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HARTELT: In their shirts?

MINNIEUR: Yes.

HARTELT: What was the reason for that?

MINNIEUR: Well, so that they don’t take anything into the grave with them. The things were collected up, cleaned and mended.

HARTELT: They used them, did they?

MINNIEUR: Yes, of course.

HARTELT: (Laughs.)

MINNIEUR: Believe me, if you had seen it it would have made you shudder! We watched one of these executions once.

HARTELT: Did they shoot them with machine guns?

MINNIEUR: With tommy guns… We were actually there when a pretty girl was shot.

HARTELT: What a pity.

MINNIEUR: They were all shot ruthlessly! She knew that she was going to be shot. We were going past on motor cycles and saw a procession; suddenly she called to us and we stopped and asked where they were going. She said they were going to be shot. At first we thought she was making some sort of a joke. She more or less told us the way to where they were going. We rode there and—it was quite true—they were shot.

HARTELT: Did she walk there in her clothes?

MINNIEUR: Yes, she was smartly dressed. She certainly was a marvellous girl.

HARTELT: Surely the one who shot her, shot wide.

MINNIEUR: No one can do anything about it. With… like that no one shoots wide. They arrived and the first ones had to line up and were shot. The fellows were standing there with their tommy guns and just sprayed quickly up and down the line, once to the right and once to the left with their tommy guns; there were six men there and a row of—

HARTELT: Then no one knew who had shot the girl?

MINNIEUR: No, they didn’t know. They clipped on a magazine, fired to the right and left and that was that! It didn’t matter whether they were still alive or not; when they were hit they fell over backwards into a pit. Then the next group came up with ashes and chloride of lime and scattered it over those who were lying down there; then they lined up and so it went on.

HARTELT: Did they have to cover them? Why was that?

MINNIEUR: Because the bodies would rot; they tipped chloride of lime over them so that there should be no smell and all that.

HARTELT: What about the people who were in there who were not properly dead yet?

MINNIEUR: That was bad luck for them; they died down there!

HARTELT: (Laughs.)

MINNIEUR: I can tell you, you heard a terrific screaming and shrieking!

HARTELT: Were the women shot at the same time?

MINNIEUR: Yes.

HARTELT: Were you watching when the pretty Jewess was there?

MINNIEUR: No, we weren’t there then. All we know was that she was shot.

HARTELT: Did she say anything beforehand? Had you met her before?

MINNIEUR: Yes, we met her the day before; the next day we wondered why she didn’t come. Then we set off on the motor-cycle.

HARTELT: Was she working there too?

MINNIEUR: Yes.

HARTELT: Making roads?

MINNIEUR: No, she cleaned our barracks. The week we were there we went into the barracks to sleep so that we didn’t… outside—

HARTELT: I bet she let you sleep with her too?

MINNIEUR: Yes, but you had to take care not to be found out. It’s nothing now; it was really a scandal, the way they slept with Jewish women.

HARTELT: What did she say, that she—?

MINNIEUR: Nothing at all. Well, we chatted together and she said she came from down there, from LANDSBERG on the WARTHE, and was at GÖTTINGEN university.

HARTELT: And a girl like that let anyone sleep with her!

MINNIEUR: Yes. You couldn’t tell that she was a Jewess; she was quite a nice type, too. It was just her bad luck that she had to die with the others. 75,000 Jews were shot there.²¹³