Scroll down for translation Letter asking for cyanide gas detectors to be delivered to a crematorium in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Translation: Re: Crematorium. We acknowledge receipt of your telegram stating "Immediate shipment of 10 gas detectors as agreed. Estimate to be furnished later". Concerning this matter, we can tell you that for two weeks now we have been making inquires of five different firms about the apparatus you want indicating traces of prussic acid [*]. We have received negative responses from 3 firms and we are still awaiting answers from the other 2. When we receive further information on this subject, we will let you know immediately so that we can put you in touch with the firm making this apparatus. Heil Hitler! [*]: "prussic acid" is a common German name for HCN, hydrogen cyanide gas which was used to murder the victims in the Auschwitz gas chambers. See e.g. http://www.xrefer.com/entry/644068 http://www.nsc.org/ehc/ew/chems/hydrocya.htm Document source: Central State Special Archives, file 502-1-313. See also "Anatomy of the Auschwitz Death Camp", Edited by Yisrael Gutman and Michael Berenbaum, Indiana University Press, 1994, p. 231.
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