Letter to the USHMM :The Tragedy of the Nordhausen Camp Hospital

Director Sara Bloomfield                                 
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
100 Raoul Wallenberg Place SW
Washington, DC  20024-2126

        Regarding- The Tragedy of the Nordhausen Camp Hospital
 
Dear Director  Bloomfield:

I am writing regarding the horrible tragedy of the bombing of the Nordhausen Camp Hospital and the exploitation of the tragedy in propaganda films which are still used by your museum.

The Last Days of Nordhausen- 71 Years Ago.

Nordhausen was a sub-camp in the Mittelbau-Dora group.  A large set of barracks on the edge of the town of Nordhausen had been converted into a hospital for inmates with the specific name Boelcke Kaserne, or "Boelcke Barracks."

On April 3 1945, 247 Lancaster bombers and 8 Mosquitos of Group Nos 1 and 8 of British Royal Air Force bombed and strafed the Nordhausen Camp hospital, killing thousands of inmates.  The hospital doctors, nurses, and caregivers, (both German and detainee) fled the smashed hospital leaving the sick and wounded in a desperate situation.

The next day, the British attacked again; this time sending 243 Lancasters, 1 Mosquito of No 5 Group, and 8 Pathfinder Mosquitos to bomb the town of Nordhausen and bomb the barracks. Thousands of German civilians and more inmates were killed in the second attack.

See: http://tinyurl.com/zcypqxb               

Altogether, 490 bombers, each carrying 12,000 lbs. of bombs or almost 6,000,000 pounds of explosives, hit Nordhausen. The hospital was smashed, the doctors and staff scattered, the surrounding area devastated.  The already difficult situation in the crowded hospital turned into a disaster. The death toll of hospital inmates and workers was approximately 3,500.  The number of dead civilians has been given as approximately 8,000.                      

A Photo Opportunity
On April 11 elements of the US 3rd Armored and 104th Infantry Divisions reached Nordhausen.  The bodies of those who died in the bombing and its aftermath were pulled from the rubble and lined up for a "photo opportunity. " No mention was made that the "props" were provided courtesy of the British air force.

Cameramen A. Statt and  Rosenmann had a keen eye for filming the horrors, focusing on details of the dead and sick. The filming was supervised by Major Frank Gleason of the JAGD 89th

Here is Documentary Evidence
Their work was packaged into numerous propaganda films and Nordhausen achieved a brief notoriety.   An example of the propaganda use Gleason's work was put to can be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4B_KYf7bKFM; Universal Newsreel's Nazi Murder Mills, an Official NewsReel.  We are informed that, "The vile inhuman beasts took pride in their concentration camp at Nordhausen;" that the deaths were the result of "Germany's organized carnage", and "For the first time, America can believe what they thought was impossible propaganda.  Here is documentary evidence of sheer mass murder. Murder that will blacken the name of Germany for the rest of recorded history."

If It Please The Tribunal
The true history of the bombing and devastation of Nordhausen was known when the Nuremberg Trial started but the film images were "too good" not to be used by the prosecution.  The film footage was shown early in the Trial, on November 29, 1945, as a segment of a longer motion picture described as A Documentary Motion Picture / Document No. 2430-PS / Submitted on behalf of U.S. Chief Counsel as exhibit USA 79. In the film it was stated that, "at least 3,000  political prisoners died here [the Boelcke Kaserne] at the brutal hands of SS troops…" The camp hospital was described only as "a depository for slaves found unfit for work."  

No mention was made of the British bombings.
 
Assistant Prosecutor Thomas Dodd presented the movie to the Tribunal, claiming that, 
"that each and every one of these defendants knew of the existence of these concentration camps;…that fear and terror and nameless horror of the concentration camps were instruments by which the defendants retained power and suppressed the opposition to any of their policies, including, of course, their plans for aggressive war."  That is, Dodd implied that the conditions in Nordhausen seen in the movie were the conditions of "nameless horror" in the camps well prior to April 1945.  This was a significant fraud and a vile exploitation of the Nordhausen tragedy.  Dodd is infamous for having brought a shrunken head into the Tribunal.

Continued Dishonesty and Exploitation
This exploitation is widespread even 70 years after Dodd's shameful antics.The US Holocaust Museum website on Dora-Mittelbau (also known as Dora-Nordhausen or Nordhausen)at https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005322 still uses the propaganda video…and still "forgets" to mention that the people in the film were killed in a German hospital by British bombardment.

The propaganda film is also used in an exhibit in your museum and, amazingly, your Museum does not even mention the terrible bombings.
 
Where to find the Truth
An accurate history of Nordhausen's final days can be seen at the Revisionist website http://questioningtheholocaust.com

Scroll down to Nordhausen, the Epitome of the Big Lie. Or go to Youtube 

That the public needs to go to a Revisionist site to get the truthful story on the Nordhausen tragedy should shame you into correcting your on use of the films.
 
Exploitation of  Real Tragedies For Propaganda Purposes.
CODOH founder Bradley Smith wrote, “Briefly, we believe that much of that history that we are taught today has been influenced by Soviet, British and American wartime propaganda which exaggerated and   exploited real tragedies for propaganda purposes."
 

Yours for a Museum that does not use propaganda lies.

Respectfully,
David Merlin,
Committee for Open Debate on the Holocaust.
P.O. Box 20774
York, PA  17402
USA
phone & fax: ++1-415-688-2129
[email protected]

CC:
Raymund Flandez  Communications Officer
[email protected]

Andrew Hollinger Director, Communications
[email protected]