Description
Up for sale is an original March 15, 1940 memo from a certain infamous German state official during the Third Reich (whose name cannot be mentioned or shown) titled, "Messages from the Reich," which appears to have been distributed to members of the German state security apparatus. It is the first page of a longer document, and as the photo shows, it has considerable wear and tear around the edges. However, the letterhead is something I've only seen once, and what makes the document especially interesting is that it was used as an exhibit at the Nuremberg Trials by Defense Rebuttal Section head Robert Kempner. After the trials ended, Kempner took boxes of files back to his Pennsylvania home, apparently with the permission of the prosecutor's office. However, it turns out that the boxes contained some historically valuable items, including the diaries of Nuremberg defendant Alfred Rosenberg, which are now in the possession of the US Holocaust Museum. The memo up for sale is one of the thousands of documents from Kempner's estate, and it bears the colored pencil notations of Kempner and his staff from the time of the trials. I purchased this document, along with two others, on eBay in the early '90s shortly after Kempner passed away. I recently sold a top secret draft Wehrmacht document pertaining to Operation Barbarossa, and I still have a legal brief from Kempner's time as a high-profile lawyer during the Weimar Republic. As noted, the condition of the document is not great, but none of the paper loss affects the text--the photo says it all. Notwithstanding that, it is still an exceedingly rare example of a Nuremberg exhibit in private hands, and the fact that it was issued by one of the highest authorities in the German state makes it even more unusual. I am selling this item as an historical artifact relating to the Nuremberg Trials, and my listing it is not intended to condone or support the policies of the regime that produced it. As with all my items, it is guaranteed original and as described, and it is priced to sell. Free shipping within the continental US.
