MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the beginning there were the SS guards,
exclusively.
M. DUBOST: Will you please speak more slowly so that the interpreters
can follow you?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the beginning there were only SS men, but
from the spring of 1944 the young SS men in many companies were replaced
by older men of the Wehrmacht both at Auschwitz and also at Ravensbrück.
We were guarded by soldiers of the Wehrmacht as from 1944.
M. DUBOST: You can therefore testify that on the order of the German
General Staff the German Army was implicated in the atrocities which you
have described?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Obviously, since we were guarded by the
Wehrmacht as well, and this could not have occurred without orders.
M. DUBOST: Your testimony is final and involves both the SS and the
Army.
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Absolutely.
M. DUBOST: Will you tell us about the arrival at Ravensbrück in the
winter of 1944, of Hungarian Jewesses who had been arrested en masse?
You were in Ravensbrück—this is a fact about which you can testify?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes, of course I was there. There was no longer
any room left in the blocks, and the prisoners already slept four in a
bed, so there was raised, in the middle of the camp, a large tent. Straw
was spread in the tent, and the Hungarian women were brought to this
tent. Their condition was frightful. There were a great many cases of
frozen feet because they had been evacuated from Budapest and had walked
a good part of the way in the snow. A great many of them had died en
route. Those who arrived at Auschwitz were led to this tent and there an
enormous number of them died. Every day a squad came to remove the
corpses in the tent. One day, on returning to my block, which was next
to this tent, during the cleaning up . . .
THE PRESIDENT: Madame, are you speaking of Ravensbrück or of Auschwitz?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: [_In English._] Now I am speaking of
Ravensbrück. [_In French._] It was in the winter of 1944, about November
or December, I believe, though I cannot say for certain which month it
was. It is so difficult to give a precise date in the concentration
camps since one day of torture is followed by another day of similar
torment and the prevailing monotony makes it very hard to keep track of
time.
One day therefore, as I was saying, I passed the tent while it was being
cleaned, and I saw a pile of smoking manure in front of it. I suddenly
realized that this manure was human excrement since the unfortunate
women no longer had the strength to drag themselves to the lavatories.
They were therefore rotting in this filth.
M. DUBOST: What were the conditions in the workshops where the jackets
were manufactured?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the workshops where the uniforms were
manufactured. . .