Approximately 16 tons of top-soil being delivered to a home in San Antonio in February 2013. In August 1942 a Pole of German ancestry delivered
a 16 ton load of 'fertilizer' (ashes from gassed and cremated Jews) from a now forgotten extermination camp, to a farmers' supply store in Krakow.
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a 16 ton load of 'fertilizer' (ashes from gassed and cremated Jews) from a now forgotten extermination camp, to a farmers' supply store in Krakow.
Found in file WO 208/1570 in the United Kingdom National Archives is a detailed report on the situation in German-occupied Krakow dated September 3, 1943. The report was compiled by British Intelligence agency MI 19, and is based entirely on information obtained from the interrogation of an unnamed 31 year-old Polish Volksdeutsche—probably a Ukrainian from territory sized by the Poles in 1919; the report states whilst he was in Berlin during early April 1943 the Germans provided him with papers stating he was a White Russian—who had worked as a chauffeur for the N.S.D.A.P. between December 1940 and November 1941, and later as a coal truck driver in-and-around Krakow. He supposedly fled from Oberhausen, Germany, to Brussels on or near April 5, 1943—perhaps to escape conscription into the Germany army—but the report makes no mention of how he ended-up in the United Kingdom's so-called London Reception Centre, where tens-of-thousands of immigrants were held and interrogated during the war.
Below is an extract from the report, and I've added a map for clarity, although I was unable to find a village named Pustelnik near the town of Dębica.
Below is an extract from the report, and I've added a map for clarity, although I was unable to find a village named Pustelnik near the town of Dębica.
ATROCITIES.
38. On three occasions in about Aug. 42. informant had to take coal to the crematorium in the village of PUSTELNIK about 6klm. from DEBICA which is about 145klm. from CRACOW on the road to LEMBERG.39. Polish workmen working in the "fertilizer" stores told him that from 450-500 Jews and Poles (mainly Jews) are cremated every day. The Jews are said to come in the main from a distance.40. The victims are gassed in a special chamber. Suffocation takes about 15 minutes. The bodies are them removed by Ukrainians and Jews to the crematorium and the ashes after cremation filled into sacks and described as "fertilizer".41. Informant has on his three journeys taken 7 tons, 9 tons and 16 tons back to CRACOW and delivered to a store at LWOWSKA no.9 from where the "fertilizer" us [sic] rationed out to the farmers.42. It is also possible to buy this "fertilizer" in the Black market at Szl. 40-50. - per sack.43. The crematorium is run by the S.S. and S.A. and of course the workmen are prisoners and not allowed to leave.
M.I.19. (R.P.S. [= Royal Patriotic School]) /1768. 03.09.1943. "Interrogation of:- Polish Lorry driver, born 19, Jul. 12. Left Cracow 28 Mar. 43." p.4. UK NA: WO 208/1570. I was made aware of this report by Joel Zisenwine who briefly summarises it (but fails to mention the man was Volksdeutsche, employed by the N.S.D.A.P. for a period, and the enormous quantities of "fertilizer" he is supposed to have claimed to have delivered) in his article 'British Intelligence and Information about Murder by Gas' in the Yad Vashem Studies 41/1, 2013, pp.171-172.