Fascinating page. When they hauled in Kramer, a British officer said, "I hope you die slowly." But Albert Pierrepoint was a superb executioner, so I'm sure Kramer died quickly. Probably faster than Ribbentrop and his cronies at the hands of Master Sergeant John Wood. They should have had Pierrepoint brought to Nuremberg.
The actual methods of hanging were different between the UK and US. See: http://www.richard.clark32.btinternet.co.uk/hanging2.html
Giles's War - By Tim Benson - Giles's War " Few contemporaries captured Britain’s indomitable wartime spirit as well or as wittily as the cartoonist Carl Giles. Now, for the first time, the very best of the cartoons he produced between 1939 and 1945 are brought together, including many that have not seen the light of day in over 75 years. As a young cartoonist at Reynold’s News and then the Daily Express, Giles's work provided a crucial morale boost – and much-needed laughs – to a population suffering daily privations and danger, and Giles's War shows why. Here are his often hilarious takes on the great events of the war – from the Fall of France, via D-Day, to the final Allied victory – but also his wryly amusing depictions of ordinary people in extraordinary times, living in bombed-out streets, dealing with food shortages, coping with blackouts, railing against bureaucracy and everyday annoyances. It's a brilliantly funny chronicle of our nation’s finest hour, as well as a fitting tribute to one of our greatest cartoonists. " Giles's War Has this on Belsen, Kramer and Irma Grese... Giles's War
The trial report can be downloaded these days, thanks to Dr. Dan Plesch of SOAS, and the ICC website, aka "legal tools." It takes some time to download but less than a minute with my dodgy connection. https://legal-tools.org/doc/c8c671/pdf THE BELSEN TRIAL TRIAL OF JOSEF KRAMER AND 44 OTHERS BRITISH MiLITARY COURT, LUNEBURG, 17TH SEPTEMBER-17TH NOVEMBER, 1945
My grandfather went to the trial. He wrote this in a letter home: Tomorrow I’m going to Lunenburg to see the other Boche, Kramer, Irma Grese and the others. I have a ticket and a truck to take me. And this is Saturday.... night and I’ve completed a journey of 500 kilometers. Last night I had to break off to go out to a breakdown. The chap heard a noise, got down and thought there was an oily rag hanging down from his engine it was only a piston* (*struck-through) big end through the sump. I was off again this morning at 4.30am to see this trial, I’ll send you the ticket, on the back I’ve drawn a layout of the court. The Gallery was above and fortunately I was able to move around and see various parts of the court. Some of the girls were very nice looking, some weren’t. Some of the men too looked anything but murderers. I thought Kramer looked a normal… …sort of bloke, but the Doctor, No.2. didn’t attract me in any way. One chap about 24 was quite good looking, nice little moustache which he couldn’t leave to nature, obviously a new effort. Irma Grese looking a little dowdy for so smart a person kept rubbing her hair just above the right ear. There was one very pretty dark girl with nice eyes. A rather attractive woman of, I should guess 32 or 33, homely type who looked quite out of place. The big, fat, blonde German girl was there and also a few shrunken efforts. Apart from the one chap all the others were 35 or over. So much for that lot.
The transcript for the day he attended the trial may be available at the same website if you can work out the date he attended. Then it is a case of working out the number of the day in relation to the start of the trial and taking into account the non-sitting days. Interesting to read his reaction to the proceedings and other events. My late mother knew the name of Kramer was associated with Belsen.
Illustrates what an account of the Eichmann trial called "the banality of evil". Monsters don't look like monsters and all too often they didn't see themselves as such. Reading accounts, minutes etc of much of the planning that lay behind the Holocaust (from the setting up of the Lodz Ghetto to the Wannersee conference) one can see that once one has ceased to consider people as humans and merely numbers to be dealt with how easily it all became a matter of logistics and each set of atrocities becomes just another day at the office. There are examples of men writing to their wives complaining how tiring having to organise mass shootings can be and how relaxing playing in an impromptu string quartet in the evening has been!
