After two years had gone by without anything special happening, suddenly a strange condition came over me. I became very irritable, nervous, and excited. I couldn’t stand doing any work, I was a tailor at the time, and I had enjoyed it. However, I was unable to eat. Every bite I forced down my throat came back up again. I couldn’t read anything anymore and I couldn’t concentrate at all. Like a wild animal I paced rapidly back and forth in my cell. I couldn’t sleep anymore. Up until then, 1 always slept deeply and almost dreamlessly through the whole night. But now 1 had to get up and pace back and forth without finding any rest. When I finally did drop on my bed, because I was exhausted, and fell asleep, I would awake after a short time out of a confused nightmare bathed in sweat. In these nightmares, I was constantly persecuted, beaten, or shot to death, or I was plunging into a deep abyss. Those nights became torture to me. Hour after hour, 1 heard the tower clock strike. The closer the morning approached, the more I dreaded the coming day and the people I would have to see again, and I wished 1 wouldn’t see anyone anymore. With all my power I tried to pull myself together, but 1 just couldn’t fight it. I wanted to pray, but all 1 could manage was a sad, fearful mumbling. 1 had forgotten how to pray; I could no longer find the way to God.
In that state of mind I believed that God didn’t want to help me anymore because I had left him. My officially leaving the Church in 1922 tortured me. And yet, this was only the result of a condition which existed since the end of the war. Even though it happened gradually, I had already cut the ties to the Church during the last years of the war. 1 reproached myself bitterly for not having followed the will of my parents, for not becoming a priest. It was strange how all of that tortured me. My mental agitation grew from day to day, in fact hour to hour. I was close to going raving mad. Physically, I was deteriorating more and more. My foreman noticed my absentmindedness, which I had never shown; I did even the simplest things wrong. And although 1 worked like a dog, I just couldn’t complete my quota. For several days now I had fasted because I assumed
I would be able to eat again after that. I was caught dumping my lunch into the garbage by a guard. Even the guard who normally did his job in a tired and indifferent manner and hardly ever cared about the prisoners noticed my behavior and appearance. He himself told me later that he had watched me closely.
I was taken immediately to the doctor. This doctor, an old gentleman who had been practicing in the institution for decades, listened patiently to me, leafed through my files, and said with the greatest calm, “Prison psychosis. That’ll take care of itself. It’s not so bad!” I was put into an observation cell in the prison hospital, received an injection, and was wrapped in cold towels, after which I immediately sank into a deep sleep. During the following days they put some tranquilizers into my hospital food. My general state of excitement ebbed and I recovered. By my own wish I was returned to my cell. They had intended to put me in a multiple cell, but I had asked to remain alone. During those days the warden advised me that because of my good conduct and work record I was put into the second step and I would receive various privileges.
I was now allowed to write monthly, I could receive as much mail as was sent to me, and I was allowed to keep flowers on my window sill. I was allowed to have a light on until 10 p. m, and could, if I wanted, get together for hours with other prisoners on Sundays and holidays. This ray of hope, the anticipation of all the privileges, helped me to get over my state of depression more than all the tranquilizers. However, the deepest impressions of this condition stayed with me for a long time.
There are things between heaven and earth which one does not experience in the course of the day, about which one entertains serious thoughts when completely alone. Is it possible to communicate with the dead?
In my hours of greatest agitation, before my thoughts became confused, I often saw my parents standing before me in the flesh and I spoke with them as if I were still under their care. To this day I cannot find clarity about the connection between these things. And in all my years I have never spoken about these occurrences to anyone.
In the later years of my imprisonment I was able to observe prison psychosis. Many cases wound up in the padded cell; several of them completely lost their minds. The prisoners I knew who went through this stir-craziness and survived were, however, shy and depressed and pessimistic for a long time afterwards. Some of them never lost their depression. Most of the prisoner suicides that I observ'ed there I attribute to prison psychosis. In this condition all rational thoughts and inhibitions which in normal life prevent suicide fall away. The tremendous agitation which rages through a human drives him to the outer limits of suicide in order to end the torture and find peace! Based on my experiences, the attempt to fake mental breakdown and insanity in order to escape imprisonment is very rare in penal institutions because from the moment of transfer to a mental institution, the term of sentence is suspended until the patient is again able to serve his term. He has to return or remain in that mental institution the rest of his life.
And strangely enough, most prisoners have an almost superstitious fear of becoming insane! After this low, this breakdown, my life in prison passed without particular incident. I became more and more calm and clear-thinking. In my free time I eagerly studied English. I even had textbooks sent to me. Later I had them regularly send me books and magazines in English, so that in about one year I learned this language without anyone helping me. This was a terrific discipline for my mind. I continually received good books on all subjects from fellow soldiers and acquaintances. I was particularly interested in history, ethnology,* and genetics. I enjoyed reading these the most. On Sundays I played chess with those prisoners with whom I got along well. This game is a rather serious mental duel and is particularly suited to exercise the mind and to freshen it up, since the mind is constantly threatened by the monotony of life behind bars. My contact with the outside world increased and was more varied by the letters, newspapers, and magazines that I now constantly received, which was a welcome new mental stimulus. If every once in a while a blue mood came over me, then just the memory of my near mental breakdown acted like a whip and caused the cloud that had appeared to vanish quickly. The fear of a repetition was too strong.
1. Most Nazis had an obsession about racial purity and studied ethnology extensively.
World History
