European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 22, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Concentration Capwill testify at alleged nazi s trial n a amps Jim Derheim Bruno hitter walks along Railroad tracks near his Home. As a boy he initially escaped a nazi concentration Camp by jumping from a train. By David Tarrant staff writer for almost 50 years Bruno w. Ritter tried to forget his four years in hell. Not even his wife. And daughter knew the painful details of How he survived the notorious nazi death Camps of Auschwitz Buchenwald and Krakow. V but when Ritter who joined the . Army after surviving the concentration Camps read about an upcoming trial of alleged nazi War criminal Josef Schwammberge he decided it was time to step Forward with his Story and testify. A \ Ritter believes that Schwammberge was personally responsible for sending him and his family from their Home in Przemysla in Southern Poland to the polish. Concentration Camp . A he also believes Schwammberge shot his brother a wife to death in cold blood on a Street in Przemysla. Quot i owe this to my family. That s the reason fam doing it Quot said the 63-year old Ritter whose parents two Sisters and a brother died at Auschwitz. Ritter who lives in the bavarian town of Garmisch  Baden Wurttemberge state prosecutors office in Stuttgart Germany and offered to testify at the trial which began last thursday. A Schwammberge is being held in Stuttgart s High Security prison Stamm Heim where the trial is also expected to take place. During world War ii Schwammberge was an is lieutenant who commanded forced labor Camps in Poland including concentration Camps near Przemysla where thousands of inmates mostly jews were a interned and died. A statement from the prosecutor s office said that Schwammberge is suspected of personally killing at least 50 jewish  assisting in the murders of at least 3,377 others from 1941 to 1944. Unlike some previously accused War criminals. Schwammberge does not dispute his identity Only the jurisdiction of a German court to try him for crimes committed in Poland he admits participating in Only one killing under Quot special circumstances a German prosecutors said a a Ritter has no doubt about Schwamm Berger a complicity. In Early 1941, the nazi army blitzed into his Hometown of Przemysla driving out the russians who had been occupying the City. His family was arrested in a Roundup of jews and non jews and taken to Auschwitz the  some jewish ancestry. Only Ritter and his older brother Joseph who at the. Time was a polish officer in Russia escaped. The nazis ordered Ritter to work As a labourer sweeping the streets. He was at the Railroad station the Day the nazis herded his family aboard a cattle train heading to Auschwitz. It was the last time he Ever saw them. A Quot i heard my Mother hollering to me you stay where you Are. One of these Days you re going to see your brother and maybe you la survive this a everything a Quot Ritter said in. V v / \ Berlin Poland \ Buchenwald \ Warsaw q a germ any Auschwitz 1 min Urnberg s Krakow it s-1 Quot at that time i was 13 years old with my Broom. Sweeping a the Street and crying. I was seeing. This person a Schwammberge Page 14 the stars and stripes whose name is in the newspaper Quot seeing him with his dog chasing the people into the train. Get in fast a he yelled. And if someone was slow getting into the train he would get that dog on them and the dog chomped them up on the hand or leg. It was a German Shepherd. Name was Prince a Ritter said. Quot imagine yourself. You Are 13 years old and your Mother hollers from the train. You re crying and you see that Guy with the dog. You never forget. You see it. You see the person. You see the dog. And you see that everybody was afraid of that Guy when he was of the  a not Long afterwards the nazis ordered Ritter to the concentration Camp at Krakow Poland but he escaped by jumping  train. He could t find food while hiding in the Woods and so he a. Backtracked to Przemysla where he hid for a time before being captured again. This time he was sent to Auschwitz. A a Quot they put us into a formation to go inside a. Building Quot he said.  left Side was a Shower unit. On the right Side was a Gas chamber. You never knew who goes to the Shower and who goes to be executed with Gas. There was a person is standing. In the Middle with a whip. We were coming through single file. He would shout out. A left. Right. Left.  i happened to get on the Side that had the Shower units. The people on the other Side they never came out alive. Most of the people were Young children pregnant women older people a most of. Them that would not be Able to  was shuttled Between concentration Camps in Poland s Krakow and Auschwitz and in Buchenwald and floss Enburg in Germany. Quot the thing that kept me  that i was always telling myself one of. These Days you re going to be free. Don t give up. ,. He almost did t make it. In Krakow he contracted typhus. Quot so i had to be hidden under the Barracks. Because anyone who had typhus would have been a killed right . _ another time he was almost killed in the Krakow Camp after a guard ordered him to clean his Rifle. Another officer became furious when he saw Ritter a holding the weapon. He tried shooting the youth but the gun jammed. So he smashed him on the forehead and turned to the other prisoners and said Quot Bury  instead he was hidden in the dirt under the Barracks and nursed Back to health. He still bears a scar from the incident. By this Point the horrors of the Camps hardened him beyond his teen age years. He stole charcoal from the crematorium in floss Enburg to Sharpen his chisel for cutting the Cobblestone which was part of his prison work. He also buried Many of the Campos dead in mass Graves. A at that time you could t cry when you buried these people because the Gestapo with machine guns were standing Over the top of us. We had to line the bodies straight in a grave and put this White powder something like Lime on their bodies. If you did t move too fast or if you cried they d shoot you. Saturday