Thursday, May 30, 2013

The Kortelisy Massacre

On 23 September 1942, Reserve Police Company Nürnberg destroyed the Ukrainian small town of Kortelisy and killed almost all its inhabitants. The present article about this massacre, where not stated otherwise, is based on the well-sourced brochure »Ihr Gewissen war rein; sie haben es nie benutzt«. Die Verbrechen der Polizeikompanie Nürnberg, by Jim G. Tobias and Nicola Schlichting, 2005 ANTOGO Verlag, Nuremberg. Tobias also made a short documentary that includes interviews with survivors of the massacre ("Der Schwarze Mittwoch" Polizeikompanie Nürnberg vernichtet Kortelisy). Accounts quoted in the following are my translations from German text.
  

Saturday, May 18, 2013

The Photograph of the Crematorium Site Undressing Scene in Auschwitz-Birkenau



A snapshot of a wooded area from Auschwitz (ASM neg. 282, close up from Swiebocka, Auschwitz: A history in photographs): Four naked women are walking to the left. Several other, unidentifiable persons and benches with clothes can be seen in the blurry background as well as two dressed male persons. The scene resembles the undressing of women. Without further context, it might show the bathing of people.

To say one thing straight away, the photograph was taken in Auschwitz-Birkenau. More precisely, the scene is taken place at the front yard of crematorium 5. Its eastern chimney is visible in the bottom right corner as observed by Auschwitz researcher Jean-Claude Pressac (Pressac, Technique, p. 424)