The Nazi Hunters (52 page)

I have been blessed with a wide circle of friends. I want to express my appreciation to David Satter, Ardith and Steve Hodes, Francine Shane and Robert Morea, Alexandra and Anthony Juliano, Eva and Bart Kaminski, Monika and Frank Ward, Linda Orrill, Ryszard Horowitz and Ania Bogusz, Renilde and Bill Drozdiak, Linda and Michael Mewshew, Anna Berkovits, Victor and Monika Markowicz, Sandra and Bob Goldman, Elaine and Marc Prager, Lucy and Scott Lichtenberg, Jeff Bartholet, Fred Guterl, Arlene Getz, and Leslie and Tom Freudenheim. My apologies for this very incomplete list.

Finally, there is my family. Now that my father, Zygmunt, is no longer
with us, my mother, Marie, continued the tradition of following my research and writing progress, encouraging me every step of the way. I also want to thank my sisters, Maria and Terry, along with their spouses, Roberto and Diane.

I wish to pay special tribute to Eva Kowalski, as generous a soul as can be found anywhere. Her late husband Waldek was not just my brother-in-law; he was also a treasured friend.

I am the very proud father of four grown children—Eva, Sonia, Adam, and Alex. I hope they realize how much their love and support means to me on a daily basis. Along with their spouses, Eran and Sara, they have built their own families now, and I can boast seven wonderful grandchildren: Stella, Caye, Sydney, Charles, Maia, Kaia, and Christina.

As for Krysia, the woman who captured my heart when I first met her as an exchange student at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, she has always served as my first sounding board about absolutely everything, including every line in these pages. I cannot imagine doing any of this without her.

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© ANDREW RUDAKOV

Andrew Nagorski, an award-winning journalist, was born in Scotland to Polish parents, moved to the United States as an infant, and has rarely stopped moving since. During a long career at
Newsweek
, he served as the magazine’s bureau chief in Hong Kong, Moscow, Rome, Bonn, Warsaw, and Berlin. He is the author of five previous books and has written for countless publications. He lives in St. Augustine, Florida.

@andrewnagorski

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Hitlerland

The Greatest Battle

Last Stop Vienna

The Birth of Freedom

Reluctant Farewell

“I have no”:
Harry Patterson,
The Valhalla Exchange,
166.

“Anyone who seeks”:
David Marwell interview with the author.

I interviewed Niklas Frank:
Niklas Frank interview with the author; excerpts from this interview: “Horror at Auschwitz,”
Newsweek,
March 15, 1999; and Andrew Nagorski, “Farewell to Berlin,”
Newsweek.com
,
January 7, 2000.

“My husband was”:
Abby Mann,
Judgment at Nuremberg
, 62.

On October 16, 1946:
The details of the executions are largely drawn from Kingsbury Smith, who was the pool reporter at the event. His full report:
http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/nuremberg/NurembergNews10_16_46.html
.

Additional information was drawn from Whitney R. Harris, a lawyer who was part of the American staff at Nuremberg, and designated by Justice Robert H. Jackson to represent him in the Palace of Justice on the night of October 15–16. His account is in his book,
Tyranny on Trial: The Evidence at Nuremberg,
485–88.

“There is nothing”:
Telford Taylor,
The Anatomy of the Nuremberg Trials: A Personal Memoir,
588.

“his face pale”
and
“His hands”:
G. M. Gilbert,
Nuremberg Diary,
431.

“The one thing”:
Harold Burson interview with the author.

“Death by hanging”:
Telford Taylor, 600.

“a death which is”
and
“to commute”:
Ibid., 602.

“his application”:
Ibid., 623.

Herman Obermayer:
All quotes from Obermayer are from two sources: Herman Obermayer interview with the author, and his article, “Clean, Painless and Traditional,” in the December 1946 issue of the
Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern
, the college’s literary magazine.

347 people:
Ann Tusa and John Tusa,
The Nuremberg Trial,
487. Others question that tally. See for example:
http://thefifthfield.com/biographical-sketches/john-c-woods/
.

Kaltenbrunner still insisted:
Gilbert, 255.

“I deserved it”:
Ibid., 432.

“Everyone in the chamber”:
Stanley Tilles with Jeffrey Denhart,
By the Neck Until Dead: The Gallows of Nuremberg,
136.

“That’s quick work”:
Werner Maser,
Nuremberg: A Nation on Trial
, 255.

In an interview:
Ibid., 254.

“died of slow strangulation”:
Telford Taylor, 611. This passage also includes Taylor’s mention of the photos of the hanged Nazis.

“indications of clumsiness”
: Albert Pierrepoint,
Executioner: Pierrepoint,
158.

German historian Werner Maser:
Maser, 255.

He tried to deflect:
Tusa and Tusa, 487.

“a more-or-less drunken moment”:
Herman Obermayer, “Clean, Painless and Traditional,”
Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern
, December 1946.

“I operated”
and
“Capital punishment”:
Pierrepoint, 8.

“If this Jewish business”:
Christopher R. Browning,
Ordinary Men: Reserve Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland,
58.

“
Now we know”:
Richard Overy,
Russia’s War,
163–64.

“sent back to”
and
“If I had my way”:
Michael Beschloss,
The Conquerors: Roosevelt, Truman and the Destruction of Hitler’s Germany, 1941–1945,
21.

“At least fifty thousand,” “I will not be,”
and Roosevelt’s intervention: Ibid., 26.

According to his entries
and rest of account from Liddell diaries: Ian Cobain, “Britain Favoured Execution over Nuremberg Trials for Nazi Leaders,”
The Guardian,
October 25, 2012.