An inside view of the dread German concentration camps at Oswiecim, Poland, was given in open court here during the week-end by a young Frenchman named Verniers who is on trial as a traitor.
Verniers had been employed by the Gestapo and last February, he testified, he was sent to Oswiecim in the guise of a deportee to uncover sabotage there. After denouncing 60 persons he became known and, his value ended, was returned to Paris
The Jewish concentration camp, Verniers testified, was the worst by far of the six camps at Oswiecim. The most brutal of the SS guards were stationed there. For the slightest illness prisoners were sent to gas chambers to be killed. In April, Verniers said, executions reached a total of 2,700 men and women daily, and even the German command found this to be excessive and ordered a reduction because the executions were causing a labor shortage.
Verniers disclosed that the 25,000 Jews at the camp were dressed, winter and summer alike, in blue gowns resembling bathing suits. Their heads were shaved and all identification removed except for a number branded on their chests. Prisoners in the other camps labored 16 hours daily in synthetic butter and jam factories but most of the Jews, including women, were assigned to heavy labor on roads, railway construction and as porters, he said. Young women who retained their liveliness were placed in camp houses of prostitution and the hardest workers in all camps were rewarded with tickets to these houses, Verniers revealed.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
