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CHAPTER FOUR LIFE OUTSIDE THE COURTROOM Obviously, there was much more to interpreters' experience in Nuremberg than their place and performance in the courtroom. In an effort to give a well-rounded picture of the experience of the interpreters in Nuremberg, this chapter explores the more human part of then- Nuremberg stay and their lives off-court: how they spent their time and paycheck , where they lived and whatrelationships existed among themselves and with other court members. Interpreters' Pay The U.S. was by far the richest country among the Allied nations. Their salaries were high, though the distribution was unfair. The French, Russian and British economies had been destroyed by the war,so that it is not surprising that they were not paying as generous salaries as the U.S., and did not have as much personnel. As a result, the Americans ended up paying most of the costs of the language services, and this fact had a remarkable impact on the organization of the Subsequent Proceedings. Before the beginning of the trial the delegations agreed that the U.S., being the host nation at Nuremberg, would provide and finance the Translation Division.1 Each countrywould provide the personnel for language services into its own language, with the British and the Americans sharing the responsibility for German. Interpreters would be paid by the delegation that hired them, which corresponded to their desk (for example , France paid for the French desk, the U.S.S.R. for the Russian desk). As for U.S. personnel pay, from the beginning the U.S. Office of Chief of Counsel realized that the high-caliber personnel they needed would be entitled to substantial compensation. They knew that the 122 THE ORIGINS OF SIMULTANEOUSINTERPRETATION functioning of the system and the success of the trial itself depended upon the interpreters and did not want to economize on their fees. But the compensation presented problems. Charles Horsky, Jackson's executive , suggested putting translators and interpreters on the payroll of the Overseas Branch of the War Department; if that was not feasible he suggested creating an ad hoc sum from the President's fund.2 Neither of the two suggestions worked, however, and anarchy ruled at the U.S. payroll office. There were no standards for pay. Most of the time, the procedure for U.S. personnel was to continue the person 's former pay, which was an unfair system. The order read: Employees of the State Department or other governmental agencies who are recruited may come on temporary duty and in this case would continue to be paid by their present employer.3 With this method, an interpreter hired as Army PFC (private first class, the lowest U.S. Army grade) would receive about $85 a month, and would sit next to, and do the same job as, the top legal expert from the Department of Justice, hired at the top civil service salary of $10,000 per year.4 Later on, when the division realized that interpreters needed to be paid enough so that their services could be retained, the salaries were increased. This was the suggestion Alfred Steer, then Head of the Translation Division, put forward in 1946 in the document "Simultaneous Multi-Lingual Interpreting System," where he suggested paying interpreters between CAP 9 and CAP 11. CAP (clerk administrative fiscal) was the now outmoded way to classify civil service employees. After his suggestion, the interpreters usually received a CAP-11 pay, which at the time was relatively high. CAP 1, the lowest grade, corresponded to $500-$640 a year, CAP 2 about $200 more, and the highest level was CAP 15, which was paid around $12,000 a year. For comparison , "in the late 1940's and early 1950's fees for interpreting were generally $25 per day in 'large teams,' and $36-40 in small teams."5 The personnel index cards of some Nuremberg interpreters show that most of them in 1945 were paid between $3,000 and $4,500, with the exception of George (Youri) Khlebnikov ($1,200) and Haakon Chevalier ($6,230). Siegfried Ramler remembers being given the CAP-11 rate, and being paid a yearly salary of about $3,000.6 Frederick Treidell remembers that some interpreters, including himself, who were hired as CWS 9 (Continental Wage Schedule), advanced to CWS 11 after a few months, which mainly meant better accommodations, especially at the Grand Hotel.7 U.S. interpreters and court personnel were paid in special occupation dollars...

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