Word: maeltzer
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...Kappler's superiors, Field Marshal "Smiling Albert" Kesselring and Generals Kurt Maeltzer and Eberhard von Mackensen, were originally condemned to death by a British military court on similar charges, later had their sentences commuted to life imprisonment...
...venom-charged atmosphere the prisoners themselves seemed the least concerned. Towering, monocled Colonel General Eberhard von Mackensen stared impassively at his judges. Wax-faced Lieut. General Kurt Maeltzer, wartime Roman governor, sat beside him, hunched and bewildered. Between sessions he went to earn cigarets by building a playpen for a British guard's baby...
Mackensen and Maeltzer were merely links in the long German chain of command. Their defense, of course, was that they had only passed on superiors' orders...
Coolly fingering the long, deep dueling scar on the left side of his face, Kappler told the court how, after long consultations with Mackensen and Maeltzer, he had combed the streets of Rome looking for hostages. There were not enough condemned men in the Regina Coeli prison, so he had had to fill out the list with 57 Jews. Asked why he had shot 15 more than ordered, he explained: "Somebody must have sent them as extras, I guess...
Whatever it may have thought of the guilt of Kesselring or Kappler (soon to be tried themselves), the court sentenced Mackensen and Maeltzer to death by firing squad. For once the courtroom was almost quiet, but from the back, where the widows were gathered, gratefully came one word: "Grazie...
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