Otto Moll 'Crematorium Chief' and holocaust doubter

[Stubble]

From the JTA-

Mall, condemned for the murder of one Jewish boy, is now awaiting death in the Landsberg fortress in the American zone. As an S.S. leader, Moll was in charge of the crematoriums at the Birkenau and Oswiecim death camps. Major Draper asked the American commandant at Landsberg to permit him to interrogate Moll before he dies. “The world should know the extent of this man’s fantastic crimes,” Major Draper said.

https://www.jta.org/archive/war-crimes- ... in-history

There's a problem though...the guy didn't know anything about the crematoria...

Otto Moll (4 March 1915 – 28 May 1946), SS Hauptscharführer at the war’s end, was employed as a gardener at the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp until May 1941. Then he was transferred to Auschwitz, where he served in the same role. According to his own statement during post-war interrogations, he was deployed to excavate mass graves at Auschwitz in 1942. After that, he was transferred to the Monowitz Camp in late 1942, where he remained until early 1944. He was then transferred to the Gleiwitz Subcamp, were he remained until the evacuation in January 1945.

When asked about 'his fantastic crimes;

Before he was executed, U.S. investigators interrogated him several times, probably to get “confessions” with which they could prosecute other former German officials, who were still awaiting their trial. During those interrogations, Moll accepted the claim that he was head of the crematoria during the claimed extermination of the Jews deported from Hungary. However, whenever he was asked for any details about the crematoria and about gassings supposedly taking place in them, he displayed a striking ignorance of the most basic (claimed) features of these facilities, clearly showing that he had never set a foot into these facilities, let alone managed their operations for two months.

https://holocaustencyclopedia.com/witne ... -otto/693/

I find this odd and interesting. Anybody know where I can find his interrogation protocols and his SS file? I'll poke around.

[borjastick]

he was deployed to excavate mass graves at Auschwitz in 1942.

An odd claim in every respect don't you think given that there were no mass graves at Auschwitz. I have never heard of this fellow and suspect from the sections you post he was fitted up for the role of in-charge of the crematoria to help give credibility to the whole swathe of 'death camp' stories and claims.

If he admitted anything it was after intense and very painful interrogation and torture. Just a thought as clearly there will be no evidence of the details of his interviews by Major Draper etc.

[Stubble]

Typhus victims were buried in '41 and exhumed in '42 because of ground water contamination if memory serves. This was why the Kremas were built, attrition had outrun capacity, so, cremation capacity was increased.

[Wetzelrad]

Moll was tried in the Martin Weiss trial for his activities at Dachau. There is a poor quality scan of a judge's review of that trial here:
https://jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsourc ... ial/d3.pdf

On pages 77-79 you can read some accusations against Moll and the part of his affidavit where he denied all those accusations. Since only his activities from January 1945 on are described, it is unremarkable reading. On page 127 you can read a summary of additional statements and accusations. All that was written about Auschwitz is here:

The accused, Otto Moll, elected to testify and make the following unsworn statement: He was a 30 year old German. In civilian life he had been a gardener (R 1428). He joined the SS on 30 May 1935 (R 1428, 1432). Moll was at first at Oranienburg and then went to Auschwitz as a gardener where he remained from 1941 until 1945 (R 1433). He never had contact with the prisoners at Auschwitz(R 1433). He came to Kaufering Number 4 on 26 February 1945 (R 1428).

It wasn't until after he was sentenced to death for his activities at Dachau that Moll was interrogated about his activities at Auschwitz. These interrogations appear in HH #35 Commandant of Auschwitz, as they relate to and involve Rudolf Höss. Those interrogations are a more interesting read.

Firstly, Moll confessed that he supervised a cremation crew at the crematoria, but since he knew little and couldn't even get the number of ovens right he was probably fibbing. He dated this to the summer of 1944.

The next day Höss told investigators that indeed he had assigned Moll to the crematoria, first two of them and then all four of them, but before that he assigned him to the farmhouses AKA the bunkers. He dated this to 1941, well before the bunkers began operation according to Holocaust historians.

Moll then denied all of this, demanding to face his accuser, to which the interrogators obliged. It becomes more confusing from there as both individuals alternately agreed with each other, contradicted each other, contradicted their own previous statements, and contradicted other known facts.

It is difficult to fit any one motive to Moll's behavior in these interrogations. One possible interpretation is that Moll, knowing he was due to be executed in the immediate future, was willing to fall on his sword to absolve others of guilt. This may be why he insisted on having Höss present and frequently deferred to whatever Höss said. Literally: "Let my Commandant tell you".

Whatever the case, Moll was very poorly informed about the thing that he was supposed to be "chief" of.

[Stubble]

I'd like to see the rest of the interrogation protocols and his personnel records.

Going over what there is, I can't rule out that he indeed just ran the garden (farm) detail and was hated for it, and thus framed up for something different.

I see some parallels to 'Frankenstein' here. Shooting jews in the back of the head and shoving them into a burning pit etc. Being part of the farm detail that ostensibly put jews to work at manual labor. Accusations of mass murder.

He seemed to be quite unaware of what he was supposed to be confessing to, and thus, couldn't, even had he wanted to.

[TlsMS93]

Typhus victims were buried in '41 and exhumed in '42 because of ground water contamination if memory serves. This was why the Kremas were built, attrition had outrun capacity, so, cremation capacity was increased.

In fact, Himmler wanted to increase the camp's capacity and therefore created Birkenau to hold up to 200,000 prisoners. Consequently, the camp's bureaucrats estimated the need for more crematoria to handle potential typhus epidemic outbreaks.

But even calculating the average typhus mortality rate in other camps, Birkenau's crematoria would still be insufficient to meet the demand. This proves that the potential demand for cremation of gassed prisoners was beyond imagination, something that doesn't seem typical of a bureaucratic country that uses efficiency even for locating a nail.

[curioussoul]

he was deployed to excavate mass graves at Auschwitz in 1942.

An odd claim in every respect don't you think given that there were no mass graves at Auschwitz. I have never heard of this fellow and suspect from the sections you post he was fitted up for the role of in-charge of the crematoria to help give credibility to the whole swathe of 'death camp' stories and claims.

If he admitted anything it was after intense and very painful interrogation and torture. Just a thought as clearly there will be no evidence of the details of his interviews by Major Draper etc.

There were mass graves at Auschwitz, but we know very little about them. Even Mattogno recognizes this. They stem from 1942 during a time when all of the crematoria were out of operation, and the outlines of them are visible in aerial photos. According to Mattogno, some 36,500 corpses of registered detainees would have been cremated in these mass graves during 1942. Bear in mind these are completely unrelated to the imaginary outdoor cremations of the Hungarian Jews, which supposedly happened in 1944. True to form, Holocaust historians have barely broached this subject because it pertains to the real history of Auschwitz. Otto Moll was present when these graves were dug up and cremated and he references this during the Hoess trial.

I can't bother digging up the exact excerpts but he discusses this in various books, among them Open-Air Incinerations (HH#17). Other users may be familiar with these graves and can provide some more information for now.