SOBIBÓR - Holocaust Handbooks

J. GRAF, T. KUES, C. MATTOGNO, SOBIBÓR 173
men stationed in Sobibór, Bauer among them, 494 but does not ascribe to
any of them any specific crimes. Bauer’s promotion to the rank of
“Gasmeister” is the work of the former Sobibór detainees Esther Raab
and Samuel Lerer who appeared in Berlin as witnesses for the prosecution.
Shaindy Perl, whose only source is the testimony of Esther Raab,
gives the following account of the circumstances leading to Bauer’s arrest:
Esther Raab and Samuel Lerer are said to have lived in Berlin after
the war. One day, Samuel Lerer burst into Esther Raab’s Berlin apartment
telling her that he had discovered Bauer and his family at a fair on
a ferris wheel. The two of them ran to the fair and bribed a policeman
with two pounds of coffee to arrest Bauer: 495
“The policeman eyed the sack of coffee greedily. ‘Okay,’ he said
finally, ‘but I hope you two are not mistaken.’ Esther and Samuel assured
him that they weren’t. Then they watched with trepidation as
the policeman approached Erich Bauer and whispered quietly to
him. Bauer’s color drained from his face and the policeman took his
arm and led him away.”
We leave it up to the reader to decide whether this account is credible.
On the other hand, it is a fact that the Berlin court, in its sentence,
relied almost entirely upon the depositions of the witnesses “R.” (Raab)
and “L.” (Lerer). The only other two witnesses, “the former detainees
‘B.’ and ‘C.,’ who have testified outside of court and have meanwhile
emigrated,” are mentioned only in passing. This means that Raab’s and
Lerer’s credibility is extremely significant. We know little about Lerer,
but the fact that he spoke of a million victims at Sobibór 496 should make
us pause, to say the least. We have already stressed the doubtfulness of
the witness Esther Raab. 497 Her notorious lack of reliability also becomes
apparent when we see that she supplied her, as it were, biographer
Shaindy Perl with inaccurate information concerning key questions.
The following passages have been taken form Shaindy Perl’s book,
22), p. 208.
494
“Szpic, Wagner, Frenkel, Niemand, Rost, Greischutz, Gomerski, Getzinger, Konrad,
Gebrüder Wolf, Vetland, Michel, Veis, Bauer, Sztojbel, Richter” (Spelling of names unchanged
from source), ibid., p. 209.
495
S. Perl, op. cit. (note 62), p. 221.
496
J. Schelvis, op. cit. (note 70), p. 239.
497
Cf. chapter 2.3.4.2. and 2.3.15.