Q.As I understand it, then.....
A.I mean I was not approached directly by Dietrich. I can give you some more details if you want them. I can give you more details.
Q.All I wanted to know, defendant, was that he was, in effect, soliciting funds for the election. This was his role, wasn't it, and it was through his soliciting that you made these contributions?
A.Well, I could not actually tell you whether Dietrich was actually a collector for Hindenburg's election. You cannot put the words into my mouth. After all, I don't know whether that is correct or not. The fact was that the Vice Chancellor of the Bruening Government was in favor of Hindenburg's election and not in favor of Hitler being elected but I think it is utterly unnecessary to make any commentary to that effect. But I can give you more details. Otto Wolf told me that Dietrich had talked the matter over with him and had talked of payment made by the Industry for the election of the Reich President, which was to take place right after. He, Otto Wolf, said he was ready and had made up his mind to contribute 300,000 marks for that purpose, perhaps over 400,000 and he wanted to tell me that it would be appropriate that I, too, should contribute to the election of Hindenburg, and to support Hindenburg against Hitler; and if I compared his fortune and mine, then he was of the opinion that I should contribute more than 300,000 marks. Eventually I made up my mind to do that, and did so and, I must say. Most generally those are the figures which you have here at your disposal and again I can say that at that time they certainly had the nature of a very unusual payment and that they contributed largely to the success of the election. The originator was Otto Wolf, and the payments were made to the Mayor Winkler. Mayor Winkler, as far as I know, is still living and, in the summer of 1944, all the documents still existed concerning the election of Hindenburg and I would advise counsel for Prosecution to get this man, Mayor Winkler, and Vice Chancellor Dietrich. Unfortunately, Otto Wolf is no longer living, but these two can explain the matter with great detail.
Q.I thank you for your advice, defendant. I think I can find out enough about it from you.
THE PRESIDENT:Mr. Ervin, what was the date of the election, in 1932?
MR. ERVIN:There were elections in 1932. The first was the 13th of March, at which no candidate obtained a majority. The run-off election was on the 10th of April and the run-off was between Hindenburg and Hitler.
THE PRESIDENT:Yes. Well, in the 5th and 6th items, under the first section of this list, there are 2 dates given, on Hugenberg in July and on von Papen in October. Those were after the election.
MR. ERVIN:Yes. If your Honor please, in addition to the presidential election in that year there were some Reichstag elections.
THE PRESIDENT:Yes, but this is included, as I understand it, in the contribution to the Hindenburg-Wahl.
MR. ERVIN:I think the Hindenburg-Wahl contribution which he is talking about now is Item 1.
THE PRESIDENT:Yes, 1 and 2.
MR. ERVIN:I and 2.
THE PRESIDENT:Yes, but these are again repeated, are they not, in the subsequent numbers 4 to 9 inclusive? They also add up to 450,000 Reichsmarks, which I supposed was the same items as the 450,000 in the first item.
MR. ERVIN:Your Honor, I think we can ask the defendant about them but I am certain they are additional payments. They are additional payments.
THE PRESIDENT:It does not seem to be understandable without explanation. Will you ask the witness about it?
MR. ERVIN:I will. Unless you prefer to do it, your Honor?
THE PRESIDENT:No. I want you to try your own case. If it were a German Court it would be different.
BY MR. ERVIN:
Q.Defendant, the election of Hindenburg took place on the 10th of April?
A.I could not tell you that exactly but I suppose that it was in the spring of 1932. Unfortunately, I have no calendar for 1932 in my pocket.
Q.How, I would just like to have your exact recollection as to when you paid the money to Winkler. These receipts, as I understand it, are receipts from you to your company and they, of course, all take place after the election?
A.Yes, they are.
Q.You made the payments before the election?
A.I could not tell you whether it was before the election or after it but I can tell you it was for the election.
Q.Well, was it usual to make compaign contributions after an election was completed?
A.That was quite customary. I can even give you a exact explanation for that. After the election Mayor Winkler cane and said "the election has taken much more money than we thought it would. We have a deficit in our treasury and this deficit has to be balanced. Therefore I request you to give us an additional payment after the election in order to balance our budget again." After all, it is understandable that a bank could create a fund for disposal of an election and make advances to this fund and afterwards this advance has to be covered again. Therefore it is altogether customary and proved by the facts; also, by Corresponding interrogation and investigation it could be checked, namely the fact that even for an election which has already taken place payments can be made because the election cost more money than was planned.
Q.I am just trying to get straight certain facts here from this affidavit. Some of it was probably paid before and some after, although you don't seem to have any accurate recollection at this time, other than the receipts.
Now, before going on in detail about these items in your affidavit, there are listed, under the yean 1932, 9 separately numbered items. Is it correct that the contributions for the Hindenburg election are referred to only in the first two items, or do all of then have some bearing on that election?
A.As far as I remember in connection with the election of Hindenburg, there are mainly 1 and 2, perhaps also 3; I couldn't tell you about that. 1 and 2 certainly are in connection with Hindenburg's election; whether 3 also was connected to Hindenburg, I don't remember. It was paid to Bruening but it night be connected with the Hindenburg election but then again it night not be connected with it.
Q.And items 4 to 9 were not connected with the Hindenburg election?
A. 4 to 9, no, I don't think they were.
THE PRESIDENT:Then they are not a repetition, as I had assumed they were because of the identity of the same.
A.Items 4 to 9, as far as I remember had nothing to do with the election of Hindenburg. After all it could not be connected with the election. It is certain that 1 and 2 are connected with Hindenburg's election and it is possible that 3 is connected with it but it night have been for Bruening also.
Q.Well, now, going back to the first item, this 450,000 which was paid in 3 separate instalements -- how was that carried on the books of your companies?
A. .....I mean, after all, I was not an accountant myself and I did not enter it in the books. I receipted it, but in the bonks I think it was entered on the expense account. If you want to have more details then you will have to ask Herr Kaletsch.
Q.It was carried somewhere on the books, though?
A.I think that every individual item is entered in the books of any business.
Q.And this...and these political contributions - would they be carried generally by your Berlin Office or would they be spread out among several of the companies?
A.In general we did not split matters up too much and certainly we did not split them up throughout all our concern. At that time it was mainly Charlottenhuette, as far as I remember, and perhaps also Mittelstahl who contributed. I don't think that we approached the Maxhuette, but I could not tell you whether we did or not. Furthermore, nothing can be proved to the effect that we should have dealt and consulted the other companies of our concern in matters of political contributions.
Q.How this second item on your list, of 500,000 Reichsmarks do you have a receipt for that one? .......I have a note here from Dr. Dix, defendant; before answering that question perhaps he would like to say something ....Defendant, it seems that Dr. Dix and I both have some aid to give you on this examination. He says that there is a now affidavit in that file which you do not know about, or at least do not know that it is there, which refers to the 500,000 Reichsmarks. Before looking for that affidavit perhaps you could tell us your own recollection of the transaction first?
A.What do you mean--concerning this 500,000?
THE PRESIDENT:Dr. Dix wishes to .....
MR. ERVIN:Oh....... BY MR. ERVIN:
A.Well, I can only tell you in a general way that I didn't remember whether or not Mittelstahl contributed in that matter and that the figure itself I remember so well. I don't know whether we contacted the financial manager of Mittelstahl and whether the management gave us the affidavit. I think that is also in line with the recollection of my other collaborators.
Q.That is, it's a completely separate payment of 500,000 Reichsmarks--it has nothing to do with the first item at all?
A.No.
Q.And it was paid out of the funds of Mittelstahl?
A.On the strength of the affidavits which are submitted I cannot assume that it was different. I could not tell you how it was entered in the books of Mittelstahl and whether it was. I am not the accountant of Mittelstahl, and I think it's sufficient if the Vorstand of Riesa gave this affidavit. I couldn't tell you more about that.
Q.My difficulty here is the affidavit has not yet been submitted. What has been submitted is your own statement as to the payment, and I first just wanted to find out what you knew. How, was Mittelstahl under your control at the time this payment was made?
A.Yes, it was.
Q.Who authorized the Vorstand to make payment of 500,000?
A.I assume that I authorized them.
Q.Nobody could have--nobody else could have, could they?
A.Well, I couldn't tell you whether anybody else could have. The situation was the following. In that year 1932 the Charlottenhue-that is my company--owned more than 50% of the shares of Mittelstahl and the Vereinigte Stahlwerke owned 25%, but we had the decisive influence, and I was the chairman of the Aufsichtsrat. And Voegler was deputy chairmann of the Aufsichtsrat.
And I'm convinced that the Vorstand of Riesa--that is, of Mittelstahl--Would never have made this payment without my agreement. I am convinced also that I certainly made them make the payment because if I hadn't taken the initiative they probably would not have done it without any difficulty. I mean an amount of 500,000 marks is a large sun after all.
Q.Well, that's just what was interesting to me. It's a fairly large sun, and I should think you would probably remember some details about it. Do you remember whether or not money was also paid to Winkler?
A.I couldn't tell you, but I assume with certainty that that was the way it was. I also assume with certainty that my Berlin collaborators knew about it too. I don't know for what other reasons it could have been used anyhow.
Q.Does the affidavit which you have indicate as to whom the money was paid?
A.Yes, it gives some indication; that's true. According to my recollection I'm sure that in 1932 that was paid before the election of Hindenburg versus Hitler.
Q.It doesn't say to whom though. It just says for the election. I didn't quite get the translation of what you were reading. How, would that 500,000 payment have been paid directly by the Vorstand or directly from Mittelstahl to the Party, or would the funds probably have been paid through an account in Berlin? The Charlottenhuette account, perhaps?
A.I couldn't tell you that. I believe that you have a sort of wrong conception because, after all, I was not a treasurer. I was no cashier. I couldn't tell you whether that was directly paid from Mittelstahl by check or directly to the Party. I mean those were not my functions. I couldn't tell you that. Herr Kaletsch could give you more indication, but I couldn't tell you. After all, it's really impossible after fifteen (15) years to tell whether and in what manner and under what circumstances these payments were made.
Q.Did you ever make any inquiry into available Party records to see if you could get any further information on the contributions? That is, sometime after the event?
A.How the payments were entered in the books I was not interested in. Matters of book keeping were not in my field of activities, and in my opinion they cannot have been entered in the books differently from the way usual expenses are booked--on the account for confidential expenses.
Q.Defendant, I didn't mean to direct attention to the books. I meant generally did you ever make any attempt to assist in Party records--to find out what the total of these contributions were--that is, after the event? Did you make any inquiry into the records of the Party to see whether or not they recorded these two contributions?
A.I never made any inquiries in Party records.
Q.Defendant, I think, perhaps, that I used that word misadvisedly. By "Party" I didn't mean the NSDAP; I meant the political organizations in 1932.
A.Yes, yes, I see. Yes, I understood you perfectly. I don't think it's customary to make inquiries into the records of a party and to try to find out whether the person concerned really used the money for the indicated purpose or whether he made some embezzlement. If somebody comes and sees me and tells me, please, for this or that political purpose, give me a contribution, and if I then give him 100,000 marks, then I certainly have so much confidence in the person concerned that I believe that he really uses the money for the purpose he has given me. And then I don't believe that he is a fraud and uses the money for himself--because if I thought he was a crook, I wouldn't give him the money, and I never would have taken the pain to go to one of these people who had received the money to see and to say: please now show me how you used the money and be sure that you used it for the purpose you had indicated, when you wanted the money.
THE PRESIDENT:Is Winkler living?
MR. ERVIN:Dr. Dix, I think, has told us that he is.
THE PRESIDENT:I didn't recall.
DR. DIX:As far as I have been told by friends, Winkler has been released from political, automatical custody a short while ago, and I heard that he even had been here at Nurnberg, and I think he even attended one of the court's meetings here. And certainly Winkler would bery easily available at any moment.
THE PRESIDENT:Well, it may not be material. We have to rely on....counsel.
DR. DIX:I'm referring to the question the Prosecution put to me, and may I add that Winkler was a very well-known man, even during the period of the Weimar Republic. Before he had been in some twon--some eastern town or in Silesia had been a mayor there, and then he was the owner of a very well-known--that is, he was not the owner, but he was the trustee in very large enterprises and published newspapers, and he continued in that position. He was a man of especially honest conception as far as financial matters were concerned.
THE PRESIDENT:Well, it may or may not be of important. We have to rely on counsel.
MR. ERVIN:Your Honor, Please I note it's eleven o'clock.
THE PRESIDENT:Nearly. We will have a recess for fifteen (15) minutes.
THE MARSHAL:The Tribunal is again in session. BY MR. ERVIN:
Q.Defendant, when you first arrived here in the jail in Nurnberg, do you recall being given a questionnaire to complete?
A.Yes, I do.
Q.There were some questions in that questionnaire on political contributions.
A.Yes.
Q.And you swore to that questionnaire at the date of 29 November 1946. You probably don't remember the exact date. In connection with your answer to political contributions there-
A.I can't say, but I believe that this questionnaire was made in the form of an affidavit, like all these questionnaires.
MR. ERVIN:If your Honor please, there are a few documents which will be referred to in cross examination. I would like to adopt the practice of marking these for identification and submitting them in the document book in rebuttal. I would therefore ask to have the completed questionnaire of the Defendant Flick, which is sworn to on 29 November 1946, marked as Prosecution's Exhibit 767 for Identification.
THE PRESIDENT: 767.
MR. ERVIN:I believe that is the next number in order.
THE PRESIDENT:For identification. It may be so marked.
MR. ERVIN:I have furnished the Defendant with the original in his handwriting of the portion of which I am to read:
Q.Now, you say in here, "Soon after the election of the Reich President was the subject of a conversation I had with Otto Wolff. Wolff informed me about a conversation he had had with Vice Councillor Dietrich concerning this question, and Wolff suggested to me that to pay a larger amount for Hindenburg's election which was propagandized by the Bruening government. I promised Wolff the payment of a larger amount. This promise was reported by Wolff to Dietrich. As I was able to state in the spring of 1945 from the party available records, those payments amounted to 450,000 Reichsmarks.
This amount may have been even a little larger. Part of it was paid in the fall of 1932 to cover debts when Bruening and Dietrich had already been overthrown."
And then omitting the next two paragraphs:
"These payments were made b the Charlottenhuette, whose directorgeneral I was at the time. They made further payment for Bruening after he had been overthrown. The reason why I can prove every one of these statements is due to my getting the records in the spring of 1945 by an official who imagined that they might be of some importance to me."
Now, do you still have those records?
A. (No answer.)
Q.And those records, as you state in this Affidavit, show that the contribution was 450,000.
A.Yes.
Q.There is no mention of the second payment of 500,000.
A.No, I didn't mention it at that time.
Q.And the records of the party didn't mention it either.
A.At that time I did not mention it, because the 450,000 marks for which I had receipts in November after in the interim I succeeded in getting in touch with the director of Mittelstahl in Riesa, and received a statement from him that Mittelstahl-Riesa had also paid 500,000 marks. I did not, of course, include these 500,000 marks in the total list of donations which is mentioned here. At that time I had no documents proving this and in the meantime I have succeeded through my attorney in getting in touch with this man, and he confirms this.
Q.Is that the Gehlhofen affidavit you are referring to?
A.Yes.
Q.- Would you read the last paragraph of it for us?
A.- Of Gehlofen. "The Mitteldeutsche Stahlwerke once paid the sum of 500,000 Reichsmarks to the President of the Aufsichtsrat, Herr Dr. Flick.
I remember for certain that this was in 1932 before the election of Hindenburg as Reich President against Hitler."
Q.- That is, Gehlofen remembers his paying the money to you?
A.- What Gehlofer remembers I can't tell you. I did not talk to him myself.
I can only refer to what he has written down here.
Q.- That's what I am referring to, and it says that the 500,000 Marks were paid to the Chairman of the Aufsichtsrat.
You just read that to us, didn't you?
A.- Yes.
Q.- It doesn't say at all that it was paid to anybody else, but you and in November 1946 you couldn't remember anything about it.
You didn't even mentione it in this NIQ.
A.- If I had not by accident obtained these documents in the spring of 1945 through the official who sent them to me thinking that they might interest me, I would not have remembered any of the details of these payments which I am submitting here.
That exceeds considerably what one may expect from the memory of a normal human being.
If I had not by ac cidnt obtained these documents concerning the payments end the receipts I could not possibly tell you, after 15 years, whether I paid 100,000 Marks or 50,000 or 150,000 for any purpose or whether I had given any money at all.
I had the general idea about these things, just as my col leagues had.
450,000 Marks, for which receipts are available here, cannot be the total sum for the Hindenburg election, I had the general idea that it must have been much more, but as, at that time, I had no further documents to support my memory for the time being I told you about the sums which I had proof for and in November I didn't have the documents, and I had no legal adviser, and I couldn't get in touch with Gehlofen, the director, either.
When I had the indictment and when I had an attorney and when I was able to discuss matters with my colleagues who all, like myself, thoght that it must have been more than 450,000 marks, then we got in touch with Gehlofen and asked him to tell us what he still knew about these affairs, and then these additional 500,000 Marks came up, and of course I mentioned them here to supplement my other former statements of November when I had no concrete facts about all this.
Q.- 500,000 Marks was a fairly substantial sum, wasn't it, in 1932?
A.- Yes, certainly, quite a lot.
Q.- And you say in your NIQ here, you make the allowance that there might have been additional sums beyond this 450,000 but you say this amount may have been even a little larger?
A.- I can't find anything about that here.
Q.- At the end of the paragraph that begins, "Soon afterwards the election for the Reich President" -- we will come back to that a little later.
I would like to have you look now at paragraph 13-A of this NIQ.
The question in this instance is to list firms or enterprises of which you were an official, made contributions and the approximate amounts in dicated below to political parties, political organizations or politi cal personalities listed below, between 1930 and April 1933, and just below that we have your own best estimate as of November, 1946 of the same type of list that you swore to in June of '47.
The contribution of the Bruening government for the Reich President election is listed as 450,000 Marks, isn't it?
A.- Yes.
Q.- And then you have Papen, Hugenberg, Schleicher, summer of fall 1932, 230,000 Marks; another payment to the Bruening government in the fall of 1932 of 100,000 Marks -- that would accord with item 3 on your second list -- and then the next item is a '33 payment which we should omit in trying to compare it with your '32 list.
That applies to the next two items as well, and then a little further down you have the contribu tion to the Nazi Party of 50,000 Reichsmarks.
When I total up your state ment of November as to your 1932 political contributions I get 830,000 Reichsmarks as opposed to the 1,500,000 in your next one, so that at that time, in November, you did substantially remember practically everything except this one 500,000 Reichsmarks payment; isn't that right?
A.- I have already explained memory has very little to do with it. These figures, 450,000, 230,000 and 100,000 and another 100,000, those I mentioned on the basis of documents I had, and I also explained that it is possible that the amount of 450,000 Marks may have been a little higher. I said that at that time, but I had no evidence on the subject and if I had not had documents for the 450,000 I wouldn't have mentioned this sum either.
I did not remember the 500,000 exactly but my colleagues, like myself, thought that it must have been considerably more than 450,000. I repeat once again -- I have already said it several times, then we investigated the matter and investigated to see whether Riesa had not also made a payment and the director has now confirmed this fact, and then I included this sum in the later statement of June, 1947, and the difference between the 830,000 or whatever it is supposed to be, I must count that up -
Q.- Not all the figures in that list are included in the total because two of them one for the year '33.
A.- In essence the difference is explained by the 500,000 Marks. There are estimated sums among them. It always says where they have been proved and where they are merely estimates. In addition I just notice in the list which is submitted to me here, NSDAP and affiliates, February '32, 100,000 Marks. That is a dictation error. It must be February, 1933. In February 1932 no hundred thousand marks was ever paid to the NSDAP. That checks with the list which was submitted here later on. This says, in 1933, 100,000 Marks and in the November list it also says a hundred thousand marks, but instead of February '33 it says February, '32. That is a mistake. I have just noted that and I would expressly like to have this corrected.
Q:Yes, I have already corrected it on my copy. I assumed it was a translation error and I didn't include the figures. That is what interested me about this list. It shows a very close correlation to the later affidavit except for two things. One is the substantial payment of five hundred thousand Reichsmark and the other is the item which is Paragraph 8 on your most recent estimating which is one hundred thousand Reichsmark for Democrat and Left parties. Apart from those two items the lists are almost identical.
Now one more question on this five hundred thousand marks. Isn't it possible that the statement of Ghlofen, referring to the money paid by Mittelstahl, is a matter of internal accounting, that the five hundred thousand was paid in to you to take care of the contributions which you were making through Winkler, and that in effect it is merely another record of the same payment which would amount to between four hundred fifty and five hundred thousand?
A:If the Prosecutor thinks that, as I understand it -- if he does -- that we with reference to the money paid to Winkler in advance, that if we had had this returned to us by Winkler, then I must reply the following: The statement of Gelhofen says before the election of the Reich President -- I have just heard that that was supposed to be in AprBl -- some of our payments to Winkler were made in June and another payment was made because there was a deficit in the account in October. If what the Prosecutor has built up were correct, then we would have let Mittelstahl give us five hundred thousand marks to repay a sum which up to that time only amounted to two hundredfifty thousand marks.
Charlottenhuette would in that case not only have gotten its money back but would also have had a surplus of two hundred fifty thousand marks.
It made a profit to the amount. Of course, we would have cheated Mittelstahl out of two hundred fifty thousand marks if this were true.
Q:Does the affidavit of Gelhofen state the date of the payment to you of this five hundred thousand Reichsmark?
A:No, it doesn't. I believe -- in fact, I am certain -- that this was in 1932 before the election of the Reich President, Hitler versus Hindenburg, and I believe that a director, who lives in a Bavarian village and is no longer in his plant or in his office -- I don't think that you can expect him in 1947 to remember whether it was the 12th or the 18th or the 25th of April, 1932.
Q:Well, It well could have been paid after the election as some of your own payments were when you said it was the usual thing to pay some contributions after election -
A:Yes.
Q: -- So that is a possibility, isn't it?
A:Gehlofen said that he paid before the election. I have already stated, but I can repeat it, that even after an election which has taken place, payments were made. I can give you two examples of this.
Q:Yes, they are already in the listing here, Defendant. Now you said that your colleagues are in substantial agreement with you about these amounts. How about Kaletsch? Do you think he would know about these payments?
A:I can't say for certain what Kaletsch knows about it. I think it would probably be the best thing if you asked him.
Q:Well, as a matter of fact -
A:What was accounted and went through the account Kaletsch must have known because it was his department.
Q:As a matter of fact, Defendant, we have asked Kaletsch that. I have the same -- the answer of Kaletsch to the same questionaire as you have been telling us about.
MR. ERVIN:I ask that that be marked as Prosecution Exhibit 768 for identification.
THE PRESIDENT:It may be done.
MR. ERVIN:This is Kaletsch's sworn answer to the same fragebogen. You may give that to the interpreter. He says (enclosure A): "In 1932 at the instigation of Director-General Friedrich Flick from A.G. Charlottenhuette, Administration Office, Berlin, of which I was already a member of the Vorstand, A: an over-all five hundred thousand mark contribution for the second poll founded in the President's election in the fight against Adolf Hitler on behalf of the only rival candidate, Hindenburg, by which the voting against Hitler was decisively financed." And then in parentheses, "Reich Minister of Finance, Hermann Dietrich, Democratic member of the Reichstag in connection with Reich--Chancellor Bruenin." Then Paragraph B: "Contribution is for the support of the Bruening Government, and its policy, and the Schleicher Government against Hitler totaling three hundred thousand marks, approximately about half of which was paid to Dr. Bruening by way of Dr. Etscheid. As far as I know, last payment on behalf of Bruening in the course of the last election campaign around March, 1933.
"II A and B: In view of the then grave economic depression these payments were of particular importance and great consequence representing a voluntary great sacrifice, contrary to subsequent services which were rendered under pressure and compulsion."
So, in other words, his recollection hits about the same figure, eight hundred thousand marks, and he remembers a large apyment also made at the instigation of Dietrich through Bruening, and he puts it at about five hundred thousand marks, but we are still missing one of the large payments.
THE PRESIDENT:Well, under that answer that you have just read do I understand that all these contributions were made after the first election?
MR. ERVIN:I don't believe the answer specifies the exact dates.
THE PRESIDENT:I think it ways so, as you read it -at least I so understood it. Of course, there is avery great chance of misunderstanding.
MR. ERVIN:Yes. The first one was the five hundred thousand marks at the second poll of the presidential election.
THE PRESIDENT:Nothing certain about any contribution at the original election?
MR. ERVIN:No, none whatever, It says -
THE PRESIDENT:All that in the run-off election and in subsequent deficiency -- if you assume that to be the fact -- deficiency contributions.
MR. ERVIN:Later then in the next paragraph contributions totaling three hundred thousand marks, and he does say, "As far as I know, last payment on behalf of Bruening in the course of the last election campaign around March, 1933," which also accords with the statement of the Defendant, Flick.
THE PRESIDENT:So on this statement there is a blank as to any contributions before the campaign of the run-off election.
MR. ERVIN:That is true, but the statement refers to solicitations through Dietrich.
THE PRESIDENT:Yes.
MR. ERVIN:Which I think coincide with the other statements very well. BY MR. ERVIN:
Q:Now, Defendant, let's look at Item 4 on this list for the moment. That is the payment to Schleicher of one hundred twenty thousand Reichsmark. Do you remember when that one was paid?
A:It must have been in the Summer of 1932 as far as I can establish. That is what I see from this.
Q:What are you looking at when you say that?
A:Possibly a part of it later. At any rate, it was in 1932.
Q:You have no receipt on that one. Can you give us the date?
A:Yes. Yes, one receipt -- just a moment. One receipt is dated the 10th of July, 1932, and another the 23rd of July, 1932.
Q:Who was Schleicher.
A:Schleicher used to be Reich Defense Minister and later was Reich was Reich Chancellor.
Q:He didn't become a chancellor until December of that year, isn't that right?
A:I don't know exactly, but he was Reich Chancellor, I believe, when Hitler came to power. He must have been the last Reich Chancellor before Hitler, as far as I know. When he became Chancellor exactly I can't say from memory.
Q:I have the date here as 3 December 1932 which I think is probably correct.
Was he running for some kind of office in July, '32?
A:He used to be Reich Minister of Defense, but he always played a part in politics.
Q:Do you remember the circumstances of this contribution? Did he ask you for it?
A:I think I can reconstruct the circumstances because I find a note here from Dr. Vogler. He asked me as quickly as possible to make a payment to Schleicher.