Home Maxwell Reminiscences of Dr Fredrick Töben

Reminiscences of Dr Fredrick Töben

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L-R: Fredrick, Carol, Mary, Jack, Kai, Peter, at a party in the German Club, Adelaide, to celebrate the life of Christopher Steele

by Mary W Maxwell, LLB

First, I am sorry to have to convey the news to you that our Fredrick has passed away at age 76 after a three-month illness.  Peter Hartung informed us:

“Fredrick will be remembered by his friends and supporters as a Gentleman with an enquiring mind who was not content to stand idly by and allow the endless vilification and false accusations against his beloved German people.”

To know Fredrick was to love him. I can say unequivocally that he was the most gentlemanly gentleman I ever met. He lived a quiet life in Adelaide. He like to be referred to as Dr Toben, and why not – his PhD was in Philosophy (and, boy, could he be annoying when catching you in any illogicality).

At one point in his career Fredrick lost his job as a teacher in Victoria, for being a stickler about something or other, and then got a job as a bus driver. I don’t mean to portray him as persnickety. He just always wanted to get it right. He had to get it right. Truth was his guiding star.

I think it was in the late 1970s that he became aware of the issues regarding Auschwitz. He wanted to get that right, too. This eventually led to a court case in South. Australia in which a person who claimed to speak for the Jewish community, Jeremy Jones, sued him by using the infamous section 18c of the Human Rights Act.

Fredrick was ordered by the Human Rights Commissioner Cath McEvoy to remove anti-Semitic material from his website. Fredrick wasn’t having it, as they say. He disobeyed and thus spent 3 months in a labor camp in the Clare Valley, SA. His labor consisted of painting the white lines on streets or painting fences. Not too onerous, but he would come home so tired that he would have to fall asleep and missed the dinner. On his release from jail he was a thin man!

Dr Toben did not get a criminal record from this imprisonment, as the contempt of court for which he was punished was a civil matter. But he did have a criminal record in Germany for breaching their law of “defaming the dead.” He spent time in Mannheim prison.

If I recall correctly, he also did time in London, a la Julian Assange, but it was neither a criminal nor civil matter. Rather he was being held to see if Germany wanted him again. The English court decided not to extradite him, as the UK did not have a similar law. Thank you, O Judge.

(Fredrick had been on a plane that refueled at Heathrow. When an announcement was made that the police were coming aboard to arrest someone, he knew it was he.)

I might mention a painful result of the Jeremy Jones lawsuit. Toben did not have the money to pay the damages and so was forced to declare bankruptcy. A friend then bequeathed him $75,000 to help with his living expenses, but he was ordered by the court to hand this over. Surely it must have caused great stress but you would never hear Fredrick complain.

Flipping through my emails I have just found this item from Fredrick, referring to 2003:

“And so, on 30 March I was in Jordan ready to join other human shields in protest at the impending US invasion of Iraq. I even applied for a visa at the Iraqi embassy in Amman but was advised that it was too late for a visit to Iraq because the war would start in a day, and other human shields, for example, from South Africa, were returning to Jordan. And although I met his wife and family, I did not meet up with imprisoned Revisionist Ibrahim Alloush who had been a part of a Jordanian-wide street uprising/protest against what the US coalition was doing in Iraq.” [Emphasis added]

I also found his message to me at the point at which his attempt to sue a newspaper for libel was being thwarted:

“Mary, in your reflections on my legal matter please consider the following:

“What are the implications of any defamation trial that some individuals fear the most? The discovery process! Think of what it would have revealed to me about Green Senator Christine Milne’s sources that gave rise to her initially targeting me; think of what The Australian newspaper writer would have to reveal about internal and external contacts, etc….

“I am reminded of my 2008 London arrest and sudden release after the legal decision was handed down that I would not be extradited to Germany, which was immediately appealed. I was to be released on strict bail conditions – £100,000, and reporting to the police and not to use the Internet nor to attend public meetings… Lady Michele Renouf quickly organized a conference in London at which Faurisson came from France, et al., and David Irving was prepared to let me stay at his residence….

“Then, while still inside, I was visited by the Governor of Wandsworth Prison, and the Government Prison Visitor also spoke with me. Then suddenly one late afternoon, after returning from exercise, I was advised to pack my things because ‘you’re going home’. To my question: ‘What’s going on?’ – I received a short reply: ‘Executive Order!’

“I then asked a certain gentleman: ‘What would you like me to do?’ His reply: ‘Leave Britain as quietly as possible’ – which I did, with the police farewelling me at the airport!

“Mary, in matters Holocaust our divide between legislative-executive-judiciary is a pure fiction, and it is then a clear maxim that ‘everything is political-everything is religious’, as the Iranians are fond of quoting. Going through the various judgments in my matter merely enables one to work through the sophistry that is at play when fitting a judgment to a political situation.”

I might mention that the way I met both Peter Hartung (host of the website AdelaideInstitute.org) and Fredrick Toben, around 2010, was that I heard there was going to be a freedom-of-speech trial and I assumed many law students like myself would troop gaily into the courtroom, in Victoria Square. Got there to find Peter, Fredrick, Christopher Steele, and hardly anyone else.

To end this GumshoeNews obituary, I can’t think of a more appropriate Biblical quote than the following, which I copied form Virtual Jewish Library:

The Book of Iyov (Job)

There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil. And there were born unto him seven sons and three daughters.

His substance also was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she asses, and a very great household; so that this man was the greatest of all the men of the east. …

Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them. And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil?

Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, Doth Job fear God for nought? Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face.

And the LORD said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of the LORD.

And there was a day when Job’s sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house:  And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, ….The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. …

While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house: And, behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped.  And said, Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.

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52 COMMENTS

  1. “sued him by using the infamous section 18c of the Human Rights Act.”

    I read the judgement of the Federal Court in that case. I was spitting expletives by the time I finished. That ______ of an alleged judge tried to elevate the ‘Holocaust’ to the level of ‘judicial knowledge’ by stating that ‘everybody knows that 6 million died and that there were homicidal gas chambers’. – The Hell with the evidence, “everybody knows!”

    Forget evidence or truth, the case is just one more embarrassment to the legal profession of Australia.

      • Well as per 18C “hurt” feelings is sufficient to get prosecuted. Specifically I think they use the term insult, humiliate or intimidate another person or a group of people. To a Jew questioning any aspect of the Holohoax, not matter how meek or mild, they find an insult so Whamo, they gotcha under 18C. He actually went to jail for contempt of court, not taking down his website which was one of the conditions of his 18C charge. He refused to take down the website so he served jail time for it.

  2. Some time ago I watched a wonderful video Dr Tobin presented where he visited Auschwitz and systematically and forensically provided evidence that the mass killings using gas chambers did not occur.Unfortunately I did not save it and it is no longer available.
    A truly brave and admirable soul.

  4. Mary, Peter Hartung, Jack Van Tongeron and all Fredrick’s other friends, I am in shock although I suspected that he may have been unwell. He did not answer my last email, which was quite unusual except that he had complained previously that his computer was playing up.

    I met Fredrick in Adelaide, along with the others mentioned above when Mary had her play of Martin Bryant’s court case acted out. Several of the audience and actors adjourned to Mary’s unit for a chat after the event.

    I found Fredrick to be a gentleman and scholar. Visited his neat house in the company of Peter and Jack, that evening and following Saturday or Sunday.

    On the first evening the subject of writing came up and I mentioned that I had written a book about my childhood town which had now been demolished. Fredrick took an immediate interest and asked if I would send him a copy on arrival home. That I did, and he supplied some suggestions of corrections and how to go about publication. I had not at that time decided to publish. I was glad of his help and eventually published that book “MEMORIES of KWINANA Final Edition”.

    We have maintained a friendship since, mainly by email but have met up in Perth. In my last email to him I mentioned that I was intending to do a train trip to Adelaide and planned to meet up with him.

    Good-bye Fredrick, I am very happy that we crossed paths, even if only for a short time.

  5. What to believe? I recently read A train in Winter. A Train in Winter tells the story of women of the French Resistance who were arrested and sentenced to prison and then transported to concentration camps during WW2; horrific treatment and few survived. You couldn’t make this up.

    • Getting caught up in the gas chamber debacle proves nothing but political naivete: There’s no getting round the fact that, under the auspices of the 3rd Reich, truckloads of Europeans, the majority of whom were Jews, were rounded into overcrowded prisons where they died like flies under appalling conditions.

      So far as the vilification of Hitler and Germany goes what tends to get “overlooked” is that, as the so-called allies were well aware of the situation throughout and made no attempt toward saving any of the inmates, they were no less guilty.

      So far as 20th century genocides go I would say that the episode has certainly been given disproportionate attention. e. g. prior to seeing this excellent doco back in 2004 I’d never even heard of the Armenian genocide !

      • The question that really needs to be asked is, are those who died at Auschwitz any more worthy of memorialisation than the conscripts who perished on the Russian front ?

  6. The main denial is that there were no gas chambers. I have an 86 years bowling mate who was a member of a Highland Regiment sent to relieve Belsen work camp and he states that there definitely was no gas chamber at that camp.

    I have read both the works of David Cole and Fred Leuchter, so I am certain there was no gas chamber at Auschwitz.

        • Diane , with all due respect , which comments in particular do you disagree with ?

          Let’s debate this in an open forum &, if I for one am shown to be wrong on some matters by provision of irrefutable evidence (or at least significant circumstantial evidence) , I will publicly renounce my previously held beliefs and thank you for setting me straight.

          Diane , to start with , I have posted a link ( at 10:09pm – in response to a query from Dana ) containing an article which I believe is extremely well researched .

          Which of the assertions made by this writer do you find to be false ?

          • Dear Troof abd Diane, there are 364 days in the year in which we can discuss Holocaust or anything else. Let’s use this one day to think about the man that Fredrick was. He was extraordinary.

          • Shall do Mary .

            It’s not something that can be resolved in the exchange of a few comments anyway.

            It’s best the we continue our independent analyses and bit by bit it’ll drip feed into the public domain .

          • I’m sure Fredrick would understand.
            “Fredrick will be remembered by his friends and supporters as a Gentleman with an enquiring mind who was not content to stand idly by and allow the endless vilification and false accusations against his beloved German people.”

            You see I speak from the point of the marginalised, the persecuted, the minorities, the violated, the mothers and their babies, the gypsies and my beloved desert family, and the victim survivors the MKULTRA’d the indoctrinated.

            “An estimated 500,000 Roma and Sinti were killed in the Holocaust. About 23,000 of them were placed at Auschwitz-Birkenau in Zigeunerlager (“Gypsy camp”), where the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele performed “medical” experiments on prisoners. Some 20,000 Roma and Sinti died or were murdered in the gas chambers there; 2,897 of them in crematorium no 5 on the evening of 2 August 1944, when the camp was liquidated.

            https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2013/08/some-lessons-from-history-have-still-not-been-learned/

            also Death Camps the final solution–the current agenda
            everything is infiltrated need a new lens.

          • Oh dear, Diane – this is precisely the diabolical “atrocity propaganda” [Sefton Delmer] that Dr Töben et al exposed.

            First of all, Amnesty has about as much integrity and credibility as the WHO, OSCE or OPCW.

            Too much and inappropriate to discuss here – we can continue with some questions and answers elsewhere over time.

            I will just leave you with a passage from “Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil” by Gerard Menuhin [son of Yehudi Menuhin]

            “Alone the fact that one may not question the Jewish “holocaust” and that Jewish pressure has inflicted laws on democratic societies to prevent questions—while incessant promotion and indoctrination of the same averredly incontestable ‘holocaust’ occur—gives the game away. It proves that it must be a lie. Why else would one not be allowed to question it? Because it might offend the “survivors”? Because it “dishonors the dead”? Hardly sufficient reason to outlaw discussion. No, because the exposure of this leading lie might precipitate questions about so many other lies and cause the whole ramshackle fabrication to crumble.”

  7. Those Germans are my kind of Germans. I was brought up to vilify Germans and Italians, not at home never, but school. They let us get away with cruel behaviour as long as kept in the school yard. I would use the slang terms too, but me not much after 12 years old. Gerry built and the WW2 weapons of war spoke to me of a different truth though the full reality came much later. Being stubborn too have even argued about the bs to Germans from their side, just surreal.Then there are evil one’s, we all have them and our evil locals to boot.

    Had a chat a some years ago with a JW German, after pointing out that his bible was worn and thumb marked on the old testament and not much on the new. He looked, paused, and then a huge grin broke out, the warmth I see in the picture reminds me, we had a wonderful conversation. He told me how the JW’s and everyone not of the ideal in Germany were persecuted during the war he just opened up. After a while the others with him wanted to continue witnessing(body language unable to join a challenging exchange), waited patiently though, till we thought time.

    I have a feeling of loss and lost opportunity now I will never meet Dr Töben
    One thing I have found with nearly all Germans is how very tight they hold their families.
    So condolences to the Töbens and friends, does not help in grief I know, but your very lucky to have had him around.

  8. If ever an example of fascism was required to call out the Australian Government for it’s part in deliberately limiting the public expression of free thought, then rule 18C is THE example.

    Brandis and Abbott had the perfect opportunity, in fact, Brandis even campaigned an election on being rid of rule 18C, yet both of them walked away from one of the most reprehensible, and worst of the worst bad laws to ever come out of that mockery of a place for law and order, called the Parliament of Australia.

    • For all their faults, at least Brandis and Abbott had the guts to bring up the issue & campaign on behalf of ridding us of 18C .

      Has any other leader / attorney general of either party had the balls to even bring up the issue , let alone loudly proclaim how it is a constraint on freedom of speech ?

        • Dinkum , I don’t have the exact wording of 18C at hand but from recollection , I cannot make a statement that will cause offence.

          For example , the Armenians claim in excess of a million of their kind were genocided by the Turks in 1915 .

          Let’s assume I were to say to a Turk that your forebears genocided all those Armenians. This would cause offence to the Turk (even though it may be true).

          That Turk could, from my understanding of 18C , take legal action against me for causing offence .

          Similarly, if I were to say to an Englishman that Winston Churchill (aka the Butcher of Bengal), was one of the greatest war criminals / genociders of the 20th century , that might cause him great distress (seeing as he’s been taught otherwise in his British schools), even though the statement is verifiably true.

          This Englishman could also litigate against me via 18C.
          Of course, in reality , the Turk, or the Englishman or any Muslim who’s been offended will not pursue the matter.

          However, there is one group , who have tremendous financial & political clout & if I say anything that doesn’t fit in with their preconceptions , my academic career ( assuming I’m a tenured professor) , goes down the toilet.

          If I’m a politician & I tweet something that’s not deemed kosher (even if I can prove it to be true ), my political career is over.

          This is the reality we live in here in Oz .

          We do not have the protection of free speech like the seppo’s do with their first amendment protections.

          We are effectively muzzled .

          • TV, you used two examples, the Armenians and Churchill – however, those two examples DID happen. The absurdity of the suit against Toben was a certain group was ‘offended’ that Toben was producing evidence that some things did NOT happen. They should have been relieved, not offended.

            I always felt Toben should have counter-sued for being offended that he was being demonized as having German ancestry and things were being imputed against the German people that weren’t true. – “I’m the one that is offended here!”

            Of course, it was an Australian court, so it would likely have been a complete waste of time and effort, but still, it would have created some very bizarre sophistry on the part of the judge.

          • Yeah, just imagine a submission that equated the ‘Holocaust narrative’ with a ‘Disease narrative’ that only affected Jews.

            “There was a terrible disease of the Jews that killed 6 million of them” – Crikey, that would put the fear into the Jews.

            Then you have someone like Toben do the research and tell them “calm down, chill out, yes, there was a disease, but it wasn’t the disease you have been told about.” And, more importantly, the actual death figures are incredibly inflated. The Jews had similar death figures of other groups that were exposed to the same disease (in this case WAR torn Europe).

            Well Crikey, thanks Toben for doing the research, we were going hysterical for a while.

          • apologies for the late reply.
            thanks for your answer, and for Terrys contribution.

            http://www6.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/legis/cth/consol_act/rda1975202/s18c.html

            the way I read it, as a layman, youre quite within your rights to make factual statements.

            I understand what youre saying about being a tenured professor or a politician, then again, we are also still living with the howard-beazley sedition laws..

            https://www.theage.com.au/national/sedition-provisions-to-remain-pm-20051115-ge18mh.html

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_sedition_law

            Ive not heard of anyone being convicted of that yet though, but like terry said ,

            “I’m the one that is offended here!”

            We need everyone to be more like Mary+Frederick…

            unafraid of facts, regardless of any threats 🙂
            bring it on!

  9. Mary / Aussiemal , you’re blessed for having met the courageous Dr Toben .

    His type are the ones I’m drawn to as reference sources for my information. ie: individuals that paid a heavy price for having the courage of their convictions & had well paying careers destroyed (think Dr Kevin Barrett ) , financially ruined & incarcerated ( Julian Assange on the latter & David Irving on both) and are still being subjected to ongoing harassment and ridicule by the ruling elite .

    These are the titans who will forever have a place in the pantheon of truth and decency .

  13. I see the Fascist has struck and removed at least two comments, one of them mine, and without so much as a beg pardon. And I believe BOTH comments were topic related!

    So it’s goodbye from moi. Enjoy your echo chamber!

  14. I am told that it is easy to send a greeting to 91-yr-old inmate Ursula. The rules did not say must be in German, but you could run it thru Babelfish.com for free translation so as to get thru for sure.

    Frau Ursula Haverbeck, JVA Bielefeld-Brackwede, Umlostrasse 100, D-33649, Germany.

  16. A Blessing In Disguise

    Although “Holocaust denial” laws have created physical and mental hardship for such scholars as Dr. Fredrick Töben, David Irving, Jürgen Graf and Dr. Robert Faurisson, they have actually created an interest in this historical period for people, myself included, who normally would not be interested.

    My first encounter with a prominent revisionist was when I phoned Dr. Töben at his Australian residence from my New York office, not realizing I was ringing him at 6:00 in the morning, his time. A few days later I learned from David Irving’s web site that the first person in the revisionist movement I contacted had been arrested in Germany.

    I was perplexed. Why would there be laws to sabotage historical research for Dr. Töben? His arrest had an impact on my own pursuits in historical research. What struck a chord in my new thinking about the Holocaust, in

    particular, was a point he made during our conversation a few days before his infamous arrest. When I asked him what he believed, he said “I don’t believe in anything. I want to know.” As simple as it sounds, that was my turning point in my immersion into historical revisionism.

    His words, “I want to know,” coupled with his arrest motivated me to become a web journalist and create RePortersNotebook.com, a collection of journalistic truths suppressed by the mainstream media. Its mission statement is the following: “The ramifications of dishonest news reporting divides people. Our purpose is to rectify false concepts in history writing and contemporary news reporting.”

    I am indebted to researchers such as Dr. Töben for the sacrifices forced on them, and for their courage in speaking out, at the risk of suffering physical and mental hardships. (And I would not have known about Dr. Töben, or his arrest, if I had not been exposed to the World Wide Web.)

    As we enter a new millennium, it is mind boggling that it is a taboo to want to know about certain historical events.

    Michael Santomauro
    New York City

    • Michael, thank you so much for your comment and link – ** http://reportersnotebook.com/ ** for those who missed it.

      So much to learn and what another great resource you have provided. I can’t wait to explore.

      In time I want to come back to this with quotes – including but not limited Dr Töben’s call for healing and forgiveness (amnesty perhaps) – he is not alone.

      The brain does indeed start to hurt – but oh how liberating!

  18. Fredrick Toben had a rigid mind on some subjects and intolerance to others who didn’t share his beliefs. He was, however, polite in discussions. He had the courage of his convictions especially when the government put him into the labour camp when he refused to remove material from his website after Catherine McEvoy made her decision against him in the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission. Others would have backed down, but Freddy Boy held his ground.

    His life was a life worth living and a life well-lived.

    Norm Barber

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