SS Institute of Hygiene Lab. Human broth

Numerous papers have been published in Poland and worldwide, especially in Medical Review – Auschwitz, with incontrovertible evidence that members of the Nazi German medical milieu engaged in criminal activities in breach of the principles of law and ethics. Most of these crimes were committed by SS physicians in Nazi German concentration camps, on prisoners and the corpses of dead prisoners. The ideas for these criminal projects were sprouted in the minds of top-brass German scientists, authorities in their field, professors of medicine and representatives of German scientific institutes and social organizations. The scope of their criminal experiments was extremely broad and involved numerous specialist fields of medicine: surgery, internal medicine, infectious diseases, radiography, gynecology, psychiatry, anatomy, oncology, pulmonology, immunology, serology, bacteriology, pathology, hygiene, anatomical pathology, genetics, pharmacology, toxicology etc.

This study is a historical addendum based on statements made by witnesses, Auschwitz survivors and a physician who was an SS physician in Auschwitz-Birkenau at the “scientific” laboratory known as the Hygienisch-Bakteriologische Untersuchungsstelle der Waffen SS Auschwitz¹, or alternatively as the Hygiene Institut der Waffen SS und Polizei Süd-Ost². It was located near Auschwitz and operated as a branch of the Institute of Hygiene, which in turn was part of the SS Institute of Hygiene with headquarters in Berlin on the Knesebeckstrasse, the head of which was the notorious chief SS physician Professor Joachim Mrugowski.³ Its scientific supervisor was Professor Heinrich Zeiss of the University of Berlin. The field hygiene laboratories attached to every SS division were under the authority of this institution. In addition the SS had two laboratories “for special purposes,” one at Raisko attached to Auschwitz-Birkenau, and another attached to Buchenwald. The head of the Buchenwald lab was the infamous SS physician Ding-Schuler,⁴ and it was involved in the production of typhus vaccine.

The establishment of the Raisko institute was associated with a typhus epidemic which erupted and quickly spread among the inmates of Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1942, causing a threat to the SS staff and their families. On 13 October the wife of Obersturmführer Caesar, a high-ranking SS officer who was head of the farms attached to the concentration camp, died of the disease. Other SS men were infected and died. Dr Eduard Wirths, physician of the SS garrison, turned to Mrugowsky for help. A decision was taken to set up a research institute, and SS physician Obersturmführer Dr Bruno Weber was appointed its head, with SS-Untersturmführer Dr Hans Münch as his deputy. Initially (on 8 April 1943) the institute’s labs were accommodated in Blocks 10 and 20 in Auschwitz I, but on 5 May they were moved to a two-storey building in the village of Rajsko⁵ near the city of Oświęcim. The institute grew at a rapid rate. Table I below is a schematic diagram showing its structure.

The SS men on the institute’s staff were as follows: its head, Dr Bruno Weber, in the rank of Hauptsturmführer and later Obersturmführer; Dr Hans Münch, an Untersturmführer, was deputy head; Dr Hans Delmotte, another Obersturmführer, was temporarily employed in the institute; Unterscharführer Hans Fugger served as its administrative officer; and Rottenführer Pragner as payments officer; Unterscharführer Krapmeyer was another employee; Scharführer Zabel and Rottenführer Kraus were its disinfection officers; Festweber served as sentry; and Hofmann was responsible for transport services. A meteorological station headed by Sonderführer Mulzoff was attached to the institute.

All the research, administrative, and cleaning work was done by prisoners. Dr Weber found professionals imprisoned in Auschwitz-Birekanu and used the services of the Gestapo to bring the best specialists from the universities in occupied Europe to his institute. These included Polish inmates of Auschwitz, the biologist Prof. Antoni Jakubowski from Poznań (No.3385), anatomical pathologist Prof. Janina Kowalczykowa from Kraków (No. 32212), and the mathematician Prof. Władysław Ślebodziński from Poznań (No. 79053). On 7 February 1943 a group of scientists associated with the Rudolf Weigl Institute [for typhus and virus research] and their families were brought from Lwów.⁶ They included Dr Owsiej Abramowicz (No. 100965), Dr Ludwik Fleck (No. 100966), Dr Jakub Seeman (No. 100968), Dr Resuch Umschweif (No. 100969), and later Prof. Henryk Meisel (No. 172295), who was specially rounded up and sent over to Raisko by the authorities of the Montelupich prison in Kraków. Weber also had the Czech bacteriologist Prof. Wenzel Tomašek of Brno (No. 93754), a student of Emile Roux and associate of Albert Calmette brought in; as well as Prof. Geza Mansfeld of Budapest (No. 182121); Prof. Markus Klein, a histologist from the University of Strasburg (No. A 11153); Dr Georg Levy-Coblenz, an anatomical pathologist from Strasburg (No. 164550); Dr Abraham Lettich, a bacteriologist from Tours (No. 51224); Dr Heinz Briske, a chemist from Berlin (No. 116879); the chemist Dr Jan Reyman from Kraków (No. 37302); and another chemist, Dr Ernest Reimann from Prague (No. 118335), and many, many more. A total of around 150 prisoners worked in the Raisko institute. Both the scientific research done in this institute as well as the services and relations between employees, and the laboratory supervision of the pseudo-medical experiments conducted in Auschwitz-Birkenau call for a separate study. The following facts will provide a sufficient insight into the conditions in this Nazi German medical research institute.

Its bacteriological section had a separate Nährbodenküche (culture media facility). Like any other lab, it made a cooked meat broth using an established recipe for beef, veal, or horsemeat (if neither beef nor veal was available). In his microbiology textbook Prof. Ślopek gives an example of how to make a simple type of broth: “Mince 1 kg [2.2 lbs] of beef or veal without the fat, put it in water and let it stand overnight at a temperature of 4–6^oC [39–43^oF]. Remove the fat from the surface, heat to 45^oC [113^oF] and keep it at 45–50^oC [113–122^oF] for an hour, then heat for half an hour (do not stir). Next filter through glass wool or linen, topping up with distilled water to the original volume. Sterilize and store” (Ślopek 1955: 483–484).

But often things were not at all like that in the culture media facility of the Nazi German Institute of Hygiene in Auschwitz. It was run by Zabel and Fugger, two of the SS men I have mentioned. They supplied the meat due to be cooked up. The prisoners working for them were on concentration camp food rations and they were so starved that often, “unofficially” they would eat the meat once it had been cooked, seasoning it with salt. They kept it a secret from Weber. A passage from the statement made by survivor Mieczysław Kieta (No. 59590), who worked as a warehouse attendant in the institute, on 3 October 1945 in connection with the trial of Rudolf Höss, the commandant of Auschwitz (Vol. 7, sheet 13), says that at the peak of the institute’s production, Fugger and Zabel transported deliveries of about 30–40 kg (66–88 lbs.) of meat to the institute about 3–5 times a month. They did their meat rounds using a motorcycle with a sidecar, or sometimes in Weber’s institute car. At first the prisoners who worked in the lab would eat the boiled meat, thinking that it came from the animal abattoir in the camp. But when they started to keep an eye on the two SS men this is what they discovered.

Sometimes Fugger and Zabel would take post mortem instruments such as scalpels, knives, and tweezers with them when they left the institute. On their return they would hand these instruments, which would be covered in blood, back to the prisoners working in the warehouse to clean. Each time they brought back two or three buckets full of meat. It turned out that it was the flesh of Block 11 prisoners executed by rifle squad or prisoners gassed in the Birkenau crematoria. This macabre discovery was made by Dr Mikołaj Korn (No. 32387), the kapo of the commando. One day he took a chunk of this meat with a piece of fair skin covered with hair on it to prisoner Jan Reyman in the chemistry lab. When prisoners Dr Jakub Lewin and prof. Janusz Mąkowski examined and tested it, they found that it was human flesh. They were in no doubt about this conclusion. As soon as word went round to other prisoners about this “discovery” they got nausea. They realized that unwittingly they had been practicing necrophagia. From then on they always found the smell coming from the culture medium room nauseating – it was the smell of boiled human flesh.

This fact is also reported by Dr Léon Landau, a French prisoner who worked in the institute (No. 64063), on page 75 of his book Oskarżenie [Accusation]. From that time on prisoners could recognize human thighs, buttocks, or the flesh off human chests in the buckets of meat the SS men brought in. The following episode has stayed in the memory of survivor Dr Jakub Lewin (No. 28476), who wrote about it in a letter to me. “Apparently prisoner Genci, who worked in the culture media facility, was the first to make the discovery of those “red muscles.” One lump of it had a piece of pale skin covered with fair hair. It looked like a woman’s skin.” Dr Lewin also remembers Mrugowsky visiting the institute for an official inspection, during which there was an episode when Weber told him about the Menschenbouillon (human broth). Both Weber and Mrugowsky reacted to this by laughing out loud. Recently I managed to obtain authoritative confirmation for the statements made by survivors Mieczysław Kieta, Jan Reyman, Leon Landau, and Jakub Lewin. I got a statement from an ex-SS man.

On 9 July 1967 I conducted a recorded talk with Dr Hans Münch, formerly an SS man who served as deputy head of the Raisko Institute of Hygiene in the environs of the City of Oświęcim. He said the following on the human broth: “The Institute of Hygiene received its horsemeat from an SS farm about 50 km [32 miles] away from the city of Oświęcim. Meat was in short supply, primarily because it was pilfered on the way. Zabel often had his fingers in that pie. At first he made up for the shortfall in Birkenau. Initially the prisoners working in the culture medium room didn’t know and continued to bake that meat as well. One day during a booze in the institute Zabel spilled the beans. So Weber had a systematic set of tests conducted to check out the potential of using human flesh from the gas chambers.⁷ There were no differences, except that it was more difficult to extract the fat. So Weber put a ban on the use of human flesh. However Zabel, who was in charge of the “broth kitchen,” ordered the resolution of the Fettproblem⁸ as soon as possible. Whenever he went to Birkenau to collect blood samples he always brought back flesh from the crematoria. As of the summer of 1944 he no longer needed to do that. At night we used to steal the Wehrmacht’s draught horses put out to graze in the meadows in the environs of the institute and killed them.”

After that macabre discovery no prisoner ever ate the cooked meat again, which was henceforth buried near the barrack in the institute’s garden (statement by Kieta). There is no need for any comments on these facts.

***

According to the data I have obtained from the Archives of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, the following prisoners were working in the SS Institute of Hygiene at Raisko in November 1944. I have kept the original spelling recorded in the documents.^{9, 10}

Office (Geschäftszimmer): Paul Reichl (RD 68630); Dawid Frajman (PJ 68439); Wiktor Schnell (82036); Abraham Golkar (DJ 103839); Lejzor Wimber (PJ 77524, errand boy); Ernest Pollak (DJ 58951, book-keeper); all in Block 13. — Clerks’ office II (Schreibstube II): in Block 7a: Kurt Prager (RD 122589) and Paul Laby (RD 188398); in Block 13: Robert Frank (CJ 174667), Elli Ariditti (CJ 124343), Fried Grunberger (CJ 94035); Leo Moskwer (PJ 141352, errand boy, left on 10 Nov.1944). — Bacteriology lab (Bakteriologisches Laboratorium): in Block No. 20 Wenzel Tomasek (C 93754); in Block 13: Abraham Lettich (FJ 51224); Lejbus Landau (FJ 64063); Albert Bendrichen (FJ 173243); Dawid Mossel (HJ 175443, sent to Birkenau, 8 Sept. 1944); Richard Fleck (PJ 100966).— Chemistry lab (Chemisches Laboratorium): in Block 13: Heinz Briske (DJ 116879); Ernst Reizmann (CJ 118335); Jan Rejman (P 37402); Hans Dessauer (RD 1277005); Isydor Wolf (HJ 101115); Joseph Danischewsky (RD 111024); Laszlo Gynlai (UJ A 12143); Van Dam (HJ B 3655); Owsiej Abramowicz (PJ 100965); Franciszek Bogacki (P 109619); Franz Gans (FJ A 5185); Franz Cohen (HJ B 9154); Ernst Koenig, Robert Weil (FJ A 12069). — Histology & biology lab (Biologisches und Histologisches Laboratorium): in Block 13: Anton Jakubski (P 3385, left in a transport on 4 Dec.1944); Georg Levy Coblenz (FJ 164550); Markus Klein (FJ A 11953). — Culture medium room (Nährbodenküche): in Block 13: Robert Weisskopf (CJ 71262); Bela Friedmann (UJ A 14399); Ludwig Micheels (HJ 117641). — Prisoners from Block 13 working in serology labs: Serologisches Laboratorium I: Israel Lewin (FJ 28476); Reruch¹¹ Umschweif (PJ 100969); Oskar Winterstein (UJ A 14641); Andreas Gluckmann (UJ A 12487); Serologisches Laboratorium II: Henryk Meisel (PJ 172295); Natalia Umschweif (PJ 34966, from the Gärtnerei kommando); Ernestine Fleck (PJ 34967); Rachel Meisel (PJ 70283); Serologisches Laboratorium III: Abraham Treger (PJ 98130); Wilhelm Berler (BJ 117476); Marian Burstejn (FJ A 11856); Loranc Kieselstein¹² (FJ). — Wassermann test lab. (Wassermann-Laboratorium): Anna Seeman (PJ 34965 from Gärtnerei); Paula Beck (PJ 38309, Gärtnerei): Israel Mandelbaum (BJ 179835). — Camp: Block 5a: Wiktor Kornführer (CJ 175184); in Block 13: Leo Kajzer (PJ 137339): Zoltan Fisch (UJ A 14384); Idel Katz (BJ 3536, left 10 Nov. 1944). — Meteorology department (Klimatologische Abteilung): from Block 13: Hugo Gounhut (CJ 94037) and Jakub Zajączkowski (PJ 141718); Andor Katz (DJ A 13219): Zoltan Katz (UJ A 13220). —Lab in Block 20: from Block 13: Rudolf Weisskopf (71261) and Georg Glas (DJ 124694); from Block 20:Andreas Hirsch (CJ 174662) and Paul Pollak (DJ 180082). — Cleaning & sterilisation room for consignment transportation (Spuel Sterilisierraum Versandgefässe): from Block 7a Heinrich Gramisky (RD Aso 132075. Sent back 10 Nov. 1944); from Block 13: Jakub Seeman (PJ 100968); Julius Schreier (DJ 68694).— Reinigungsküche (washing up room): Erwin Jusitz (CJ 174451); Alexander Elias (UJ A 14376); Josef Szlamowicz (PJ 141402. Sent back 10 Nov. 1944); Hirsch Garbowicz (PJ 86828); Horst Hecht (DJ 103849); Haim Zajączkowski (PJ 144458); Anadar Biro¹³ (UJ A 14357. Sent back 10 Nov. 1944); Izaak Noer (PJ 157725); Zdenek Veleminski (CJ 179644); Moritz Sniatowski (PJ 141589); Bronisław Hah (PJ 108122); Loranz Herz¹⁴ (UJ A 14084, chemist); Ellis Herzberger (HJ A 946, physician & bacteriologist); Oskar Fenner (FJ B 9652. Sent back 10 Nov. 1944); Artur Danesch (CJ 188003. Sent back 10 Nov. 1944). — Animal attendants: in Block 13: Georg Hein (RD 84512. Left 10 Nov. 1944); Sandor Senderowicz (UJ B 7562. Left 10 Nov. 1944); Wilhelm Molnar (UJ A 10342); Schutim Bromberg¹⁵ (FJ B 3704), carter; from Block 18: Rachmil Skrikowski (PJ 99199). — Gardeners: from Block 7a: Adam Kozianowski (RD 165221); from Block 13: Ludwig Mautner (UJ A 14500). — Garages: from Block 13: Wolf Schiff (PJ 174248); Joseph Luxberg (BJ B 3573); Miloge Milotonowitsch (Jug 201330).— Working in SS warehouses and cleaners (SS-Unterkünfte und Reiniger): from Block 7a: Herbert Scholz (19351, Berufsverbrecher [professional criminal according to the register]); from Block 13: Ernst Bertram (PSV 114002, Weber’s servant); Josef Jocar (C AJ 119380); Mosko Markowicz (PJ 133149. Sent back 10 Nov. 1944); Wilhelm Karfiol (BJ 64171, in lab buildings); Heinrich Zuckermann (PJ B 6887). — Craftsmen (Handwerker): from Block 13: Henryk Szczerbiński (P 85434, carpenter. Sent back in a transport, 4 Dec. 1944); Franz Steiner (PSV J 112743, varnisher); Walter Barkowski (DJ 105917, carpenter); Deisider Kleinhaendler¹⁶ (SJ 69118, electrician); tailors: Lejzor Kujawski (PJ), Moritz Kujawski (PJ) and Pinkas Unger (BJ 179893); Karl Glattan (DJ 176089, hairdresser); Albert Rowek (FJ B 3899, carpenter’s assistant); Gottlieb Zausek (C 204400, car mechanic). — Skilled workers with no job assigned to them: Nikolaus Korn (SJ 32337, Häftlingskrankenbau [prisoners’ hospital building], working in Birkenau; from Block 13: Geza Mannsfeld (UJ 182121); Georg Veleminsky (CJ 179618); Władysław Ślebodziński (P 79053); Antonio Eifarelli (It 201262, medical statistician, temporarily employed in washing-up room). — Auxiliary staff with no job assigned to them: Paul Schames (BJ 175116); Simon Sukiennik (BJ 72857); Johann Feol (FJ A 12054, convalescent, sent back on 6 Nov. 1944); Joseph Abramowicz (BJ B 3450, medical student); all from Block 18: Moses Białek (PJ 141936); Josef Ligomiere (F 201318) sent to fence-building work. – A total of 120 names.

The following names are on the list of Polish prisoners sent back from the Institute of Hygiene on a transport in late October 1944:

Nicet Włodarski (No. 1982, bacteriology lab technician); Antoni Jakubski (No. 3385, biologist); Mieczysław Kieta (No. 59590, prisoner from the camp); Władysław Ślebodziński (No. 79053, statistician in serology dept.); Jan Fabicki (No. 127745, serology lab technician): Mieczysław Uchajski (No. 156706. chemist); Witold Pieńczewski (No. 157588, chemist); Marian Koziar (No. 164414, serology lab technician); Wenzel Skudrowicz (No. 151452, clerk in serology lab II); Henryk Kusztelowicz (No. 79583, animal breeder in experimental animal farm); Czesław Kurowski (No.162153, bacteriology lab cleaner); Stefan Radomski (No. 19069, car mechanic); Henryk Sczerbiński (No. 85434, carpenter and joiner); Tadeusz Sadowski (No. 14235, cleaner working in SS quarters); Bronisław Jaroszek (No. 93727, worked in chemistry dept., later cleaning Weber’s rooms); all the following in meteorology dept.: Wincenty Wojtan (No. 2698); Jerzy Ordega (No. 76952); Józef Sulter (No. 115749); Marian Kotarba (No. 127752); Stepanow (No. 155784); Feliks ...ajczyk [partly illegible]; Adalbert Gąsowski (No. 160126): Marian Kaczyński (Kączyński?).

Translated from original article: Kłodziński, S. Laboratorium Instytutu Higieny SS w Oświęcimiu. Bulion z mięsa ludzkiego. Przegląd Lekarski – Oświęcim, 1969.

Medical Review – Auschwitz acknowledges the contribution of Mr Roman Matz to identifying the necessary clarifications to the personal data and linguistic details presented in the above article (see Notes).

Notes

1. German “Hygiene and Bacteriology Lab of the Waffen-SS in Auschwitz.”^a
2. German “Institute of Hygiene of the Waffen-SS and Police for the South-East.”^a
3. In the Doctors’ Trial at Nuremberg Mrugowsky was convicted of crimes against humanity, sentenced to death, and hanged on 2 June 1948.^b
4. Erwin Oskar Ding-Schuler, SS surgeon at Buchenwald, where he carried out criminal experiments on prisoners. Arrested by U.S. troops on 25 April 1945; committed suicide on 11 August 1945.^b
5. Rajsko is the Polish name of the place; the Germans changed the name to “Raisko” when they set up their units there.^b
6. Now Lviv, Ukraine.^b
7. Theoretically, the Cyclone B used in the gas chambers could have got into the broth from the muscles of gassed victims and had a negative effect on bacteria growth.^c
8. German “problem with fat.”^a
9. The figures in brackets are inmates’ prison numbers. The letters stand for the following: C = a Czech, F = Frenchman, It = Italian, P = Pole, RD = Reichsdeutscher. The letter J stands for Jews—from Belgium (BJ), from Czechoslovakia (CJ), from Germany (DJ), from France (FJ), from Holland (HJ), from Poland (PJ), and from Ukraine (UJ).^c
10. Endnote 10, translated from the original notes to the article, includes one mistake in the explanation of the abbreviations used. “UJ” stands for the German phrase ungarische Jude (Hungarian Jew). “PSV” stands for the German Polizeisicherverwahrt, i.e. a prisoner under police supervision.^{a, d}
11. Bernhard Umschweif according to the Auschwitz-Birkenau prisoners database. The name “Reruch” may possibly be a misspelled or misheard Hebrew name “Baruch.”^{a, d}
12. Actually Lorent Kieselstein. See the Auschwitz-Birkenau prisoners database.^{a, d}
13. Actually Andor Biro. See the Auschwitz-Birkenau prisoners database.^{a, d}
14. Actually Lorand (or Hebrew Lorent) Herz. See the Auschwitz-Birkenau prisoners database.^{a, d}
15. Probably Schulim Bromberg. The Auschwitz-Birkenau prisoners database lacks information about a prisoner registered under such a name.^{a, d}
16. Actually Desidor Kleinhändler. Auschwitz-Birkenau prisoners database.^{a, d}

a—Website Editor’s note; b—Translator’s note; c—notes translated from the original, d—suggestions for notes courtesy of Roman Matz.