Deceit & Misrepresentation The Soap Allegations Harwood/Felderer's first claim:
It would thus appear that the entire [soap] allegation is founded on
anonymous reports and speculative hearsay. No one can come up with any
locations, dates, or names.
[27]
While many of the early reports regarding human soap were anonymous,
usually regarding the RIF soap, the later ones regarding the Danzig
Anatomical Institute are not based on anonymous reports. Although they
mention the photograph of the IMT soap evidence reproduced in Butz's
book, Harwood and Felderer fail to mention USSR-197 (affidavits of
Sygmund Mazur, 28 May 1945; 11 June 1945; 12 June 1945); USSR-264
(affidavit of John Henry Witton, 3 January 1946); or USSR-272 (affidavit
of William Anderson Neely, 7 January 1946).
They also fail to mention anything regarding Professor Spanner,
Mazur, Witton, and Neely. All actually worked in the Danzig Institute --
not quite "speculative hearsay."
Harwood/Felderer's second claim:
Many Exterminationist books make no mention at all of the
"soap" story; even outlandish books such as We Have Not
Forgotten (2 & 6) which covers every other conceivable German
atrocity. The same is true of the numerous other
"Holocaustiana" which I have plowed through. Surely if there
were such factories there would be ample evidence to write book after
book, article after article, on this one subject.
[28]
This is in direct contradiction to Mark Weber who argues (see
above)
that the soap story "has been authoritatively endorsed by numerous
historians." Yet his two fellow Holocaust-deniers are pointing out
that most "exterminationists" do not mention the soap
allegations in their books and use that fact as proof that it did not
happen. That is hardly the picture that Weber painted in his article.
The "revisionists" can't have it both ways.
Harwood/Felderer's third claim:
Determined to get to the bottom of the "human soap"
problem, I paid a visit to Danzig, and unsuccessfully tried to locate
the site of the "human soap factory." At the nearby Stutthof
"extermination camp" I again sought evidence, but not one of
the officials or guides there could help.
[29]
Evidently, Felderer and/or Harwood did not go to the Medical Academy
on that visit to Gdansk. Other researchers have not had any such
problems. Carl Tighe discussed Mazur, Spanner, and the Institute in his
book, Gdansk: National Identity in the Polish-German
Borderlands, and in a letter to the authors, he wrote:
I lived in the city of Gdansk in 1975-76 and was shown the recipe
Spanner used - I believe it is still in the possession of the
Polytechnic. Among students, particularly students at the Medical
Academy and Polytechnic, and local residents, most of whom arrived in
the city after Spanner had left, Spanner's experiments were common lore.
[30]
Julian Hendy visited the Gdansk Medical Academy during the Summer of
1994. According to Hendy, "It occupies the same building as the
Anatomical Institute, the small brick shed built by the British POWs is
still there. And there's a plaque on the wall about the soap
experiments."
Harwood/Felderer's fourth claim:
It is certain that if the western public realized that almost all of
these atrocity allegations emanated from the communist bloc, then they
would receive about as much credence as contemporary communist propaganda
about intervening in Hungary, Czechoslovakia and now Afghanistan to "rescue
the inhabitants from foreign interference."
[31]
Although it was a Russian (L. N. Smirnov) who brought up the soap
allegations at the IMT, the Soviets had no control over the British
statements. Both Neely and Witton gave their depositions to the
British Judge Advocate General's Office -- in fact, both
USSR-264 and USSR-272 clearly bear the designation MD/JAG/FS/22/609(4a)
across the top.
What about Mazur's depositions? Were they just communist propaganda,
or can his statements to the Soviets (USSR-197) be corroborated by
anyone else? Before speaking to the Soviets and giving his depositions,
Mazur was interviewed by the Glowna Komisja Badania Zbrodni
Niemieckich w Polsce ("Committee for the Investigation of
German Crimes in Poland"). This Committee, which was comprised
of several prominent Poles (journalists, doctors, lawyers) as well as
some representatives of the Red Army, entered the Danzig Institute on
May 5, 1945. Mazur gave his formal deposition to the Committee on May
12, sixteen days before he gave his first deposition to the Soviets.
Zofia Nalkowska, a prominent novelist, was a member of the Committee
and discussed Mazur, Spanner, and the Danzig Institute in her 1946
non-fiction book, Medaliony. The relevant portion was
translated into English in Introduction to Modern Polish
Literature, Ed. Adam Gillon and Ludwik Krzyzanowski. Nalkowksa
quotes extensively from Mazur, and what he said to the Committee was in
substance exactly what he later said to the Soviets. Nalkowska in no way
can be considered a communist tool.
Stanislaw Strabski, another member of the Committee, was a Polish
journalist and published a 1946 book called Mydlo z ludzkiego
tluszczu, a preliminary translaton of which shows that he also
discusses Spanner, Mazur, and the Institute. So it is disingenuous to
merely dismiss the testimony at the IMT regarding the soap as communist
propaganda: two of the three affidavits were provided by the British
JAG, and Mazur's statements to the Soviets are consistent with what he
told the Committee earlier in May 1945.
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The Techniques of Holocaust Denial
Part 5 of 6
Claims by
Richard Harwood
and
Ditlieb Felderer