The second
group of journalists, which visited on April 19, also included a German author
and later playwright, they were:
Karl
Thielke – Headed the Delegation
Örnulf
Tigerstedt - Finnish poet and writer
Ferdinand
Vercknocke - Flemish writer
Filip
de Pillecijn - Flemish writer
Pierre
Hubermont – Walloon, writer
Jaabo
Neppo (Leppo?) – Finnish writer
Enrico
Massa – Italian writer
Gimenez Caballero -Spanish university
professor
František Kožík - Czech writer
Leon
Kozłowski – Polish professor, pre-war minister, then residing in Berlin
Filip Lützkendorff – German dramatist
Aside
from the German, Spaniard and Italian, these men primarily represented national
groups that were seeking to ensure their nation’s existence, a policy that the Soviets
opposed in the USSR and clearly had opposed in the Finno-Soviet War. They also noted their shock at what they had
seen in Katyn.
The Propaganda
Ministry was working in all possible manner to ensure that the information
about Katyn was publicized; not only in the Reich produced Signal, a biweekly which was produced in 25 languages, and in a
moment of rare sensitivity, which appeared incongruous, given that the Warschau
Ghetto had just been liquidated, the Nazis were careful not to print the June
issue containing graphic photos of the exhumation site and the visit of the IMC
in Polish. Additionally, materials
appeared in the Vichy produced Tout La
Vie, in the Portuguese Boleten
Semanal and in other publications issued in pro-Nazi countries.
Truly, as
Goebbels had noted in his diary – by June, the Nazis had lived off the Katyn
Massacre for a number of weeks, but in reality, by that time, the steady list
of defeats on the Eastern and North African fronts had placed Katyn in a less
important position, in fact, one could posit that even by mid-May Katyn’s
propaganda half-life, had been significantly reduced.
Nonetheless,
in mid-April, the members of the 689 PropagandaKompanie
were working diligently to produce broadcasts, films and photos. It is at this time that we encounter the
person of Joe Heydecker, who had authored a book prior to the war, and had
developed an affinity for photography and who was assigned to the PK. He is best known for his images taken in the
Warschau Ghetto, which many authors claim to show his sensitivity as Jews are
seen in a positive light. It is totally
unclear as to if or how his photographic skills were utilized in Katyn, as
Heydecker’s own memoir does not mention this, however he does note his presence
in Smolensk. However, his presence there
bore fruition in images of the three “Americans” who were assigned to the PK;
while in a collection of his images we can also find 1964 intimate images of
Horst Adolf Eichmann and his home in Buenos Aires – which serve to raise more
questions about Heydecker’s personal beliefs and the reason he chose to
emigrate to South America in the early 1960s. Given that at least one member of
the 689 PK was located and testified to the Madden Committee, it is curious
that Heydecker did not.
According to Professor Buhtz's report and other
statements, the bodies were lifted from the grave by Russian civilian workmen
under the supervision at first, of professional German medical personnel, but
later—from the second half of April—Poles, namely the Polish Red Cross team. That
team, under the direction of the senior assistant of the Institute of Forensic
Medicine at Cracow, Dr. Marian Wodziński, consisted of three officials of that
institute and the Institute of Pathological Anatomy at Cracow and 5 members of
the Polish Red Cross from Warsaw. The exhumation of the bodies which were lying
in the upper layers did not present the sort of problem that the bodies in the
lower layers did – the graphic descriptions of the Russian (sometimes described
as auxiliary) workmen needing to use hooks to remove the corpses, as well as
Jaederlund’s statement about the earlier visit
…In a large pit, we saw dead bodies,
clad in uniforms, lying in several layers. They were sticking together like
leaves. Certain dead bodies were taken out of the pit in our presence and
examined. They were in a good state of preservation, probably owing to the
nature of the soil—so to speak, half mummified…
However, the bodies in the lower levels were in a
different state, as Lt. Kramer noted
…because further down it was
impossible, you could not expect any human being to actually climb down into
the pits, because the stench was so terrible, the whole thing, that nobody
could actually go down there, they could only be pulled out with hooks, or
something like that.
This concurs with John Van Vliet’s testimony,
which gives other more graphic detail than the average reader can stomach.
But that POW visit was still over three weeks
away – meanwhile, on April 19, the second group of journalists arrived on site.
Once again, the group was assembled in
Berlin and flew into Smolensk. By this
time, Jaederlund’s story, bylined the 17th but printed the 18th,
had appeared as had others. It is not
clear if anyone from the second group had read that material.
©Krystyna Piórkowska
