Nuremberg Trial Trivia

1. Which defendant, once Hitler's lawyer, was born in Karlsruhe, in south-west Germany?

From Quiz Births of Nuremberg

Answer: Hans Frank

Hans Michael Frank was born on May 30, 1900 to Karl and Magdaleina Frank. He had an older brother, Karl Jr., and a younger sister, Elisabeth. He was one of the earliest Party members, having previously joined a 'Freikorps' in 1919. During the war, he vehemently protested having his portion of Poland, the General Government, used as a "dumping ground" for Jews.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Before the Trial

Answer: Ernst Kaltenbrunner

Believe it or not, the man who the other defendants actually feared, the man who it was said even Himmler himself feared, was inconsolable during the early days of his detention. One person who worked in the Palace of Justice during the trial said that Kaltenbrunner was "the biggest crybaby of the bunch, next to Funk." Kaltenbrunner would later suffer two cerebral hemmorhages, delaying his participation in the trial, and desperately worrying Colonel Burton Andrus, who was in charge of the prisoners. They had already lost Robert Ley and secondary prisoner Dr. Leonardo Conti to suicide, he didn't want to lose another defendant.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial: Part 1

Answer: Julius Streicher

Goering himself apparently used influence with Hitler to get Streicher removed from his post. Streicher, the editor of Der Stuermer, a highly pornographic newspaper, was a vulgar, rabid anti-Semite, possibly second only to Hitler. Even many of the other defendants at the trial tended to stay away from him, he was disliked so much.

From Quiz The Nuremberg Tribunal

Answer: Churchill

Stalin and Roosevelt favored a trial as the only other option was summary execution. Stalin and Roosevelt thought that summary execution would appear as if the Allies were taking their revenge. It would also show disbelief in the fact that the Nazi leaders could be tried and executed fairly. Churchill feared that a trial would give some Nazi leaders an opportunity to engage in political propaganda.

From Quiz Nuremberg: The Trial of the Century

Answer: Party rallies

Party rallies were held each year to show the public how strong the Nazi Party and the German military machine were. They moved the people so much that many pledged to die for Nazis. Debate was illegal in Germany under the Nazis. Anyone who dared to do so risked death.

From Quiz Births of Nuremberg

Answer: Alfred Rosenberg

Rosenberg entered the world on January 12, 1893. Some of the buildings he designed are still standing in his birthplace - Tallin, Estonia or Reval as it was then (and often still is) called by the Germans. Although he never set foot on German soil until he was into his 20's, he was one of the earliest members of the German Workers' Party, as well as a member of the Thule Society, an occultist group centered in Munich. He was the only defendant at the Nuremberg trial to go to the gallows without saying any final words.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Before the Trial

Answer: Hjalmar Schacht

Schacht's score was 143 (His score was adjusted for his age). Interestingly, he told Gustave Gilbert, who administered the test, that he thought his age might hurt him, and that he had problems with simple arithmetic. (Funny that the President of the Reichsbank and Minister of Economics would have mathematical problems!) Seyss-Inquart had the highest "natural" score, with no adjustments made: 141. Goering followed closely behind with 138. Gilbert stated he was surprised when Speer only scored a 128. Julius Streicher, a former schoolteacher, had the lowest I.Q.: 106.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial: Part 1

Answer: 3

Martin Bormann, Hitler's Private Secretary, was tried in absentia. It is believed he committed suicide or was killed during the escape from Hitler's Bunker in early May of 1945. Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach, the armaments tycoon, was found to be medically unfit for trial, after suffering from a stroke and increasing senility. (His inclusion in the indictment was actually an error. His son Alfried was supposed to have been tried, and later was.) Robert Ley, head of the Reich Labor Front, committed suicide on October 25, 1945 by tearing a towel into strips and hanging himself from an exposed pipe behind the toilet in his cell. He had stuffed a rag in his mouth so that no one could hear him if he made any noise, then leaned forward and slowly strangled to death.

From Quiz Nuremberg - The War Crimes Trial

Answer: Hess spent most of the time reading novels

Hess claimed and then denied that he suffered from memory loss throughout the trial. Many thought he was mentally unstable due to his unusual speeches in the court and his general behaviour. Some suspected it was not genuine.

From Quiz The Nuremberg Tribunal

Answer: France, Britain, USSR, US

Each country put forward two judges, which all together made eight judges. Each nation was in charge of four separate counts. Count 1 was war crimes, presented by the Americans. Count 2 was crimes against peace, presented by the British. Counts 3 and 4 were crimes against humanity which was presented by the French and the Russians. The main judge for the Russians was Nikitchenko who was said to be under the watchful eye of his assitant judge Volkchov who was sent personally by the Kremlin to make sure Nikitchenko "behaves himself".

From Quiz Nuremberg: The Trial of the Century

Answer: 1945

In the same year that World War Two ended, 1945, the allied governments decided to hold the trials in one of the most important cities in Germany. The first executions took place in 1946.

From Quiz Births of Nuremberg

Answer: Fritz Sauckel

Ernst Friedrich Christoph "Fritz" Sauckel was born October 27, 1894, to a postman and a seamstress. He joined the merchant marines of Norway and Sweden when he was 15. Although an only child, he would go on to father ten children with his wife Elisabeth. At one point during the war, he desperately attempted to flee by smuggling himself into a torpedo hold on a U-Boat, but was reported to Karl Doenitz.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Before the Trial

Answer: 2

While being held in England for the main duration of the war, Rudolf Hess had stabbed himself in the chest, then gone on a hunger strike. Meanwhile, Hans Frank had tried, on different occasions, to cut both his throat and his wrists, but was stopped before he could do any fatal damage. (Although he did suffer nerve damage to his left hand and wore a glove while in his cell.) Only Robert Ley succeeded in killing himself.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial Part 2

Answer: Ernst Kaltenbrunner & Wilhelm Frick

Ernst Kaltenbrunner and Wilhelm Frick were 43 and 69 years of age, respectively, when they were hanged. The others were between the ages of 46-64.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial: Part 1

Answer: Ernst Kaltenbrunner

Kaltenbrunner took over as chief of Himmler's Reich Security Headquarters after the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich by Czech partisans in mid-1942. He was a latecomer to the procedings, having been hospitalized twice during the early stages of the trial for subarachnoid hemorrhages. Like Julius Streicher, the other defendants tended to avoid him.

From Quiz The Nuremberg Tribunal

Answer: Nuremberg had an intact prison while Berlin did not.

During the war much Berlin had been reduced to rubble. It was estimated that there were six thousand unrecovered corpses and At the time of the trial the local water was not safe to drink.

From Quiz Nuremberg: The Trial of the Century

Answer: The Palace of Justice

This is the same building that laws had been made in 1935 to reduce the Jews to second class citizens.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Before the Trial

Answer: 6

As written in Joseph Persico's book "Nuremberg: Infamy on Trial", there was a Protestant Chaplain, Major Henry F. Gerecke, and a Catholic Priest, Father Sixtus O' Connor, on hand for the defendants. When they met for the first time, Father O'Connor shook Gerecke's hand and joked, "At least we Catholics are only responsible for six of these sinners. Your side has fifteen chalked up against you." After the trial, no Catholics were left among those serving prison terms in Spandau.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial Part 2

Answer: Fritz Sauckel

Sauckel was the eighth man to go to the gallows. Ribbentrop's last words were "My last wish is that Germany realize its destiny and that an understanding be reached between the East and the West. I wish peace to the world." Frank, the only man to go to the gallows with a smile on his face, said "I am thankful for the kind treatment during my captivity and I ask God to accept me with mercy." The final defendant to be hanged, Seyss-Inquart, like Frank, had received Holy Communion and Absolution before his death. He departed this life after saying "I hope that this execution is the last act of the tragedy of the Second World War and that the lesson taken from this world war will be that peace and understanding should exist between peoples. I believe in Germany."

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial: Part 1

Answer: Constantin von Neurath

According the Nuremberg judges it was stated that von Neurath intervened on behalf of many Czechs held by the Gestapo and Security Police. He was also personally told by Hitler that he was not being harsh enough with the Czech population during his time as Protector of Bohemia and Moravia. This was a direct result of a complaint sent to Hitler by Neurath's deputy, Karl Frank, a fanatical Nazi. Neurath later pleaded with Hitler not to send Reinhard Heydrich to take his place. When this failed, he tried to resign, but this was not accepted. In the end, he merely left, his resignation finally becoming official in 1943. The revelation of these events saved his life.

From Quiz Nuremberg - The War Crimes Trial

Answer: Do not rescue crews of sunken ships except for captains, chief engineers or anyone else of strategic importance

This order was a result of the Laconia incident. The Laconia, holding 1800 Italian prisoners of war was sunk by U-156. After realising his allies were in the water, Doenitz sent two U-Boats to rescue them. Both submarines were attacked by Allied aircraft during and after the rescue operation. Hitler was furious.

From Quiz The Nuremberg Tribunal

Answer: November 20th 1945

The trial of the major Nazi war criminals ended on 1st October 1946. The whole trial as a whole (including the follow-up trials) officially ended in 1949.

From Quiz Nuremberg: The Trial of the Century

Answer: Hermann Goering

Hitler and Goebbels had committed suicide in April of 1945. Himmler, when captured by the British, also committed suicide. So when the trial began Goering was the most senior left. Although he knew a death sentence was imminent, he remained convinced that he was right in all that he did and said.

From Quiz Births of Nuremberg

Answer: Albert Speer

Berthold Konrad Hermann Albrecht Speer was born to Albert and Lina Speer on March 19, 1905. He was the middle of three sons. He admitted to one of his biographers, Gitta Sereny, that as the middle child, he never fitted in. His younger brother was his father's favorite, while his older brother was doted on by his mother. His only source of warmth was the family's Jewish nanny, Mlle. Blum.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Before the Trial

Answer: 5

Wilhelm Frick, Hans Frank, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Constantin von Neurath, and Artur Seyss-Inquart all either had their own practices or were part of larger law firms at some stage in their lives.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial Part 2

Answer: "Von Ribbensnob"

Born Ulrich Friedrich Wilhelm Joachim Ribbentrop, Ribbentrop actually convinced his aunt Gertrud von Ribbentrop to adopt him, so that the word "von" could be added to his name. (Her husband had just been knighted) He then went on to marry the daughter of a wealthy champagne merchant. He was not a well-liked man within the Nazi hierarchy. Joseph Goebbels summed it up by saying that Ribbentrop "Bought his name, married his money, and swindled his way into office." One of the most infamous pranks during the war was pulled on Ribbentrop on the occasion of his 50th birthday. He was presented with a beautiful casket, which, upon being opened, contained a few sheets of paper. When he asked what it meant, he was told the papers were the few treaties he had made that had yet to be broken.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Tyrants on Trial: Part 1

Answer: 3

Wilhelm Keitel, Alfred Jodl, and Hermann Goering, the "Military" men, all stated to the prison psychologist after their sentences were read that they knew death was coming, but did not expect to go out in such an undignified manner. They also submitted petitions to the court asking that they be shot as soldiers, rather than hung.

From Quiz The Nuremberg Tribunal

Answer: A film of the concentration camp at Belsen.

As can be imagined, this was not the defendants' finest hour. It was said that even some Nazi leaders had tears in their eyes. Other archives from Nuremberg included letters, written orders and items from concentration camps.

From Quiz Births of Nuremberg

Answer: Artur Seyss-Inquart

Born July 22, 1892 to Emil and Auguste Zajtich, Artur Zajtich was the last of six children. His older siblings were Hedwig, Richard, Irene, Henriette, and Robert. After moving to Vienna in 1907, the family changed its Slavic name to the more German sounding Seyss-Inquart. An avid rock climber in his younger years, he broke his own leg to free his foot after it had become wedged in a crevice, causing a pronounced limp for the rest of his life.

From Quiz Nuremberg: Before the Trial

Answer: Ernst Kaltenbrunner

As the end of the war neared, Kaltenbrunner threw his personal seal into an Alpine lake, and surrendered to the Allies under a false name, claiming to be a doctor. Not too long after, his mistress, who hadn't seen him in quite some time, recognized him in public, called his name, and ran to hug him. It was this that clued the Allies in to who they had in their hands, and he was put on trial. His seal was recovered in 1995 by a vacationing Dutchman. It reads "Head of the Security Police and the SD".

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