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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE © 1972, The
Beate Klarsfeld Foundation
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and I had the moral force to fight on; they gave us
hope of success, as well as financial support.
On December 15 our
demonstration shows signs of success. In the sight of numbers of deputies and
journalists who are entering the Bundestag to learn the composition of the new
cabinet, the deportees standing erect, Serge and I are surrounded by dozens of
policemen and dragged out of the area forbidden to demonstrations. At the
police station we are questioned at great length, but what can a police chief
do when confronted by deportees who bare their arms branded with their KZ
[Konzentrationslager concentration camp] number in reply to the
routine question: "Have you ever before been arrested by German police?" Late
in the afternoon we are expelled from Germany and escorted to the border by the
police.
Klaus Barbie was not the only one in Lyon carrying out the
extermination of Jews and resisters undertaken by the Gestapo. Klaus Barbie was
head of the Gestapo in Lyon; above him the central command of the S.D. was in
the hands of S.S.-Obersturmbannführer Werner Knab, who was killed in 1945,
and his deputies. In early 1944 a new deputy arrived from Marseille, where he
had fulfilled the same duties in 1943. This was S.S.-Obersturmbannführer
August Moritz, born February 11, 1913, in Hanover.
Moritz had been
deputy to the head of the S.D. in Orleans. In Marseille, where he is again
deputy-chief, Moritz's signature on certain documents testifies to his
anti-Jewish activities. On January 10, 1943, Moritz asks Röthke "to which
camp should we send the Jews we have arrested." On March 15, 1943, Moritz
reports to Röthke in that fine bureaucratic language that speaks of
delivery of Jews as of so much merchandise, that he will be shipping him a load
of ten Jews for Drancy in two days. On March 18, another invoice for ten Jews.
On March 23, again ten Jews. On March 24, Moritz has difficulties in meeting
the delivery a technical incident, twenty-four hours lost! On March 27,
Nazi order is restored. Moritz can go back to the usual rhythm of his
shipments. On May 7, 1943, Moritz takes precautions, and under the label
"Geheim" [secret] he inquires whether the children of the Jews are to be sent
to Drancy or placed in the UGIF Center. In May, Moritz reports a shipment of
twenty Jews on the 12th, and again on the 14th, 15th, and 16th. Eighty Jews for
Drancy in five
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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE © 1972, The
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