German Warm Water Torture

Moving through Germany, Jim and his squadies came across a concentration camp, which had been left and abandoned by the fleeing Germans that had all but surrendered. The stuporous poor souls remaining inside the camp had no idea that the war was over. My father and his army colleagues broke open the high fenced and barbed doors to help what was left of those traumatized and emaciated people to get out.

One of the stories that seeped out of a place like this was the different ways in which the Germans tortured their inmates.

The one story of method, which has always stuck in my mind that Jim once told me about, was the warm water torture. And this is how it goes: when the powers that be in a place like this pick on someone that they suspect of having some sort of useful information, - usually just a ruse to try a new torture technique out to see how effective it was, - they would select a prisoner for ‘interrogation’. After this interrogation the selected person would then be told that they are going to be executed the next day! Along with some allusion of how it is to be carried out. Twenty-four hours later the same death expectant prisoner is treated to a repetition of the previous day’s cruel inquisition. Following which the inquisitors would then tell the captive in question that the execution has been postponed until the next day. This remorseless trial of abject misery continues indefinitely, which also includes other seriously disturbing mind games involving the unfortunate individual’s forthcoming expiration. The torturers, judging the efficaciousness of this torture on the inmate, keep the prisoner of war at the edge of their wits end through out, until the coolest or most insensitive of people are on the verge of a nervous breakdown or contemplating suicide.

Then all of a sudden the fateful day arrives, if the ‘victim’ is still alive! The sufferer is blindfolded, tied to a solid wooden chair, strapped into it by large leather straps around the feet, chest and hands, and then told what he or she has already been continuously led to believe over the preceding week(s); that they are going to be ‘executed’ by having their wrists slashed open with a razor blade.

For the poor sod, blindfolded and strapped down firmly into the chair, his or her heart will now be beating to its maximum, as the allusions match up to the rumours indeed! Together with sleepless nights and days of built up stress coupled to this moment, one of two things usually happens to these human guinea pigs at this dreaded breaking point: a stroke paralyses or kills; or a heart attack does much of the same terrible or fatal damage. But if this sordid build-up hasn’t affected you in the intended manner latterly described, then there comes the jug of warm water! At exactly the right psychological moment, one of the attendant German soldiers subsequently grabs one of your strapped down hands, turning it wrist upwards and then pressing his extended thumb down into your wrist, he draws his thumbnail slowly but firmly across the exposed, upturned under joint of soft flesh with his free hand, after which he immediately picks up the secretly waiting jug and quickly pours, gushing it’s warm water over your prone wrist, swiftly repeating the same procedure to the your other wrist. Still blindfolded you now believe that you are bleeding to death. If you aren’t scared into being dead, you’ve gone mad by now, and if you haven’t done either, God Help You!

~ N.W.
 

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