Mr. G, Age 82

Place of Persecution: Rabka bei Zakopane
Date: 1942

“[In] 1940-1941 we were living in Krakow, Poland. The Nazis started to build the ghetto. My father finds a house in the province, in between Krakow and Zakopane. The village is called Rabka. This happened because we did not want to go to the ghetto. The SS and the Gestapo robbed all of our possessions from the villa we lived in. And they took us along. I, 20 years [old] at that time, resist, and as a result I was subjected to medical experiments.

What I am about to write you have not heard or read before, as follows: Me and a Jewish American (a watchmaker, passport from the USA) were subjected to medical experiments. SS German Shepherd dogs, belonging to the commander of the SS Obersturmfuehrer Rosenbaum, with a special poison on their teeth … we had to run [and] the dogs had to chase us. Afterwards they examined our wounds, the blood. A doctor … ripped the flesh of my legs and examined it. After some time I was able to escape. First to a peasant in a village—afterwards to friends of mine in Krakow. There my wounded legs started healing. As a result of this experiment (the dog bite and the poison) my whole left foot was ripped apart and during the course of the years I developed wounds and cancer. During August 1962 and November 1962 I was operated [on] in the cancer institute and was treated in Gliwice in Poland. … My good parents were shot in the summer of 1942 under the supervision of SS Obersturmfuehrer Rosenbaum and were buried in the mass grave in Rabka.”

Mr. B, Age 76

Place of Persecution: Melk
Dates: September 1944 to January 1945

“In Revier Melk, the concentration and labor camp, there was a doctor and nurses in SS uniform (compare with other camp keepers that were not SS). And from time to time civilians came to visit (maybe the drug manufacturers). Without any reason they made a cut, about 10 centimeters long and 2 centimeters wide, in my arm above the palm of my hand. Today I understand that the surgery that was done on me without anesthesia was done purposely with tools that weren’t sterilized to cause infection. At the time they kept exchanging the bandages with different medicated creams and liquids. The bandage was not wrapped around the arm but only covered the wound. Every day they examined the cut and each time the cut was about to heal, they reopened it and started the whole thing from the beginning. Once in a while civilians would come to check us and the charts; they made some remarks and gave orders. A part of the experiment was also observation and they also checked our ability to work with the wound. After we transferred to Ebensee I got lucky and a paramedic [who] worked in the clinic took care of me and treated my wound. The final treatment was done in an American military hospital in Linz in Austria. After the release the doctors said that I was very lucky. There are scars until today and pain and limitations.”

Ms. M, Age 73

Place of Persecution: Auschwitz
Dates: June 1944 – May 1945

“I suffered immense pain and cruelty from the experiments. They were inhuman, but because of them I survived. As bad as the experiments were without them I would not be here today to write this … Now that I am emotionally a lot stronger I would like to describe a little more details about my horrible experiments which no matter how hard I am trying I never get over it as long as I live. I was born November 23, 1930. I was about five weeks in Auschwitz alone, separated from my family, my parents, two sisters and two brothers when Dr. Mengele pulled me out of a queue as we were on the way from the c-lager [camp] to the gas chamber. I was the only one picked that day personally by Mengele and his assistant. They took me to his [laboratory], where I met other children. They were screaming from pain. Black and blue bodies covered with blood. I collapsed from horror and terror and fainted. A bucket of cold water was thrown on me to revive me. As soon as I stood up I was whipped with a leather whip which broke my flesh, then I was told the whipping was a sample of what I would receive if I did not follow instructions and orders. I was used as a guinea pig for medical experiments. I was never ever given painkillers or anesthetics. Every day I suffered excruciating pain. I was injected with drugs and chemicals. My body most of the time was connected to tubes which inserted some drugs in to my body. Many days I was tied up for hours. Some days they made cuts in to my body and left the wounds open for them to study. Most of the time there nothing to eat. Every day my body was numb with pain. There was no more skin left on my body for them to put injections or tubes … One day we woke up and the place was empty. We were left with open infected wounds and no food. We all were half dead with no energy or life left in us. [One] day … Russian soldiers tried to shake me to see if I was alone or dead. They felt a tiny beat in my heart and quickly picked me up and took me to a hospital.”

Vera Alexander, Age 62 

She talks about her experience while being house with 100 gypsy (typically Rome) girls.

She explained how Mengele impregnated one girl with the sperm of another twin, and took great care of her during her pregnancy. He even attended the birth himself.

”But when he saw that there was only one baby and not twins, he tore the baby right out of the mother`s uterus, threw it into an oven and walked away,” she said. ”We saw this.”