Looking Back

From the William Davidson Digital Archive of Jewish Detroit History 

accessible at www.djnfoundation.org

110 | MAY 18 • 2023 

The Nuremberg Trials
T

he JN recently published an obituary for Ben Ferencz on April 20. After 
a memorable life, Ferencz passed away at 103. He was the last surviving 
prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials, 1945-1949.
The Nuremberg Trials were conducted in the immediate aftermath of World 
War II by an ad hoc International Military Tribunal. After WWII ended, the vic-
torious Allied powers — France, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and the United 
States — organized and administered trials for 197 German Nazi Party and mili-
tary leaders such as Hermann Goring, Rudolf Hess and Albert Speer. All were tried 
for war crimes and crimes against humanity; most of them were convicted. 
Ferencz was the chief prosecutor for 20 members of the Einsatzgruppen, the 
Nazi SS’ mobile death squads. Closely following German troops as 
they occupied Poland, vast areas of the Soviet Union, Hungary, the 
Ukraine and even into North Africa, the Einsatzgruppen were among 
the worst of the worst. They formed mobile killing units that murdered 
up to 2 million Jews, as well as thousands upon thousands of others, 
including political opponents, Poles, Russians and Roma. 
A graduate of Harvard Law School, at the age of 27, Ferencz was 
given a significant task: Holocaust crimes were at the core of his 
trial portfolio. But he declared, “Vengeance is not our goal.
” Rather, 
“We ask this court to affirm by international penal action, man’s right to live in 
peace and dignity, regardless of his race or creed.
” 
With this beginning, Ferencz went on to lead a storied career in international 
law and negotiations.
The Nuremberg Trials were a globally watched affair, where surviving instiga-
tors of World War II and the “Final Solution” were on trial for their lives, and the 
world heard about the horrors of the Holocaust. I wondered what stories about 
the trials might be in the William Davidson Digital Archive of Jewish Detroit 
History. There were a few surprises.
The first surprise was that only 250 pages in the Archive mention the 
Nuremberg Trials, and only 29 pages from the 1940s, when they were held. 
Considering the monumental legal precedent and the global newspaper reporting, 
I expected to find much greater coverage.
My second surprise was that the Detroit Jewish Chronicle “stole the show.
” It 
had a correspondent at War Crimes Trials in Germany, Irving Hayett. A court 
reporter for the American War Crimes Commission for the War Crimes Trials in 
Frankfort, Germany, Hayett agreed to send the Chronicle exclusive reports about 
the Frankfort Trials (Jan. 18, 1946). These trials were subsidiary to the main trials 
in Nuremberg. 
Hayett sent 30 reports to the Chronicle. Rather than stories about prominent 
Nazis like Goring or Speer, he reported on the prosecution of Nazis involved in 
such crimes as the Malmedy Massacre of U.S. soldiers during the famous Battle of 
the Bulge and the Mauthausen Concentration Camp Case. 
The Nuremberg Trials still resonate today. For example, the obituary in the JN 
for Holocaust survivor Howard Triest notes that, as an interpreter at Nuremberg, 
Triest was a “Witness to History” (May 19, 2016, JN). Sara Bloomfield wrote about 
the trials’ meaning as well as that of the Eichmann Trial (June 23, 2011, JN). 
Let us hope that the Nuremberg Trials are remembered, and that we won’t have to repeat them in the future. 

Want to learn more? Go to the DJN Foundation archives, available for free at www.djnfoundation.org.

Mike Smith
Alene and 
Graham Landau 
Archivist Chair

