Glossary

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Testimony by Buna/Monowitz Concentration Camp Survivors in Nazi Trials

In all the trials of Nazi criminals, special significance was assigned to the statements of witnesses, particularly of those who were survivors of concentration camps: For one thing, the victims’ side had almost no written evidence available; its representatives could counter the Nazi documents only with their oral testimony. Moreover, the often harrowing testimonies furthered public knowledge of the crimes committed in the concentration camps. The statements of the survivors who were witnesses in the trials thus contributed to an increase in Germans’ awareness of the Nazis’ crimes. For the witnesses, testifying was always an enormous emotional and physical strain, and they accepted this burden as an obligation to their fellows in misery who had been murdered.

 

 

Overview:

 

Auschwitz Survivors as Witnesses in Nazi Trials

 

 

Testimony of Buna/Monowitz Concentration Camp Survivors:

 

Buna/Monowitz Concentration Camp Survivors as Witnesses in the I.G. Farben Trial at Nuremberg

 

Norbert Wollheim’s Testimony in the Trial of Veit Harlan

 

Buna/Monowitz Concentration Camp Survivors as Witnesses in the Wollheim Trial

 

 

Other trials in which testimony by survivors of Monowitz played a major part:

 

Trials of Bernhard Rakers

 

Frankfurt Auschwitz Trials

 

Trial of Horst Fischer