Records of the War Refugee Board
A.K.A. War Refugee Board Report, 1944 – 1945
FOR RELEASE SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 1944.
EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT
WAR REFUGEE BOARD
WASHINGTON, D.C.
GERMAN EXTERMINATION CAMPS — AUSCHWITZ AND BIRENAU
It is a fact beyond denial that the Germans have deliberately and systematically murdered millions of innocent civilians — Jews and Christiana alike — all over Europe. This campaign of terror and brutality which is unprecedented in all history and which even now continues unabated, is part of the German plan to subjugate the free peoples of the world.
So revolting and diabolical are the German atrocities that the minds of civilized people find It difficult to believe that they have actually taken place. But the governments of the United States and of other countries have evidence which clearly substantiate a the facts.
The War Refugee Board is engaged in a desperate effort to save as many as possible of Hitler’s intended victims. To facilitate its work the Board has representatives in key spots in Europe. These representatives have tested contacts throughout Europe and keep the Board fully advised concerning the German campaign of extermination and torture.
Recently the Board received from a representative close to the scene two eye-witness accounts of events which occurred in notorious extermination camps established by the Germans. The first report is based upon the experiences of two young Slovaklan Jews who escaped in April, 1944, after spending two years in the Nazi concentration camps at Auschwitz and Birkenau in southwestern Poland. The second report is made by a non-Jewish Polish major, the only survivor of one group imprisoned at Auschwitz.
The two reports were prepared independently and are reproduced exactly in the form they were received by the War Refugee Board, except for a few deletions necessary for the protection of persons who may still be alive. The figures concerning the size of the Jewish convoys and the numbers of men and women admitted to the two camps cannot be taken as mathematically exact; and, in fact, are declared by the authors to be no more than reliable approximations, They are accepted as such by the Board.
The Board has every reason to believe that these reports present a true picture of the frightful happenings in these camps. It is making the reports public in the firm conviction they should be read and understood by all Americans.