JAN NOWAK

On 11 September 1947 in Warsaw, Appellate Investigative Judge Jan Sehn, member of the Main Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, acting at the written request of the First Prosecutor of the Supreme National Tribunal, this dated 25 April 1947, in accordance with the provisions of and procedure provided for under the Decree of 10 November 1945 (Journal of Laws of the Republic of Poland No. 51, item 293), and in connection with art. 254, 107, and 115 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, interviewed as a witness the person named below, a former prisoner of the Majdanek concentration camp, who testified as follows:


Name and surname Dr. Jan Nowak
Age 39
Religious affiliation Roman Catholic
Nationality and citizenship Polish
Occupation medical doctor
Place of residence Warsaw, Kielecka Street 48, flat 6

Between 26 June 1941 and 18 February 1942 I was interned at the Auschwitz concentration camp. On 18 February 1942, together with other doctors, I was transported to the Majdanek concentration camp, where we were supposed to set up a medical service. I remained at said camp until 6 April 1944.

During my time at the Majdanek camp, I came across SS-Unterscharführer Muhsfeldt, who I believe was later promoted to the rank of Oberscharführer. At that time, I knew him by his first and second name. His first name was Erich. In the photo presented to me, he looks emaciated, but it bears a resemblance to the man. Initially, Muhsfeldt held the position of the Blockführer and later he became Kommandoführer [detail leader] of the crematorium. He would get drunk and, under alcoholic excitement, was capable of various deeds, including the atrocities ascribed to him. For his kommando he would enlist the filthiest scum of all nationalities, who were capable of doing anything if ordered. All of them were prisoners who were never to be released from the camp. It took place on orders from the Political Department.

In his capacity as head of the crematorium, Muhsfeldt supervised the incineration of the camp’s dead bodies, either of people who had died of natural causes or died a sudden death: shot, murdered, hanged, and also gassed. He participated in executions by firing squad, after which he had to sign the receipt for the corpses of people shot, and then, over the period of intensified exterminations at the Majdanek camp, when other instruments would prove insufficient for terminating people, his crematorium saw people shot, hanged, and killed with batons. In order to drown out the screams of the victims murdered in the crematorium, the engine of a tractor would be started up nearby. Such operations were carried out at night and began after the roll-call, once all prisoners were already at the barracks.

In spring 1944, the camp saw the greatest intensification of incoming transports of people to be executed, following the judgments of German police courts in connection with partisan activities in the Lublin area. Because of his position and the function he fulfilled, Muhsfeldt always participated in the executions of these convicts. He obtained the money for vodka, of which he drank plenty, from “rustling up” the belongings of the murdered, and was assisted by the prisoners from his kommando. I am certain that Muhsfeldt was in possession of considerable assets thus acquired. When I was at the camp, Leichenträgers [corpse carriers] told me that Muhsfeldt, assisted by the slaves from his kommando, had reportedly burnt alive a woman in a crematory furnace who came in on a transport of partisans because she would not undress. This fact was widely discussed at the camp and was common knowledge.

The report was read out.