In August 1942, after having collected the Zyklon B from a factory in Kolin (near Prague, Czech Republic), Gerstein was taken to Majdanek, Belzec, and Treblinka.
He arrived at Belzec on August 19 where he witnessed the entire process of gassing a trainload of Jews. After the unloading of 45 train cars stuffed with 6700 people, those that were still alive were marched, completely naked, and told "in a pastoral voice" that no harm would come to them.6 After the gas chambers were filled...
- Unterscharführer Hackenholt was making great efforts to get the engine running. But it doesn't go. Captain Wirth comes up. I can see he is afraid because I am present at a disaster. Yes, I see it all and I wait. My stopwatch showed it all, 50 minutes, 70 minutes, and the diesel did not start. The people wait inside the gas chambers. In vain. They can be heard weeping, "like in the synagogue," says Professor Pfannenstiel, his eyes glued to a window in the wooden door. Furious, Captain Wirth lashes the Ukrainian assisting Hackenholt twelve, thirteen times, in the face. After 2 hours and 49 minutes - the stopwatch recorded it all - the diesel started. Up to that moment, the people shut up in those four crowded chambers were still alive, four times 750 persons in four times 45 cubic meters. Another 25 minutes elapsed. Many were already dead, that could be seen through the small window because an electric lamp inside lit up the chamber for a few moments. After 28 minutes, only a few were still alive. Finally, after 32 minutes, all were dead.7
Gerstein was then shown the processing of the dead:
- Dentists hammered out gold teeth, bridges and crowns. In the midst of them stood Captain Wirth. Hew as in his element, and showing me a large can full of teeth, he said: "See for yourself the weight of that gold! It's only from yesterday and the day before. You can't imagine what we find every day - dollars, diamonds, gold. You'll see for yourself!"8
Telling the World
Gerstein was shocked by what he had witnessed. Yet, he realized that as a witness, his position was unique.
- I was one of the handful of people who had seen every corner of the establishment, and certainly the only one to have visited it as an enemy of this gang of murderers.9
He buried the Zyklon B canisters that he was supposed deliver to the death camps.
He was shaken by what he had seen. He wanted to expose what he knew to the world so that they could stop it.
On the train back to Berlin, Gerstein met Baron Göran von Otter, Swedish diplomat. Gerstein told von Otter all he had seen. As von Otter relates the conversation:
- It was hard to get Gerstein to keep his voice down. We stood there together, all night, some six hours or maybe eight. And again and again, Gerstein kept on recalling what he had seen. He sobbed and hid his face in his hands.10
Von Otter made a detailed report of his conversation with Gerstein and sent it to his superiors. Nothing happened.
Gerstein continued to tell people what he had seen. He tried to contact the Legation of the Holy See but was denied access because he was a soldier.11
- [T]aking my life in my hands every moment, I continued to inform hundreds of people of these horrible massacres. Among them were the Niemöller family; Dr. Hochstrasser, the press attaché at the Swiss Legation in Berlin; Dr. Winter, the coadjutor of the Catholic Bishop of Berlin - so that he could transmit my information to the Bishop and to the Pope; Dr. Dibelius [bishop of the Confessing Church], and many others. In this way, thousands of people were informed by me.12
As months continued to pass and still the Allies had done nothing to stop the extermination, Gerstein became increasingly frantic.
- [H]e behaved in a strangely reckless manner, needlessly risking his life every time he spoke of the extermination camps to persons he scarcely knew, who were in no position to help, but might easily have been subjected to torture and interrogation. . . 13
Suicide or Murder?
On April 22, 1945, near the end of the war, Gerstein contacted the Allies. After telling his story and showing his documents, Gerstein was kept in "honorable" captivity" in Rottweil - this meant he was lodged at Hotel Mohren and just had to report to the French gendarmerie once a day.14
It was here that Gerstein wrote down his experiences - both in French and German.
At this time, Gerstein seemed optimistic and confident. In a letter, Gerstein wrote:
- After twelve years of unremitting struggle, and in particular after the last four years of my extremely dangerous and exhausting activity and the many horrors I have lived through, I should like to recuperate with my family in Tübingen.15
