Nazi surgical set withdrawn from auction

Philippine Times (IANS) Friday 10th February, 2012

A set of surgical tools once used by a Nazi war criminal was withdrawn a day ahead of its scheduled auction Saturday following phone and e-mail threats.

The wooden box of tools belonged to Anton Burger, a Major in the German dictator Adolf Hitler's paramilitary organisation Schutzstaffel (SS), who worked at the Theresienstadt concentration camp between July 1943 and February 1944, the Daily Mail reported.

An estimated 140,000 Jews were held and 33,000 of them killed at the camp and it is believed that the tools were used in the Nazi's brutal experiments on prisoners.

The set was to go under the hammer at Villa Hall Auctions in Bude, Cornwall.

The police said the messages prompted safety concerns for staff and there would be a police presence at the auction even though the controversial lot has been withdrawn.

Disguised as a music box, the set contains instruments that would have been used in amputations, including a saw and scalpels. It belonged to the late Jewish man whose wife is the current owner.

The kit's case contains scissors, scalpels, and saw-like knives. The equipment was originally made for Anton Burger, the commandant of World War II concentration camp Theresienstadt.