take for prisoners to die in a Nazi gas chamber?

Many people have wondered how long it took for the gas to take effect in a Nazi gas chamber.  After reading the story of a Holocaust survivor, who gave a talk to students in Canada recently, I now know the answer.  In a previous blog post, I wrote about how gassing methods were first tested and perfected at Dachau. I also blogged about the story of Eva Olssen here.

According to Holocaust survivor Eva Olssen, it took 20 minutes for her relatives to die in the gas chamber.  This quote is from a news article which you can read in full here.

It was May 15, 1944.

Olsson and her 19 extended family members, who lived in a two-room apartment in Hungary, were forced from their home.

Four days later they arrived in Auschwitz-Birkenau — also known as The Killing Factory. She was holding her young niece’s hand and a prisoner whispered to Olsson to give the child to an older woman. Olsson didn’t let go. The prisoner said it again and after a third time, Olsson let go of the girl’s hand. That ensured she would survive.

Her mother, sisters and nieces went the other way to a gas chamber. You would hear screaming for 20 minutes and then there was silence, she said.

An Auschwitz prisoner was standing beside the trains when Jews arrived

In the photo above, notice the prisoner, wearing a striped uniform, standing beside the train on the far right.  These prisoners, who helped the Nazis, were called Kapos (captains).  They advised the prisoners on how to survive the selection that took place as soon as the train stopped.

Eva Olssen was saved because a Kapo told her not to hold the hand of a child.  Children under the age of 15 were gassed within hours after arrival at Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Photos were taken at Auschwitz-Birkenau on May 26, 1944; Eva Olssen arrived on May 19, 1944 so she is not shown in any of the pictures.

You can read about Auschwitz-Birkenau on my website at http://www.scrapbookpages.com/AuschwitzScrapbook/History/Articles/Birkenau01B.html

You can read about the deportation of the Hungarian Jews, including Eva Olssen, at http://www.scrapbookpages.com/AuschwitzScrapbook/History/Articles/HungarianJews.html

Could Eva Olssen have heard the screams coming from the gas chamber?  It is possible, although not very likely.

The photo below shows the ruins of Krema II, one of the four gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau.  In 1944, railroad tracks were extended inside of the camp, to within a few yards of Krema II and Krema III.  The International Monument, which is shown in the background of the photo, was built a few feet from Krema II and Krema III.

Ruins of Krema II, one of the gas chambers, at Birkenau

Ruins of oven room in Krema II with women’s camp in the background

In the photo directly above, you can see the kitchen in the women’s camp in the background.  The women’s barracks are behind the kitchen, but not shown, in this photo.  The gas chambers in Krema II and  Krema III, were five feet below ground. It would have been hard to hear screams, but not impossible.

In 1944, the train tracks had been extended inside the Birkenau camp, right up to the location of Krema II and Krema III.  The photo below shows how close the tracks are to the Holocaust monument which is between the ruins of Krema II and Krema III.

The end of the train tracks at Birkenau is close to the ruins of Krema II and Krema III

In the photo above, the ruins of Krema II are on the left, but not shown.  The ruins of Krema III are on the right.

Prisoners walking past Krema III gas chamber building which is in the background

The prisoners in the photo above are walking past Krema III, which is in the background. They are looking toward Krema II, as they walk to the showers. Strangely, there are some children in the photo, who were not selected to be gassed. There are also some prisoners who look as if they are able to work.

All this is very confusing.  You would think that the Nazis would have put the gas chambers off in the woods somewhere, not out in the open, near a road where other prisoners marching past could hear the screams.  How horrible — to hear the screams of your mother dying in a gas chamber!

Shocking claim that Krema II and Krema III at Auschwitz-Birkenau were bakeries

I found a shocking claim on a blog post of one of the readers who regularly comments on my posts.  Here is a quote from the blog of “little grey rabbit” who calls himself a skeptic:

… the sites at Birkenau known today as “Krema” II and III originally had a much different purpose and and layout than that shown in what are alleged to be the construction blueprints of these buildings.  For reasons which I will not elaborate here, it is my belief that these two buildings were in reality bakeries. Whether that is in fact the case, is irrelevant besides the demonstrable fact that they were not crematoria, or at least not crematoria as were detailed by the blueprints.  My own realization of this fact came some years ago when I noticed the complete absence of underground flues at “Krema” II, underground flues which would be required to connect the ovens to the smoke-stack.