On 21 June 1947 in Kraków, a member of the Main Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, District Investigative Judge Jan Sehn, acting upon written request of the first prosecutor of the Supreme National Tribunal, this dated 25 April 1947 (file no. NTN 719/47), and 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), in connection with Article 254, 107 and 115 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, interviewed the inmate of the Auschwitz concentration camp named below as a witness, who testified as follows:
| Name and surname | Maria Budziaszek |
| Date and place of birth | 8 September 1920 in Kraków |
| Religious affiliation | Roman Catholic |
| Citizenship and nationality | Polish |
| Occupation | an employee of “Społem” |
| Marital status | unmarried |
| Place of residence | Kraków, Twardowskiego Street 115 |
I was incarcerated in the Auschwitz concentration camp from October 1942 to 20 October 1944 as Polish political prisoner no. 23359. During the first two months I worked in the field, and for the next two I was employed in the Effektenkammer [personal effects storeroom] supervised by Effinger. Later, I worked for a year in a kommando of about 500 female prisoners tasked with sorting underwear in “Canada” in the Auschwitz camp. Next, already in 1944, I was employed in Birkenau at section b FKL [Frauenkonzentrationslager, women’s concentration camp] in the kitchen, and from there I was taken to the punitive unit, with which I remained for the last three months of my stay in Auschwitz. From the period of my stay in the camp I remember very well the senior overseer Maria Mandl. I have presently recognized her beyond doubt in the photographs displayed to the public. She was actually a head of the women’s camp at Birkenau, where she supervised not only the prisoners, but also the work of female and male SS personnel employed in the women’s camp. She was a ruthless person; she treated the prisoners in a very harsh manner, as if they were not human beings. By way of illustration, I can cite the following facts: one evening in the summer of 1943, when our kommando, numbering some 500 women, was coming back from work in “Canada” in Auschwitz to FKL Birkenau, Mandl ordered a selection to be carried out in the main gate to the FKL. The selection was conducted by Taube and several Aufseherins. Because nothing was found on the prisoners during the search, Mandl ordered that every tenth woman be flogged. Acting in accordance with this order, Taube chose every tenth woman from among the prisoners who stood in fives, and flogged her on a stool by block 25. Mandl stood by the Blockführerstube [guardhouse] and watched it. Some several dozen prisoners were then flogged.
Maria Mandl in her capacity of Oberaufseherin took part in all selections of prisoners unfit for work. When a selection was to be carried out, all prisoners had to line up in the roll call square, each block separately, and everyone had to be present: both the healthy and the sick. A group of SS men accompanied by “functional” prisoners conducted the Sortierung. The prisoners who seemed unfit for work were then chosen, and it was enough to have swollen legs to be selected. The “functional” prisoners had to pull the selected women from the line. Mandl watched their work closely and if any of them omitted their friend or wanted to spare someone else for any other reason, Mandl would point to the overlooked woman and order that she be placed aside. All selected women were sent to block 25, from which no later than after three days, in the evening, the Sonderkommando [special squad] took them in cars to the gas chambers located by the crematoria in Birkenau. If some prisoner couldn’t go on her own to block 25 because she was too ill, then Mandl would order the women from the Sonderkommando to fasten straps around the victim’s wrists and drag her along the ground to block 25. I recall that during one such scene, Mandl turned to the SS man who was standing next to her and said with a sneer that it smelled.
Mandl would also send those prisoners who failed to appear at a roll call to block 25. In such cases, the entire camp would be searched, and when the inmate who failed to appear at the roll call was found, Mandl would send her to block 25, from which the prisoner – regardless of the state of her health – would be sent to the gas.
In other cases, Mandl would place such prisoners with the punitive unit (SK [Strafkompanie]). One very frosty Sunday in the winter of 1942/1943, Mandl organized a general roll call for the FKL which lasted from 5.00 a.m. to the late evening hours. All prisoners were then driven to the meadow in front of the camp, from which they were admitted to the camp one by one through the gate. In front of the gate there stood Mandl and her subordinate SS personnel. Due to freezing weather and exhaustion, many prisoners had already collapsed on the meadow. From among those who were admitted to the camp one by one, the numbers of all those who couldn’t walk fast due to exhaustion or illness were taken down. All those whose numbers were taken down were sent to the Revier [camp hospital], where the doctors segregated them and took the majority to the gas.
Mandl put me in the SK for stealing a loaf of bread at the time when I worked in the kitchen. I wanted to give this bread to an older friend of mine who worked in another kommando, in the field. The bread was discovered by the kitchen kapo, who informed Aufeseherin Franz about the discovery. Franz, in turn, reported me to Mandl. I was summoned to her office (nach Vorne), where I waited for three days for Mandl to see me, and she questioned me about the incident and placed me with the punitive unit for three months. That same day I was transferred to the block of the punitive unit, where I remained until the end of my stay in Auschwitz.
From the period of my stay in the Birkenau camp I also remember Aufseherin Brandl. She gained notoriety for beating every prisoner she chanced upon with anything she had at hand and setting an especially malicious dog, who accompanied her everywhere, on the prisoners. She beat my friend Klekowska with her keys about the head. I don’t recall overseers by the surnames of Danz, Kock, Bodem or Zlotos.
On 20 October 1944 I was deported from Auschwitz with a transport comprised of some 200 Polish women to the munitions factory in Dresden.
The report was read out. At this the hearing and the report were concluded.