JOURNAL OF CREATION 30(2) 2016 || BOOK REVIEWS
Death-camp doctors—
Darwin’s proctors
In 1935, Mengele received a Ph.D. in
Giants: The Dwarfs of Auschwitz anthropology for a thesis “attempting
Eilat Negev and Yehuda Koren to demonstrate that one could
MJF Books, New York, 2013 differentiate racial groups according
to jaw shape” (p. 70). He claimed that
“dental irregularities were hereditary
and tended to appear with other
Jerry Bergman hereditary abnormalities, like idiocy
and dwarfism” (p. 71). Mengele’s
T his book about a dwarf family
focuses on the infamous medical
research done by the Nazi doctors and
doctoral advisor, Professor Theodor
Mollison (1874–1952), even boasted
that he could tell a Jew merely by
how and why the research was done. A looking at his photograph. A year later
major reason for the research was an the 25-year-old Mengele was licensed
attempt to apply Darwinism to science to practice medicine. In 1937 he joined
with the goal of producing a superior the Nazi Party, and the next year he “… enthusiastic letter of recom
race. joined the SS. mendation won Mengele a highly
During the 1930s and 1940s, the Mengele’s work was highly coveted position as a research assis
Lilliput Troupe family of singers influenced by the Darwinian scientific tant at the Institute for Hereditary
dazzled audiences with their unique establishment. Throughout his life, Biology and Racial Purity at the
vaudeville performances. The only “Mengele instinctively bowed to University of Frankfurt … . ‘Men
all-dwarf show then, their small authority figures; a charismatic gele was now at the epicenter of
stature earned them fame—and, science teacher shifted his interest Nazi philosophical and scientific
ironically, ultimately saved their lives from the arts to the natural sciences” thinking, which held that it was
in Auschwitz. After descending from and an esteemed professor turned his possible to select, engineer, refine
the cattle train in the Auschwitz death interest to Darwinism (p. 70). The and ultimately purify the race’”
camp, the Ovitz family—seven of latter’s Ph.D. work was the inspiration (pp. 70–71).
whom were dwarfs—was plunged for Mengele’s genetic research in The authors describe Dr Mengele
into the Nazi horrors during the Auschwitz (p. 37). as obsessed with eugenics. He ordered
darkest moment of modern history. After two years of military service, a series of loathsome experiments on
They were separated from the other Mengele was wounded and reassigned the Ovitz family, and concurrently
victims on the orders of Dr Joseph to the Berlin headquarters of the developed a disturbing fondness for
Mengele (1911–1979). Formerly Race and Settlement Office, which his “human lab-rats”. Mengele “did not
“showered with flowers and besieged was responsible for the concentration want simply to succeed”, but to become
for autographs, these entertainers … camp medical experiments. Mengele so famous that “his name would be in
were now declared a … genetic error was then able to resume his close encyclopedias” (p. 70). He succeeded,
that the state set out systematically to relationship with his patron, Professor but not for the reason he had envisioned.
erase” (p. 91). Otmar Freiherr Verschuer, who had Due to the war, Verschuer’s
recently moved “to Berlin to take research on twins suffered a major
up his new post as the director of setback because his access to new
Enter Mengele
the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of research cases dried up. Verschuer
In 1930 Mengele enrolled as a Anthropology, Human Heredity, and therefore encouraged Mengele to
medical student at the University of Eugenics” (p. 72). Verschuer was a “apply for a position at Auschwitz,
Munich. He soon became intrigued “renowned geneticist and ardent where they would have continual
by the then burgeoning field of admirer of Hitler” (pp. 70–71). access to an unlimited supply of
Darwinism, heredity, and eugenics. Mengele’s doctoral advisor’s human specimens”. Mengele was
30
BOOK REVIEWS || JOURNAL OF CREATION 30(2) 2016
of twins, that he had discovered Epstein did get out of Auschwitz
among the Gypsies and Czech Jews alive, although the rest of his family
... . But now, with the imminent did not.
arrival of hundreds of thousands of An inmate artist named Dina was
Jews, research vistas of unlimited assigned to draw other inmates. Not
scope and variety were about to happy with her apparent preference
open up for him” (p. 88). for good-looking Gypsies, Mengele
After the mass extermination himself selected “elderly women and
of almost half a million Hungarian men … to acquire visual documen
Jews, the camp authorities turned to tation to support his racial theory”
the Gypsies. The Nazis had “been and to illustrate a book that he was
undecided in its policies towards writing (p. 100). Also, “a female Polish
them: should they be exterminated as prisoner took the hand and finger
an inferior race, … [or] locked away prints of all the inmates selected by
and sterilized?” (p. 119). The decision Mengele for his experiments. Mengele
was they should be exterminated as an instructed Dina to sketch their skulls,
inferior race, so in May of 1944 the SS ears, noses, mouths, hands and feet”
surrounded the Gypsy camp for his book (p. 100).
Figure 1. Auschwitz I concentration camp “… in an attempt to lead all 6,000
entrance inmates to the gas chambers. The
The end of the Nazi Darwinian
troopers, however, met with fierce
eugenics program begins
accepted, and on 30 May the 32-year- opposition—men and women
old doctor arrived at the Birkenau- armed with knives, iron pipes and During his year as the head
Auschwitz complex. Because Ausch any metal object, dull or sharp, that physician of the Gypsy camp, Mengele
witz was eventually no longer able they could find ... . As a result, the developed cordial relationships with
to deal with “the mass of racially camp administration changed its many of its inmates. He had special
undesirable peoples” sent there, the plan. Able-bodied Gypsy women “… fondness for the twin children
Birkenau camp began operation in were sent to slave labor camps, and and often smiled when they called
February of 1942 (p. 72). Gypsy men from Germany were him ‘Uncle Mengele’. But when he
Mengele was then appointed chief sent to the Wehrmacht to serve as received the final order to liquidate
physician of the Gypsy camp section, live mine detectors” (p. 119). the remaining 2,897 Gypsies, most
responsible for selecting which of the Mengele once confided to the of them women and children,
new camp arrivals should be sent to distinguished Jewish pediatrician he carried it out obediently and
their immediate death or be assigned Berthold Epstein (1897–1962), who diligently. … he now made use
to the slave labour section of the camp. was then imprisoned at the camp, that of their blind trust by enticing
Soon his “enthusiasm, ambition, his (Mengele’s) goal in the war was to boys and girls out of the hiding
charisma and cruelty set him apart use his achievements “as a springboard places with the same candies he
from the other death-camp doctors” towards a professorship … in the shape had offered them after painful
(p. 72). of a scientific treatise that would experiments. As he led them to
The ambitious Mengele was confirm … the indispensability of his their death, he ignored their frantic
soon no longer content to work as research”. pleas” (p. 120).
Verschuer’s assistant, as he had up “‘We are enemies—you will not get After the annihilation of the
to this point, but wanted his own out of here,’ Mengele bluntly told Gypsies, Mengele was appointed First
research project to better understand Epstein. ‘If you perform scientific Physician of the Auschwitz-Birkenau
race and Darwinism; and in the spring work for me and I publish it in camp. In this position he continued to
of 1944, as Birkenau was preparing for my name, you will prolong your direct a myriad of medical tests on his
a massive influx of Hungarian Jews, own life.’ As a result, Epstein new 350 Jewish victims, 250 of them
Mengele saw his opportunity. During extensively researched a deadly twins (p. 123).
“… his first year in the camp, he gangrene of the face and the mouth, Because his former mentor, Prof.
had mainly experimented on a few conducting tests on Gypsy children Verschuer, stressed that heredity can
dozen cases, most of them sets and adolescents” (p. 88). be most effectively researched on
31
JOURNAL OF CREATION 30(2) 2016 || BOOK REVIEWS
Figure 2. The main entrance to Auschwitz II (Birkenau) concentration/extermination camp
complete families, when Mengele The laboratories were well equipped, often ended up gruesomely maimed”
learned and “the cream of academia was (p. 87). When a doctoral student,
“… that a large family with dwarf present—people with an international Mengele published an article that
traits had just arrived he did not reputation,” allowing him to “carry argued
waste a moment. … Crowding out experiments on human beings “‘… it is not useful to take as many
around him, the Ovitzes did not usually only possible on rabbits” (p. measurements as possible: one
waste their chance to dazzle him. 86). Dr Mengele “felt no compunction must restrict oneself to the most
They answered his questions about experiments conducted upon the significant ones.’ However, with the
eagerly, and Mengele was indeed Jews. He argued that since they were all unlimited time, human resources
dazzled: ‘I now have work for doomed to die anyway … it would be a and research possibilities available
twenty years,’ he said joyfully” waste for science not to use them” for at Auschwitz-Birkenau, Mengele …
(p. 74). his brutal research to better understand unleashed himself and his team on
The first time the Lilliputs were evolution (p. 86). his subjects in a relentless quest for
evaluated at the camp clinic, the doc detail” (p. 105).
tors that examined them assumed this After inmate anthropologist
Science used to research
“… was a routine admission Dr Martina Puzyna had completed
Darwinian based racism
procedure. But when the examin the initial round of anthropometric
ations were repeated day after day, The research was completed by measurements, the subjects were
it soon dawned on them that they a team of medical specialists who examined by a team of prisoner
had been selected for some medical exploited the “unlimited pool of “… specialists: an internist, a
purpose. Josef Mengele was only subjects to test any new substance neurologist, a psychiatrist, an
one of dozens of doctors who or procedure that captured their ophthalmologist, a dermatologist,
performed criminal experiments eugenic interest, such as efficient, a surgeon, a urologist, and an
on the inmates of Auschwitz- cheap methods of implementing ear, nose and throat man—all of
Birkenau. Whereas German law mass sterilization and eliminating the them prisoners ... . While Mengele
protected laboratory animals, there mentally, genetically or racially unfit” reviewed all the results, he himself
were no limitations whatsoever races (p. 87). In the end, “thousands conducted none of the actual
on what could be done to human of young prisoners suffered radiation, examinations” (p. 107).
guinea pigs in the death camps” repeated injections with various The specialists
(p. 74). chemical substances, and operations “… evaluated the dwarfs’ entire
Furthermore, the working without anesthetics. Those who did anatomy by comparing the phys
conditions at the camp were ideal. not die in the name of German science ical features and psychological
32
BOOK REVIEWS || JOURNAL OF CREATION 30(2) 2016
characteristics to those of average- passing through the gates of sympathizer … was fined [only] 600
sized humans in search of Auschwitz-Birkenau” (p. 103). marks”. Then, in “1951, he became
irregularities that would account Professor of Human Genetics at the
for their arrested growth. … the … University of Münster; three years
The focus on the eugenic racist later, he was promoted to the position
dwarfs supplied samples of urine,
‘blood’ claims of dean of the medical faculty …
stool and saliva that were analyzed”
(p. 107). Although Mengele acted according honours were bestowed on him by
Dr Puzyna, although “ambivalent to standard practice, “he had no idea the American, Italian, Austrian and
in her judgment of Mengele’s work what he was looking for”. For this Japanese societies for [his work in]
… insisted long after the war that its reason, the repeated tests took large human genetics” (p. 209).
results ‘were of immense value to the amounts of blood for his research for Another example is Mengele’s
science of anthropology’” (p. 105). The no apparent reason (p. 103). Some gave academic competitor, Professor
Ovitz family blood to test for syphilis, even in the Hans Grebe, who soon obtained an
“… felt they were consistently children, including baby Shimshon. academic “position in the department
being violated for apparently “They, as well as the adults, all proved of human genetics at the University
needless and endless samplings, negative” (pp. 96–97). of Marburg” and in 1957 became
puncturings and probings. They “The Ovitzes were never told which president of the German Association
saw their medical files grow tests were going to be performed on of Sport Doctors. Ironically, the
them on any particular day, but … medical records kept by
steadily thicker, document by
would find themselves lying naked “… Verschuer at the Kaiser
document, yet they could see no
and face down on the examination Wilhelm Institute are not available
medically constructive or beneficial
tables, and the bustle of medical to researchers: in a bizarre irony,
purpose whatsoever behind it all”
activity around them only many decades after they were
(p. 123).
intensified their anxiety as they murdered, the Nazi doctors’ Jewish
The research goals included deci
wondered where precisely their victims have been transformed by
phering genetic differences of Jews,
bodies would be pierced or jabbed German officials into esteemed
Gypsies and others to determine their
or poked, and to what violent and patients whose right to privacy
resistance, or lack thereof, “to various
devastating effect” (p. 123). must be steadfastly safeguarded”
infectious diseases, and assemble
After the camp’s liberation, “in (pp. 209–210).
as much material as possible from In an effort to dissociate it
laboratory report-forms on samples of
genetically affected twins or families” from its Nazi past, in 1948 the Kaiser
blood, saliva, urine and faeces, several
(p. 87). The scientists felt the key to Wilhelm Institute was renamed “the
thousand lab results were found intact”
race was in the blood. As a result, in Max Planck Institute”. In June 2001,
(p. 91).
“… the 1940s, medicine was When the Russian army liberated the society’s president, Professor
obsessed with blood and its constit Auschwitz, the entire Ovitz family Hubert Markl, admitted that scientific
uents. It was generally believed that was still alive. After the war, Mengele evidence exists “proving beyond the
blood plasma retained all traces of “followed the Nuremberg trial of shadow of a doubt that directors and
illness and contained all genetic his former Nazi medical friends employees at the Kaiser Wilhelm
traits. German scientists considered and colleagues in December 1946 Institute were together intellectually
blood as a key to the differentiation with some degree of apprehension”. responsible for, and sometimes even
between superior and inferior Seven were hanged; five received actively collaborated in, the crimes
races” (p. 93). life sentences. “On the other hand, of the Nazi regime” (p. 210). The fact
This is why the … [rapid] social and professional is “The biggest crime in history was
“Mengele’s research relied primar rehabilitation of his superiors, … carried out under the direction of
ily on blood tests, X-rays and anth [and] their embrace by [the] post-war leading scientists and distinguished
ropometric measurements. He had Germany … academic community— institutions” who were under the spell
neither the time nor the inclination must have stirred in him considerable of Darwinian eugenics (p. 210).
to test his hundreds of victims envy” (p. 209).
personally but then, he did not For example, Mengele’s profes
need to—not with the abundance sional sponsor, Verschuer, the “head
of expert professionals among the of the genetic and hereditary research
hundreds of thousands of people program … was declared a Nazi
33
