Affidavit concerning the screening of Soviet POWs who were political commissars or Jews, who were executed, and the handling of cases of Polish men who had sexual relationships with German women

Statement
of
SS-Sturmbannfuehrer Kurt LINDOW
I, Kurt Lindow, having been duly sworn, make the following statement under oath:
1. I was Kriminaldirektor in Section IV of the RSHA (Chief Reich Security Office) and head of the subsection [Referat] IV A 1, from the middle of 1942 until the middle of 1944. I have the rank of SS-Sturmbannfuehrer.
2. From 1941 until the middle of 1943 there was attached to subsection IV A 1 a special department that was headed by the
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Regierungsoberinspektor, later Regierungsamtmann, and SS-Hauptsturmbannfuehrer Franz Koenigshaus. In this department were handled matters concerning prisoners of war. I learned from this department that instructions and orders by Reichsfuehrer Himmler, dating from 1941 and 1942, existed, according to which captured Soviet Russian political commissars and Jewish soldiers were to be executed. As far as I know proposals for execution of such PWs were received from the various PW camps. Koenigshaus had to prepare the orders for execution and submitted them to the chief of section IV, Mueller, for signature. These orders were made out so that one order was to be sent to the agency making the request and a second one to the concentration camp designated to carry out the execution. The PWs in question were at first formally released from PW status, then transferred to a concentration camp for execution.
3. The department chief [Sachbearbeiter] Koenigshaus was under me in disciplinary questions from the middle of 1942 until about the beginning of 1943 and worked, in matters of his department, directly with the chief of group IV A, Regierungsrat Pan-zinger. Early 1943 the department was dissolved and absorbed into the departments [Laenderreferate] in subsection IV1 B. The work concerning Russian PWs must then have been done by IV b 2a. Head of department IV b 2a was Regierungsrat and Sturmbannfuehrer Hans-Helmut Wolf.
4. There existed in the PW camps on the Eastern front small screening teams [Einsatzkommandos] headed by lower-ranking members of the secret police [Gestapo]. These teams were assigned to the camp commanders and had the job to segregate the PWs who were candidates for execution, according to the orders that had been given, and to report them to the office of the secret police [Geheimes Staatspolizeiamt].
5. I also know that in cases of sexual relationships between Poles and German women and girls the Poles, according to an order from Reichsfuehrer Himmler, were to be hanged. The execution of the Poles and the punishment by a court of German women depended upon the opinion of the "racial expert" [Ras-sereferant] at the HSSPF [Chief SS and Police leader] concerned. If the Poles had serious intentions of marriage, the racial expert would examine if the Pole was, on basis of his entire appearance, racially unobjectionable and therefore capable of being Germanized. If the opinion of the "racial expert" was positive nothing happened, that is to say the Pole was permitted to marry the German girl and was Germanized. But if the judg-
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ment was negative then the Pole would be hanged and the German girl turned over to the courts for trial. Each individual case had to be reported, by the addition of photos, to the Reichs-fuehrer Himmler, who had apparently reserved the decision for himself and who alone gave the order for the hanging. These cases must have been handled by department IV B 2b; head of department IV B 2b was Regierungsrat and Sturmbannfuehrer Tomsen.
That the facts stated above are true; that this declaration is made by me voluntarily and without compulsion; that after reading over the statement I have signed and executed the same at Oberursel/Germ'any this 30th day of September 1945.
[signed] KURT LINDOW Kurt LINDOW SS-Sturmbannfuehrer
Subscribed and sworn to before me at Oberursel/Germany this 30th day of September 1945.
[signed] B. D. SILLIMAN, MAJOR JAGD
B. D. SILLIMAN, Major JAGD