"Non-Germans" Under the Third Reich (189 page)

The behavior of the army in Hohensalza is no different from that in the other three
kreisfreie
cities and rural districts of the
Gau
. Pretentiousness and arrogance have sometimes been close to bearable limits. Above all, the troops believe they can requisition whatever they want. I have had to intervene most severely…. Furs, clothes, bedclothes, and so on have all been taken in the name of requisitioning. This goes for officers too. Particularly the behavior of the younger officers was not consonant with the principles of the National Socialist upbringing. Men who in their private lives were primary school teachers or assistant teachers at secondary school stood out in this respect.

See also the secret correspondence from the head of the Central Trustee Office of the Eastern Territories to the head of the Four Year Plan, dated February 5, 1941 (DZA Potsdam, Reich Ministry of Finance no. 6176, 35, excerpts in Łuczak,
Grabie
polskiego mienia
, 196).

7.
Cf.
Meldungen aus dem Reich
of May 16, 1940, BA R 85/184 (where it is reported that many Reich Germans used the term
confiscation
for stealing valuable objects; the need for such measures could no longer be examined and indeed never had been examined). It was also reported that actions had been instituted for minor thefts committed by ethnic Germans during hostilities or shortly after the occupation (of Łód
). There was thus a movement among law officers for an amnesty, given the bitterness on the part of the ethnic Germans.

8.
See the excerpt from the transcript of a meeting of the heads of the trustee offices on July 23–24, 1940, in Berlin, the report by the head of the trustee office in Łód
(State Archive Pozna
, Treuhandstelle Posen, 10654), which states, “In addition, the evacuation of Poles and Jews was often accompanied by measures to secure the personal assets of those involved, and all these measures considerably increased the reigning confusion. The first thing to concentrate on, therefore, was everything that concerned the administration…. Thus a search was carried on in virtually every house, including the landings, and finally every flat was looked through to see whether it did not contain some articles of value or business that concerned our administration.”

9.
Letter dated February 5, 1941, from the head of the Main Trustee Office East (HTO) to the head of the Four Year Plan, quoted by Łuczak,
Grabie
polskiego mienia
, 196: “Up to the beginning of 1940, tens of thousands of measures have been taken by all sorts of incompetent and officious offices and the Party, none of which have been recorded. In very many of these cases, goods have been embezzled, in others they have ended up in the hands of Landräte, Bürgermeister, police, and military stations, without their origin being discernible. Enormous quantities of furniture, clothes, and other everyday objects disappeared during that period.”

10.
Administrative decree of October 19, 1939; all individuals enriching themselves in this manner were to be prosecuted by law. Violations would be punished “without discrimination” and reported to the RSHA (
Mitteilungsblatt HTO
1940, no. 4, 15, reproduced in
Doc. Occ
. 5:212 f.).

11.
See also the report dated January 10, 1940, from the municipal administration of Łód
(State Archive Pozna
, Stadverwaltung Litzmannstadt, 81a): “Acts of aggression, unofficial confiscation of goods, and so on, formerly commonplace in the circumstances of the war … have diminished considerably as a result of the control measures taken in cooperation with the army command.” In an instruction dated June 7, 1940, Himmler as RKF was still urging inclusion of Göring’s instruction in his decree of October 19, 1939 (
Doc. Occ
. 5:212 f.).

12.
Decree of January 15, 1940, by the head of the Four Year Plan on the Protection of the Assets of the Former Polish State (
RGBl
. I 174).

13.
RGBl
. I, 270.

14.
Decree of July 18, 1940, by the Reich minister of finance; details in Steffens, “Die rechtliche Vertretung der Juden im Reich” (1942). See also the status report of November 15, 1939, for the Kalisch (Kalisz) District (State Archive Pozna
,
Reichsstatthalter
1831, Bl. 3): “Business and industry was virtually exclusively in the hands of the approximately 32,000 Jews who had established themselves here in Kalisch. The Jews have been excluded from all occupations, and a large number of businesses have been taken over by ethnic Germans and sometimes also Reich Germans as trustees.”

15.
Instruction of August 26, 1941, by the
Reichsführer
-SS/RKF (
Mitteilungsblatt HTO
1942, no. 1, 30 f.; reproduced in
Doc. Occ
. 5:245 f.).

16.
Some 3.5 million reichsmarks from the sale of Polish and Jewish household goods (in the Warthegau alone?), circular of October 18, 1941, from the Main Trustee Office East, quoted in Łuczak,
Grabie
polskiego mienia
, 204.

17.
Sec. 2, par. 1b, of the decree of September 17, 1940 (
RGBl
. I 1270). For the Warthegau, see the secret decree of November 12, 1939, by the HSSPF Posen (ZS, Polen, film 62, Bl. 0547–0551); confidential information sheet from the head of the Emigration Center, Łód
, Zamos branch, dated November 21, 1942, on the desettlement of Polish farmers (Institute for Western Studies, Pozna
, doc. 1–53).