War Crimes Trials - Vol. II The Belsen Trial. 'The Trial of Josef Kramer and Forty Four Others'

Appendices (Affidavits & Statements - Herbst, Elisabeth)
 

(102) DEPOSITION OF ELISABETH HERBST (Czech, aged 28)

2. I recognise No. 3 on photograph Z/4/2 as a Kapo at Auschwitz. I knew her by the name of Hilde Lohbauer and I have now been told that that is her correct name. One morning in August, 1942, I was one of a party of women who were assembled preparatory to being marched to work. We were near the perimeter of the camp, where there was a ditch and a barbed wire surround. The ditch was about 2 metres from the barbed wire, about 3 ½ to 4 metres wide and about 3 metres deep. It was half-filled with water. The barbed wire was electrified. In the ditch, struggling in the water, I saw between 10 and 20 women, and there were about 10 bodies, apparently dead, floating on the surface of the water. Lohbauer, another Kapo named Krause (now dead), three or four other female Kapos and an S.S. Unterscharführer were standing on the bank of this ditch. Lohbauer and Krause had long poles in their hands. Some of the women in the water were crying desperately for help, and I heard one in particular shout "Kapo, pull me out." Lohbauer pulled her half out. Then with a downward thrust of the pole, pushed the woman back in the water. She and the other Kapos were highly amused, and Lohbauer did this with several other women. I watched this scene for about 20 minutes and was then marched our of camp with the other workers. When I returned in the evening the ditch was empty.
 
Appendices (Affidavits & Statements - Herbst, Elisabeth)