For the subsequent trials held by the United States, see, "International Military Tribunal" redirects here. In mid-1945, France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States agreed to convene a joint tribunal in Nuremberg, with the Nuremberg Charter as its legal instrument. [217][218] The last prisoner was released in 1958. Twelve of the defendants were sentenced to death by hanging. Speer spent much of his time drawing exquisite pencil sketches ranging from landscapes to magnificent buildings to quaint German villages. 18008 Bothell Everett Hwy SE # F, Bothell, WA 98012. All sessions of the tribunal were held in Nrnberg, Germany, under the presidency of Lord Justice Geoffrey Lawrence. [151], In order to appease concerns about fair process, the defendants were allowed a free hand with their witnesses and a great deal of irrelevant testimony was heard. I need your: His remembrance of duty at Nuremberg remains vivid. The authority of the International Military Tribunal to conduct these trials stemmed from the London Agreement of August 8, 1945. All I can recall is that he was standing to the left in the court room. [81] Senior American officials believed that convicting organizations was a good way of showing that not just the top German leaders were responsible for crimes, without condemning the entire German people. [227] The main legal criticisms of the trial focused on questions of retroactivity, selectivity, and jurisdiction. He had actually tried to usurp Hitlers authority during the last days of the Reich but remained an ardent supporter of the Nazi regime during the trial, often proving himself a skilled debater. Those men who liberated the camps of the Holocau. [46], The French prosecutor, Franois de Menthon, had just overseen trials of the leaders of Vichy France;[37] he resigned in January 1946 and was replaced by Auguste Champetier de Ribes. These were the intellectuals; the ramrod-stiff military officers; the cunning politicians; the world's most vicious, depraved, notorious mass murderers; an architect; a filthy-minded and sex-obsessed anti-Semitic newspaper publisher; a gentle writer of poetry; the bombastic bullies; an unrepentant, ghost-like figure; the subservient military Gring enjoyed baiting his guards. The . [38], In early 1946, there were a thousand employees from the four countries' delegations in Nuremberg, of which about two-thirds were from the United States. An excerpt from The Post of Oct. 16, 1946: Nuernberg (Wednesday), Oct. 16 (AP). Sentenced to death, Reich Law Leader 193345 and Governor-General of the, Hitler's Minister of the Interior 193343 and. Two of the six were acquitted, two given prison terms and two sentenced to death. Jackson. The SA, the Reich Cabinet, and the General Staff and High Command were not ruled to be criminal organizations. I had no idea of the magnitude of what they had done. New Patient Forms; Join historians and history buffs alike with our Unlimited Digital Access pass to every military history article ever published (over 3,000 articles) in Sovereigns military history magazines. [236][237], The trials were the first use of simultaneous interpretation, which stimulated technical advances in translation methods. Subsequent Nuremberg Trials (December 1946 - April 1949) When I once asked him why he had done what he was convicted of doing, he replied that he only did what the Fatherland [Germany] instructed him to do. It was in my family until the early 2000s. Martin Bormann was tried and condemned to death in absentia, and Hermann Gring committed suicide before he could be executed. My final wish is that Germany should recover her unity and that, for the sake of peace, there should be an understanding between East and West. Until the end of the negotiations, it was not clear that any trial would be held at all, due to acrimonious disputes over fundamental matters; the American delegation threatened to walk out. On 1 October 1946, 12 death sentences were passed down by the judges of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg on some of the most high-ranking and influential members of Nazi Germany. Staff Sgt. These sketches were given to guards who requested them and to prison officials. Efficiency Report for Henry F. Gerecke, 7/1/1945, NAID 6016856. The following is a brief . It was an appointment that, when coupled with his Baltic origin, brought him into sharp conflict with most of those in Hitlers entourage. [228][24] The charge of crimes against humanity, the charge of conspiracy, and imposing criminal penalties on individuals for breaches of international law were also novel but attracted little criticism. By special arrangement with a guard or prison official, he gave his handwritten notes to be mimeographed and returned to him. How Gring obtained the lethal capsule has never been firmly established. Many were resistance fighters or political opponents. She was released after four years and eventually committed suicide in a Bavarian prison. [13] Planners in the United States Department of War were drawing up plans for an international tribunal in late 1944 and early 1945. So the court then allowed him to choose any lawyer he wanted and Stahmer was his pick. [138], From March to July 1946, the defense presented its counterarguments. [171] Only eight defendants were convicted on that charge; all of whom were also found guilty of crimes against peace. First, it rejected the contention that only a state, and not individuals, could be found guilty of war crimes; the tribunal held that crimes of international law are committed by men and that only by punishing individuals who commit such crimes can the provisions of international law be enforced. View full size Courtesy, U.S. Army The Military Tribunal proceedings in Nuremberg, Germany, Herman Goering sits between two guards, the left one being Andrew Wendland of Bay City. Today these sketches are highly prized. In this capacity, he was ultimately responsible for the use of slave laborers from the occupied territories in armaments production. American guards ate in separate, enlisted mess halls and slept in segregated, barracks-like rooms, six to a room. I have searched photos of the trials to see if I could find my dad. There was no physical contact, and all conversation via microphone was closely monitored by a guard standing behind each prisoner. Three were sentenced to life imprisonment. He, like the others, was always bumming cigarettes or cans of Prince Albert tobacco for his pipe. Mark Felton Productions. [79] Initially, the Americans had planned to try fourteen organizations and their leaders, but this was narrowed to six: the Reich Cabinet, the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party, the Gestapo, the SA, the SS and the SD, and the General Staff and High Command of the Wehrmacht. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. The film, compiled from footage of the liberation of Nazi concentration camps, shocked both the defendants and the judges, who adjourned the trial. [106] Although these aspects had already been covered by the American prosecution, Soviet prosecutors introduced new evidence from Extraordinary State Commission reports and interrogations of senior enemy officers. He guarded Goehring. Again, without a word being spoken, the door was slammed shut. [155] In the context of the brewing Cold War, the trial became a means of condemning not only Germany but also the Soviet Union. His initial assignment was as a guard at the Nuremberg prison. [64] The division of labor, and the haste with which the indictment was prepared, resulted in duplication, imprecise language, and lack of attribution of specific charges to individual defendants. Many of the prisoners never accepted the fact that they were no longer on top of the world. After encountering a you tube video by accident I have a different answer. [158][136] In contrast to the opening prosecution statements, all eight closing statements highlighted the Holocaust; and the French and British prosecutors made this the main charge, as opposed to that of aggression. He promoted an intentionalist view of the Nazi state and its overall conspiracy to commit all of the crimes mentioned in the indictment. Back in 1945, his grandfather was stationed in Germany for the infamous Nuremberg trials, during which he got his hands on a pair of sunglasses allegedly worn by a high ranking Nazi. (Robert Ley committed suicide while in prison, and Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbachs mental and physical condition prevented his being tried.) Neurath, Konstantin von. A further 12. Each of the governing countries, the United States, England, France, and Russia, had its own interpretation of punishment. Some were convicted of historys most barbaric crimes against humanity. Read about WWII here. Prestianni said that during his guard duties he tried to adhere to his fathers advice. [192] Members of the SS were tried in the Pohl trial, which focused on members of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office that oversaw SS economic activity, including the Nazi concentration camps;[193] the RuSHA trial of Nazi racial policies; and the Einsatzgruppen trial, in which members of the mobile killing squads were tried for the murder of more than one million people behind the Eastern Front. There was also a picture of him guarding Hitler. Public to Get Access to Nuremberg Trials Digital Recordings An enduring mystery of the 1946 Nuremberg trials was apparently solved yesterday when an American former prison guard claimed it was he who, as an unwitting accomplice, passed to Hermann. This wasnt authorized, but it was done on occasion, Prestianni smiled. BAY CITY . Upon arriving in the European Theater, Prestianni, a replacement, found himself in the U.S. 1st Infantry Division. The tribunal was given the authority to find any individual guilty of the commission of war crimes (counts 13 listed above) and to declare any group or organization to be criminal in character. Afterwards, during the Berlin Blockade, they took part in securing Allied facilities involved in the Berlin Airlift and later also were guarding USA Army headquarters. Institutional rivalries hampered the search. My father was a guard in the courtroom (Palace of Justice) at the Nuremberg trials in 1946. [86] Overall, the prosecution called 37 witnesses compared to the defense's 83, not including 19 defendants who testified on their own behalf. [144] Most defendants argued their own insignificance within the Nazi system, but Gring took the opposite approach, presenting himself as Hitler's loyalist and expecting that while he would be executed, the German people would eventually appreciate his loyalty. I never treated him differently than I did the others I guarded.. Soldiers in tank stand guard in front of the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg where the International Military Tribunal . Her guards were repulsed, and some requested reassignment to another cellblock. Thank you so much for your time and I am looking forward to getting into many discussions. I would like any information that would lead me to a more detailed understanding of what my father did while part of this undertaking. [208][209] Many Germans lumped criminal trials with denazification, internment, and confrontation with the concentration camps, as illegitimate victor's justice and the imposition of collective guilt. The verdict was drafted by British alternate judge Norman Birkett. [197] The trials heard 1,300 witnesses, entered more than 30,000 documents into evidence, and generated 132,855 pages of transcripts, with the judgements themselves totaling 3,828 pages. [141] The defendants tried to blame their crimes on Hitler, who was mentioned 1,200 times during the trialmore than the top five defendants combined. [69][37], The defendants, who were largely unrepentant,[70] included former cabinet ministers: Franz von Papen (who had brought Hitler to power); Joachim von Ribbentrop (foreign minister), Wilhelm Frick (interior minister), and Alfred Rosenberg, minister for the occupied eastern territories. [103], Much of the American case focused on the development of the Nazi conspiracy before the outbreak of war. That was enough. The 3rd Battalion of the 26th Infantry Reg., "Blue Spaders," of the 1st Infantry Division were chosen to secure the historic Nuremberg War Crimes Trials. During the months of imprisonment, the brisk gait of some of the prisoners gradually evolved into defeatist, head-bowed shuffling as acceptance of their fate gradually wore them down and eroded their will. [143] Although a few defense lawyers inverted the arguments of the prosecution to assert that the Germans' authoritarian mindset and obedience to the state exonerated them from any personal guilt, most rejected such arguments. [5] Soviet jurist Aron Trainin developed the concept of crimes against peace (waging aggressive war) which would later be central to the proceedings at Nuremberg. , That used to shut him up but usually only for a few minutes, and then he would start up again with the jokes. [146] The Nuremberg Laws were compared to discriminatory laws in the United States. Stahmer fought hard for his clie. [152] The defendants' witnesses sometimes managed to exculpate them, but other witnessesincluding Rudolf Hss, the former commandant of Auschwitz, and Hans Bernd Gisevius, a member of the German resistanceeffectively incriminated the defendants. Her last name was Marsico (cant recall her first name} and she was from Montgomery, WV. [129] The Soviet prosecution also attempted to fabricate German responsibility for the Katyn massacre, which had in fact been committed by the Soviet Union. Prominent banker and economist. [241][242], Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}492716N 110254E / 49.45444N 11.04833E / 49.45444; 11.04833. The defendants at Nuremberg. Guards, for the most part, were not allowed to talk to each other or to prisoners while on security duty. My father Gordon Fitzgerald also spent several months as a guard there. He was made an MP after the war William A Shoemaker from North Carolina. All were destined for incarceration, at least during their trials, in two of Germanys most feared prisons: the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg and Spandau Prison on the western outskirts of Berlin. As a good military officer I was only following orders, he steadfastly maintained with quiet military bearing.
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