Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day022.06 Last-Modified: 2000/07/24 Q.Yet it happened after all, did it not? They were killed? A.As I say, we are not quite sure how long this lasted. If you can trace that up as literature, you can say how long this lasted, which groups it applied to, and so on and so forth. For the moment he is saying, "keine vernichtung der Zigeuner". It has nothing whatsoever to do with Hitler. He had not seen Hitler at that time. There are plenty of other things that he puts in this which also appear to have nothing at all to do with the date, 20th . P-47 April. "Termine", for example, visit to Greiser. That has nothing to do with Hitler's birthday. Q.Would you consider it to be a significant entry in the telephone log? A.This? "Keine vernichtung der Zigeuner"? Yes, of course. It is very interesting. Q.Have you seen it mentioned by any other historians whatsoever at any time? A.I have not seen any other historian claiming that this is an order by Hitler. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Have I got this document, Mr Irving? MR RAMPTON: Your Lordship really ought to have a copy of this book. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I have a feeling that somewhere the reference ---- MR RAMPTON: I copied the relevant pages for 30th November and 1st December. MR JUSTICE GRAY: 30th November and the 1st, certainly. MR RAMPTON: Those you have. I have never looked at this before. There was a copy of it produced by Mr Irving at some stage. MR IRVING: This is probably in the Schlegelberger file. MR RAMPTON: And I pointed out at that time that this took place before Himmler had lunch. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes, I knew I had seen it but, if somebody could give me the reference for it, I would be grateful. . P-48 MR RAMPTON: Yes I will try to find it? A.Would you look to borrow this, briefly? MR JUSTICE GRAY: I would rather have the reference. Is it J2? I have not got a J2, incidentally. MR RAMPTON: Nor have I. MR JUSTICE GRAY: These points just will not really get home unless I have got the document. I am sorry, Mr Irving, to interrupt. MR IRVING: I can do it in a very nice way, my Lord, by lending your Lordship the volume of the Himmler diary. MR JUSTICE GRAY: That is very kind. But in a way I would rather have the actual document in a file that I am going to be keeping, because I am not going to keep the book. MR IRVING: I can have a photocopy of that page made during the luncheon adjournment. That is the actual handwritten text. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think I am actually getting close to it. J Yes, I have it. It is J1, tab 3, for the transcript page 23. MR IRVING: Would you agree, Professor Evans, that this is an odd way for other historians to write history, cheerily omitting documents which you consider to be significant, or which you agree to be significant? A.Well, it is cited by, I think, by Zimmerman's standard work on the gypsies. I have to say that the gypsies, until recently, were not a much studied group of victims . P-49 of the Nazis. Once again, Mr Irving, it is not a problem for me that you made use of this. It is the use that you made, the way you use it. Q.Have you referenced this particular item in your report? Can you remember what your criticism of my use of this item is? A.I am making my criticism now. It is that you are claiming that this is an order from Hitler when it clearly is not. Q.And, using your common sense, of which you are apparently well endowed, you would not consider there is any connection between the fact that this very unusual order, for which there is no precedent, occurs only on the day of Adolf Hitler's birthday, when Himmler is at Hitler's headquarters? MR JUSTICE GRAY: We have had that point. A.He was not at Hitler's headquarters, Mr Irving. MR IRVING: It is an exact parallel to the November 30th episode then, is it not? Is that right? A.He was not at Hitler's headquarters. He went to Hitler's headquarters after he made the telephone call. It says here in black and white. Q.Is this an exact parallel to the November ---- A.So you have just made a completely false claim. Q.Is this an exact parallel to the November 30th 1941 episode where the telephone call to Heydrich appears to ante-date the visit to Hitler? . P-50 A.It is not an exact parallel but there are similarities. The 30th November telephone call concerns one particular train load of Jews. That is quite clear. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I am sorry to interrupt. I had better have a photocopy from somebody of that page because it obviously has more than I have at the moment. A.We are back to 30th November. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes. MR IRVING: My Lord I will provide you with a photocopy of the facsimile, but also with a typescript copy. MR JUSTICE GRAY: That would be kind. MR IRVING: Because the handwriting is, as we have discovered, sometimes prone to misreading. A.That is right, on page 278. MR IRVING: Page 278? A.13.30 Jew transport from Berlin. No liquidation. And then 14.30 to 1600, lunch with the Fuhrer. Q.Yes. Can you keep that page roughly open because we are now going to go on to the December 1st item. A.Right. Q.Professor Evans, have you misread any words in preparing your expert report for this case? A.I hope not, but one can never be entirely sure. Q.Yes. A.As you have said yourself many times ---- Q.These things happen? . P-51 A.-- one always makes errors and one does one's best to correct them. That is why I sent you an 18 page list of corrections and amendments to my report on 10th January. Q.Would you agree that mostly misreadings are quite innocuous and have no serious consequences? A.I hope that is true of mine. I do not believe that is true of yours. Q.Do you remember The Spectator letter where the omission of the one word "as" totally reversed the meaning of that letter? MR JUSTICE GRAY: We have been through that. A.I do not think that was my misreading. MR JUSTICE GRAY: We are more concerned with the criticisms of you, rather than the criticisms you make of Professor Evans. I understand why you make them, but let us focus on the point. I know the arguments now. MR IRVING: It is a little bit more colour and flourish to the argument about to develop, my Lord. Would you agree that a historian who sits in a book lined cave taking printed books off shelves, like the Himmler diary in front of you, with a nice index and photographs and beautifully bound, is less likely to make reading errors than somebody who uses the handwritten original, what I might call a shirt sleeves historian, who goes into the archives and reads the microfilm? Is the latter, the shirt sleeved historian, more likely, more prone to commit these stupid . P-52 blunders of reading an E for an A, or something like that? A.Well, it is easier, obviously, to read the printed text than it is to read handwriting. It goes without saying. I have done an enormous amount of reading of handwritten German myself and I know how difficult it is. Q.Yes. A.Or can be. It depends a lot on the kind of handwriting, of course. MR JUSTICE GRAY: If I may suggest it, I think probably the best thing to do is to show the witness the script. MR IRVING: We have two or three versions of it. MR JUSTICE GRAY: There is only one manuscript version. MR RAMPTON: No. There are two different forms of copy, my Lord. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Show the better one. MR RAMPTON: There is one that Mr Irving produced. I am quite happy for Mr Irving to use the copy that he produced. MR IRVING: I think that would be more fair. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think that is J1, tab 3, page 14 but I may be wrong. MR RAMPTON: That is right. MR IRVING: We have the actual version I used here. A.I have the microfilm version. MR RAMPTON: If Mr Irving is going to use his own copy, I would like Professor Evans to have the same copy. No doubt, if it is necessary, I can come back to the better copy, the . P-53 microfilm, in due course in re-examination, if I have to. But, if Mr Irving is going to use his rather worse copy, then I think Professor Evans should have the same one. Professor Evans will need the J file, J1, tab 3, at page 14. MR IRVING: We are looking first at the November 30th entry which is Judentransport? A.Oh right, yes. Q.We will start with that one. A.Then I have not got that here, I am afraid. Q.There is no need to look at the actual wording. We are going to look at the word "transport" very briefly, my Lord. MR JUSTICE GRAY: We all know what the point is. A.Could you point me to exactly where it is. MR JUSTICE GRAY: J1, tab 3, page 12. MR IRVING: My Lord, I have done a little research on the word "transport" but I am sure Mr Rampton will not begrudge me ---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: Put your question, which I could put for you because I know what it is going to be. MR IRVING: I will give my version of the question which is as follows, Professor Evans. A.Yes. Q.Are you familiar with the fact that the Cassell's German Dictionary translates the word "transport" only as . P-54 follows: "The German word transport has only these meanings" in the Cassell's Dictionary and I will give the Langenscheidt one in a moment. The Cassell's entry has it in this order: "Transport, transportation, carriage, conveyance, transfer, shipment". So is it actually referring to a vehicle or to a concept? A.What date is this dictionary, Mr Irving? Q.The Cassell's Dictionary has remained unchanged in this particular one since 1935. A.Are you quoting the 1935 edition? Q.Yes. I spent a lot of money buying them at five year intervals to see if it changed, and they just used a photographic copy the whole way through. A.Can I see a copy, please? Q.Let us refer to the Langenscheidt edition? MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think the witness is entitled to have the contemporary Cassell's Dictionary shown to him if he wants to see it. MR IRVING: My Lord, the point is, if you are looking at a word without the surrounding context, and you are looking for a translation, you pick the primary meaning. If you then later on learn ---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes. We do not want to overdo this point. You put that the dictionary meaning of "transport" includes as one of the meanings "transportation" and you say that has been the Cassell's Dictionary definition . P-55 since time immemorial. The witness says he wants to look at the relevant one, which would be the one from the 1930s, and I think that is a fair request. MR IRVING: Can I just show him the typed extract I made last night? MR JUSTICE GRAY: If it relates to the contemporary Cassell's Dictionary, yes. MR IRVING: In that case I will just put to the witness this 1935 dictionary. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Is it Cassell's? MR IRVING: No. This is now a different one. This is a Butler & Tanner. It is a Routledge Dictionary and unfortunately it is more abbreviated. It does not give the sense that I was looking for in such detail. The point I was trying to make, my Lord, is that it refers to "transportation" rather than "a transport" in the sense of a train. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I know what the point is. A.Here, of course, it does not. MR IRVING: It just says "transport" which is ambiguous. A."Transport conveyance", transport or conveyance. Q.Yes. A.Those are the primary meanings.
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