SOBIBÓR - Holocaust Handbooks

98 J. GRAF, T. KUES, C. MATTOGNO, SOBIBÓR
parts of the camp. This means that deloused deportees could have left
camp III unnoticed by inmates in camp I and II. Interestingly, the Rutherford
map shows a sort of passage leading from the northeast corner
of camp III through the forest in the general direction of the main railroad.
240
4.4. Miscellaneous Anomalies and Absurdities
The testimonies left by former Sobibór inmates are rife with contradictions,
incongruities, anomalies, and absurdities which are indicative
of their general quality. Below I will list only a few of them.
Dov Freiberg claims to have seen in the forest surrounding camp III
“a hill of white sand about twenty meters high” which “looked suspicious.”
241 Needless to say, anyone would be surprised by a mysterious
mountain of sand the height of a seven story building! He also writes
that “hundreds of other workers were killed daily during the months I
spent in the camp and were replaced by others.” 242 Given that the inmates
numbered around 600, 243 his survival was more than a little miraculous.
Freiberg also maintains that a group of 73 Dutch detainees caught
trying to escape was punished with decapitation (!) and: 244
“After the war, an SS man by the name of Novak was caught, and
a search of his home revealed photographs of the beheadings in
Lager 3.”
Yet no Sobibór SS man named Novak was ever arrested, 245 and if
such photographs really existed, they would surely have been reproduced
a hundred times by now!
240
It should be pointed out here that the trains bound for the east may have departed from
the main railroad, rather than the sidespur leading into the camp. According to Jan Piwonski,
who worked at the Sobibór station, the Che�m-W�odawa line saw little traffic,
and thus such embarkations were feasible; Jan Piwonski, op.cit (note 221). The 1942
timetable of the railways in the General Government shows that there were four trains
per day on this line, in each direction; cf. Kurzbuch Polen 1942 (Generalgouvernment),
Verlag Josef Otto Slezak, Vienna 1984, p. 118.
241
D. Freiberg, op. cit. (note 68), pp. 219f.
242
Ibid., pp. 260f.
243
Y. Arad, op. cit. (note 49), p. 333.
244
D. Freiberg, op. cit. (note 68), p. 276, note 1. According to Louis de Jong, some witnesses
like Freiberg maintain that the Dutch Jews were beheaded, while other claim that
they were shot; Louis de Jong, “Sobibór,” Encounter, December 1978, p. 26.
245
According to Schelvis, two men of the camp staff bore the surname Novak: Anton Julius,