What documents presented at the Nuremberg Trials record Frank’s signatures and the wording of the reprisal decrees?
Executive summary
The Nuremberg record contains multiple documentary avenues that preserve Hans Frank’s handwriting, signatures, and the text of reprisal decrees: chiefly the prosecution’s document books and exhibit series (which include copies of decrees and Frank’s own diary), the trial transcripts in which those documents are identified and discussed, and archival holdings now accessible through NARA, the Harvard Nuremberg document project, and the Donovan collection at Cornell [1] [2] [3] [4]. These materials show both Fuehrer decrees that defined administrative powers in the General Government and specific decrees attributed to Frank — for example, a 2 October 1943 order imposing summary death sentences for “non‑Germans hindering German construction” — while the record also preserves Frank’s testimony disputing some operational implementation of orders [5] [6] [7].
1. What kinds of documents at Nuremberg record Frank’s signatures and decree wording
The IMT evidentiary corpus assembled for Frank included prosecution document books and the prosecution exhibit series that together preserved official decrees, minute books and court papers, and extracts from Frank’s own diary — all of which were entered into the Nuremberg record and later published in the Trial volumes and archival microfilms [1] [2] [4]. The Harvard Nuremberg document viewer explicitly hosts extracts from Frank’s diary documenting “hostage‑taking and reprisal actions” and related administrative entries attributed to Frank [4]. The Cornell Donovan collection likewise contains trial briefs, document books, and interrogation transcripts tied to Frank’s defense and testimony [3] [8].
2. Specific decrees cited at the trial that bear on reprisals and Frank’s authority
The prosecution and defense repeatedly relied on Führer decrees and on internal decrees to define competences and responsibility; the Avalon Project’s published trial proceedings cite the Führer’s decrees of 12 October 1939, 21 March 1942, and 7 May 1942 as central documents delineating the Governor‑General’s powers and the placement of security functions — documents which were presented or referenced in the courtroom record [9] [6]. Beyond those higher‑level decrees, the trial record cites directives and orders attributed directly to Frank’s administration, including the 2 October 1943 decree mentioned in the Nuremberg judgment that ordered “any non‑Germans hindering German construction in the General Government” to be tried by summary courts of the Security Police and SD and “sentenced to death” [5].
3. How signatures and wording are established in the transcripts and exhibits
Transcripts of IMT proceedings and the prosecution’s document books constitute the route by which wording and authorship were fixed in the record: counsel and witnesses pointed to documentary exhibits in open court, the exhibits were entered into the prosecution series now held by archives, and Frank himself was questioned about specific decrees, sometimes conceding their existence only if the documents were produced (for example, his answers in the Avalon transcript where he says “I assume so, if you have the document”) [6] [9]. The published Trial volumes and the microfilm collections listed by NARA reproduce these prosecution exhibits and the nearly complete transcript of proceedings [1].
4. Competing assertions, limitations, and where to see originals
The record also preserves Frank’s attempts to minimize or disclaim operational effect: in his testimony he asserted that some orders “were never carried out” because they required concurrence from Himmler, a claim preserved in the trial transcript [7] [6]. Scholarly and archival projects — Harvard’s Nuremberg site and the Cornell Donovan collection — have catalogued the prosecution’s 174+ Frank documents and attendant pages, but locating a particular signed original often requires consulting NARA’s Record Groups and the published Trial volumes or the document viewers that host scans or transcriptions [2] [1] [3]. The sources consulted establish that the Nuremberg exhibits and trial transcripts are the authoritative place where the signatures, texts, and attributions were entered into the legal record, with the caveat that viewing the original paper files or high‑resolution images requires consulting the named archival collections [1] [4] [3].