Savage Continent: Europe in the Aftermath of World War II (78 page)

50

Beevor and Vinogradova, p. 209.

51

Genia Demianova quoted in Owen and Walters, p. 134.

52

See Naimark,
Russians,
p. 70.

53

Polcz, pp. 89, 90, 105.

54

Quoted in de Zayas,
Terrible Revenge,
pp. 54—65.

55

See Alexander Solzhenitsyn,
Prussian Nights: A Narrative Poem,
trans. Robert Conquest (London: Fontana, 1978), pp. 41, 51—3, 93—103; and Lev Kopelev’s memoirs, pp. 50—56. See also Beevor, Berlin, p. 29.

56

Beevor and Vinogradova, p. 327.

57

Quoted in Andreas-Friedrich, p. 16, entry for 6 May 1945.

58

Kardorff, p. 217.

59

Ost-Dok 2/14, p. 106, quoted in de Zayas,
Terrible Revenge,
p. 45.

60

Judt, p. 20.

61

Johr, p. 54. According to Botting, p. 92, 90,000 women in Berlin sought medical assistance as a consequence of rape. See also Laurel Cohen-Pfister, ‘Rape, War and Outrage: Changing Perceptions on German Victimhood in the Period of Post-unification’, in Cohen-Pfister and Wienroeder-Skinner, p. 316.

62

Naimark,
Russians,
pp. 79, 94—5.

63

Johr, p. 59.

64

Kenez, p. 44.

65

Lilley, pp. 11 – 12.

66

Ruhl, p. 155. The official statistics for West Germany alone show 68,000 ‘Besatzungskinder’, of which 3,194 were the product of rape; see the Statistisches Bundesamt figures quoted in Ebba D. Drolshagen, ‘Germany’s War Children’, in Ericsson and Simonsen, p. 232. According to
Die Welt,
17 August 1948, 2 million abortions were carried out in Germany each year after the war; see Naimark,
Russians,
p. 123.

67

For statistics on the huge outbreaks of VD throughout Europe see Naimark,
Russians,
p. 98; War Office,
Statistical Report on the Health of the Army,
p. 264; United States Army, Office of the Surgeon General, vol. V, p. 257; and Andreas-Friedrich, p. 84, entry for 18 August 1945.

68

For examples of how women who were not raped were affected by the postwar atmosphere see Lena Berg, quoted in Donat, p. 317; Yvette Levy, quoted in Hitchcock, p. 307; Muriel Heath, IWM Docs 98/25/1, manuscript booklet.

69

See, for example, the testimony of Ruth Irmgard in Jacobs, p. 77.

70

Naimark,
Russians,
p. 125. In England and Wales divorce rates tripled between 1939 and 1945: see Central Statistical Office, p. 54.

71

Kopelev, pp. 51, 55. See also Anon.,
A Woman in Berlin,
p. 158; Naimark,
Russians,
p. 109.

72

Respectively, the words of Soviet soldiers according to Lena Berg, quoted in Donat, p. 317; a Soviet tank man quoted in Kopelev, p. 51, and a Soviet interpreter’s words to the British military governor in Schwerin, Major A. G. Moon, IWM Docs, 06/126/1, typescript memoir, p. 56.

73

Beevor and Vinogradova, p. 327.

74

Kopelev, pp. 56—7.

75

Grassmann, p. 28; MacDonogh, p. 100.

76

Byford-Jones, p. 53.

77

Central Statistical Office, p. 51.

78

United States Strategic Bombing Survey, vol. I, pp. 89—90. See also Beck, p. 220, note 111.

79

Newsweek
report from Stockholm correspondent, 11 June 1945, p. 56.

80

Borgersrud, p. 75.

81

“‘I have looked into the souls of these Nazi boys – they are black”’,
Daily Express,
26 October 1944.

CHAPTER 6 – HOPE

1

Motto of Jean-Paul Sartre’s
Les Temps modernes:
see Watson, p. 410.

2

Mayne, pp. 12—32.

3

Jens Miiller,
Tre kom tilbake
(Oslo: Gyldendal, 1946); Oluf Olsen,
Contact
(Oslo: Erik Qvist, 1946) and
Vi kommer igjen
(Oslo: Erik Qvist, 1945); Knut Haukelid,
Det demrer en dag
(Oslo: Nasjonalforlaget, 1947); Max Manus,
Det blir alvor
(Oslo: Steensballes Boghandels, 1946).

4

Speech by Josip Broz Tito, 9 May 1945, reproduced as doc. 239 in Trgo, pp. 718 – 21.

5

Churchill speech, 13 May 1945, quoted in Cannadine, p. 258; VE Day speech, 8 May 1945, quoted on
www.winston-churchill-leadership.com/speech-victory.html
– accessed 23 September 2011.

6

Declaration of the new Romanian government, as broadcast on Radio Romania, 23 August 1944: see
FRUS,
1944, vol. IV, p. 191.

7

Speech to meeting of Moscow Communist Party representatives, 6 November 1944, quoted in Stalin,
War Speeches,
p. 110.

8

FitzGibbon, p. 63. FitzGibbon, an Irish food writer, lived in London during the Blitz.

9

Mayne, p. 12.

10

At the time of writing, Croatia had just received the green light to join the European Union, and Serbia was expected to follow suit within a few months.

11

Drakuli
, p. 35. For an expanded argument along these lines, and a Polish affirmation of Drakuli
’s experience, see Jan Gross, ‘War as Revolution’, in Naimark and Gibianskii, pp. 17 – 40.

12

Milward,
War, Economy and Society,
pp. 284 – 6.

13

FitzGibbon, p. 63.

14

Quoted in Owen and Walters, p. 80.

15

Quoted in Philip Morgan, p. 64.

16

Kovaly, p. 57.

17

Quoted in Kenez, p. 107.

18

Pelle, p. 151.

19

Gross, p. 40.

CHAPTER 7 – LANDSCAPE OF CHAOS

1

Dean Acheson memorandum to Harry Hopkins, 26 December 1944,
FRUS,
1945, vol. II, pp. 1059 – 61.

2

New York Times,
3 June 1945, p. 22. See also
Newsweek,
11 June 1945, p. 60.

PART II – VENGEANCE

1

Beevor and Vinogradova, p. 248.

CHAPTER 8 – THE THIRST FOR BLOOD

1

Le Courrier de Genève,
7 November 1944. Fisch, pp. 151 – 3, disputes the accuracy of this report, as well as the author’s claims to have been an eyewitness.

2

Hermann Sommer, quoted in Spieler, p. 148.

3

See Fisch, pp. 165 – 7, who refutes claims that this happened in Nemmersdorf, but admits that it probably did occur elsewhere in East Prussia.

4

Hermann Sommer, quoted in Spieler, p. 147.

5

Kopelev, p. 37.

6

Quoted in Ehrenburg and Grossman, p. 236.

7

Quoted ibid., p. 234.

8

Quoted ibid., p. 38.

9

Fisch, pp. 141 – 53: for example, there were probably 26 killed in the village, but this was exaggerated to over 60.

CHAPTER 9 – THE CAMPS LIBERATED

1

Werth, pp. 889 – 90.

2

Quoted in Hitchcock, p. 288. See also Werth, pp. 892 – 3: Werth visited Majdanek in 1944 and witnessed the use of human ashes as fertilizer.

3

Werth, p. 896.

4

Ibid., p. 897.

5

See Arad, p. 368; Werth, pp. 890 – 99.

6

Pravda,
11 and 12 August 1944, 16 September 1944. See also Rubenstein, p. 426 fn. 82; Beevor and Vinogradova, p. 281.

7

Werth, p. 895; Rubenstein, p. 426 fn. 82.

8

Gilbert,
The Holocaust,
p. 711.

9

Vasily Grossman, ‘The Hell Called Treblinka’, in Ehrenburg and Grossman, pp. 399 – 429. See also Beevor and Vinogradova, pp. 280 – 306. For figures, see Burleigh,
Third Reich,
p. 650. The US Holocaust Memorial Museum puts the figure between 870,000 and 925,000: see their Holocaust Encyclopedia page for Treblinka at
www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005193
, accessed 27 September 2011.

10

US Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia page on Auschwitz,
www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005189
, accessed 27 September 2011.

11

For a good comparison of the Nazi Holocaust and the Soviet gulag system, see Dallas, pp. 456-68.

12

See, for example, Burleigh,
Third Reich,
p. 752.

13

Pravda,
17 December 1944, quoted in Rubenstein, p. 220.

14

Pravda,
27 October 1944, quoted ibid., p. 426 fn. 82.

15

Anthony Eden speech to Parliament, 17 December 1942, Hansard, series 5, vol. 385, col. 2083.

16

TNA: PRO INF 1/25 1 Part 4: ‘Plan to combat the apathetic attitude of “What have I got to lose even if Germany wins?”’, 25 July 1941.

17

Roosevelt statement to reporters, 24 March 1944, quoted in Beschloss, p. 59. For American reluctance to believe in wholesale extermination see Abzug, pp. 5—19; and Marcuse, pp. 53-4.

18

Beschloss, p. 61.

19

Werth, p. 890.

20

Ibid., p. 898.

21

See Abzug, pp. 3—4; testimony of Dr Fritz Leo, TNA: PRO WO 309/1696.

22

See
New York Times,
5 December 1944; Abzug, pp. 5—10.

23

Eisenhower, p. 446.

24

Patton, pp. 293—4.

25

Ibid., pp. 293—4.; see also Abzug, p. 27.

26

Hackett, pp. 103, 112—15.

27

Quoted in Abzug, p. 33.

28

Quoted in Marcuse, p. 54.

29

Ibid., pp. 54—5.

30

Abzug, p. 92. See also Percy Knauth’s description of Buchenwald in
Time,
30 April 1945.

31

Marcuse, pp. 51, 54.

32

Buechner later wrote a book about this incident called
The Hour of the Avenger
(Metairie, LA: Thunderbird Press, 1986), which has been criticized for distorting the facts and exaggerating the number of Germans killed. See Jürgen Zarusky, ‘Die Erschießungen gefangener SS-Leute bei der Befreiung des KZ Dachau’, in Benz and Königseder, pp. 113—16, and Israel, pp. 175-8. See also
www.scrapbookpages.com/dachauscrapbook/dachauliberation/BuechnerAccount.html
— accessed 13 September 2011.

33

Quoted in Abzug, p. 94.

34

Sington, pp. 20—25, 37; and Lt Col. R. I. G. Taylor quoted in Shephard,
After Daybreak,
p. 37.

35

Sington, pp. 49-50.

36

Lt Col. M. V. Gonin, IWM Docs 85/38/1, typescript account, ‘The RAMC at Belsen Concentration Camp’ (no date, c.1946), p. 5.

37

Testimony of Wilhelm Emmerich, ‘Interim Report on the Collection of Evidence at Belsen-Bergen Camp’, TNA: PRO WO 309/1696; figure of 18,000 given by Shephard,
After Daybreak,
p. 37.

38

Testimonies in ‘Interim Report on the Collection of Evidence at Belsen-Bergen Camp’, TNA: PRO WO 309/1696.

39

Ibid., p.1.

40

Quoted in Shephard,
After Daybreak,
p. 55.

41

BSM Sanderson quoted by Major A. J. Forrest, IWM Docs 91/13/1, typescript memoir, ch. 17, pp. 5—6.