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Experiences of a young Vienna lawyer in the period from 10th to 14th November.

Herr Dr. X. had, like many Viennese Jewish intellectuals, taken part in one of the re-training courses set up in Vienna by the Kultusgemeinde with the approval of the Gestapo, to manufacture leather belts. At the beginning of September all the participants in this course were summoned to the police, amongst them also Dr. X.; an anonymous report had come in which accused the course participants of “Communist activity against the state” . After extensive, thorough questioning of the course leader and the course participants the police established that there was nothing to this report; it was another of those many unjustified accusations which immediately inferred “communist activity” from well-attended gatherings of Jews. The police even allowed the continuation of the course; its participants alone decided on its termination in order to avoid further unpleasantness. In spite of this clarified state of affairs, on 26th September Dr. X. received a summons to the Gestapo, where it was explained to him that as a participant in a course preparing for emigration he would have to leave the country within three months; moreover he had to promise to report twice weekly, and namely on Mondays and Thursdays, at the police station responsible for him in the Gemeindebezirk of Vienna I.

Dr. X. consistently complied with this instruction; at the same time he pursued his emigration to Australia with zeal. 10th November fell on one of the days stipulated for reporting, namely Thursday. Dr. X. knew that he would not return home again from this reporting, undertook it out of consideration for his relatives however, and was indeed arrested. From the police station he was first taken to the school in Karajangasse which had been converted into a police arrest centre. He had to spend the time there until Saturday in two small adjoining rooms with another 158 people; the space available to each person on average amounted to 25 cm², there was no possibility of sleep, they had to spend most of the time standing, the feet of the majority of the prisoners were swollen as a result.

From Karajangasse they were taken to the supplementary prison of the Vienna police prison in Hahngasse (Vienna IX). At first they stood there just as in Karajangasse, still under police surveillance, which – as was also confirmed from another quarter – was absolutely proper. On the other hand Dr. X.’s claim, that people on the street behaved aggressively towards the arrested men on arrival, differs from the descriptions of others, who declare that the people took no part in the ordered operation by molesting or insulting the arrested men.

On Sunday evening it was announced that SS-Verfügungstruppe would take over duty in the prison building. "From this moment on," stated Dr. X., "my memory of the events is only of blood, blood and more blood." The police were withdrawn punctually at 12 o’clock midnight, and immediately afterwards one heard the tramp of the approaching soldiers. "The appearance of these men was that of an organised gang of murderers, I have no other term for it," reports Dr. X.

He heard that these men had taken part in a six-month training course in the Altreich, which only provides knowledge of the most barbaric torture of human beings; in fact before 10th November this SS-Verfügungstruppe, the appearance of which alone strikes one to the core, was not to be seen in Vienna.

From 2 o‘clock at night until seven o’clock in the morning on Monday “exercising” was done under the command of this Truppe. The exercises consisted of:

  1. Standing to attention facing the wall; at the slightest movement one received punches so that one immediately started to bleed;
  2. Raising both arms and moving the fingers up and down; here too a lowering of the arms or slowing of finger movements was punished with punches;
  3. “Gymnastics” which were carried out in such a way that every four men of the Truppe grabbed the arms and feet of one prisoner and wrenched the limbs in such a way that the unfortunate man had to do a cartwheel.

A “special pleasure” of the Truppe formed the hauling out of individual, especially prototypically Jewish-looking prisoners, who were pulled by their hair or had “emblems” cut into their hair.

At 7 o’clock the tormented men received a black coffee; many of them could not swallow at all due to pain and anxiety. Then it was: Report for questioning! The prisoners had to form a double row. The men in front of and to the sides of Dr. X., who himself has a strong constitution, were so weakened from the torture that he had to support them. The interrogation room lay at the end of a very long narrow corridor through which the prisoners had to pass individually. The SS-Truppe men positioned themselves so that the Jews had to run the gauntlet past them. They drove the prisoners forwards with punches, many of them stuck out a leg so that they fell over a man from the Truppe who, with the words, "Saujude, can’t you look out!" laid into the pitiable man. The prisoners were pushed through the door to the interrogation room in such a way that they banged their nose squarely on the desk positioned opposite the door, from there they were pushed back again and had to immediately “stand to attention”.

Dr. X. noticed that on the desk of the – Austrian – interrogating officers were folders with the letters “D”, “Z” and “E”. “D” and “E” were clear to him at once, “Dachau” and “Enthaften” [release]. He learned what “Z” meant by chance, he heard from the neighbouring desk the words, “Zur Überprüfung” [to be examined], and deduced correctly from the context that it meant being held back in Vienna prisons to examine the assertions of the person being interrogated.

He was asked what he had undertaken to hasten his emigration, and stated truthfully that the approval of his entry to Australia had already arrived, and that every day he expected the permit so that he probably would even be able to emigrate before the appointed date. At that the officer drew a “Z” on his file. In view of his correct assumption Dr. X., with a stiff military bearing, which he believes may have made an impression, had the audacity to speak again, and said, “I can prove the claims I made at any time; I have the relevant documents at home, as I really was not at all prepared for my arrest. In addition I would like to allow myself to point out that I was enlisted from the year 1917, and was awarded the Silbernes Verdienstkreuz.” At that the officer drew an “E” on the file and Dr. X. was led away by a policeman who stayed next to him, as Dr. X. believes, for his personal protection from further harassment by members of the SS-Verfügungstruppe until his release really did take place an hour later. E.g. a member of this Truppe really did approach Dr. X. and the policeman guarding him with the words, “What’s happening then with the Jew?” to which the policeman explained, “He’ll be deported!”

At the German border Dr. X. – as incidentally are most of those currently travelling abroad by this method – was taken from the train which travelled on, whilst the customs formalities took place only after the departure of the train, in the most unpleasant manner. The Jews had to spend the time until the departure of the next train – c. five hours – behind a type of cage bars, hungry, as in ignorance of this stop they had spent all the German money that they were allowed to take with them on the journey to the border.

Dr. X. told me too, as is indeed already well known, that the ceremonial hall at the Jewish cemetery has been completely burnt out, about which he was able to satisfy himself from personal experience; the ceremonial hall at the cemetery in Baden bei Wien, the spa town near Vienna on the southern railway route formerly greatly frequented especially by Jews, has been blown up, as he heard from a thoroughly reliable friend; the person concerned wanted to visit his mother‘s grave, which lay right next to the ceremonial hall, and could no longer find it for it existed as little as other graves that had been destroyed in the explosion.

Reporter: Dr. Reich from Vienna, now Australia, passed on through Oskar Hirschfeld, London

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