59 Summer 2025 ith a substantial number of Holocaust-related books already published, among them at least dozens regarding the war’s subsequent trials of Nazis and their sympathizers, what could possibly be left to study? As this book illustrates, there is still room for more. Whether any such additions are useful for communication or legal scholars is another matter. Noël Marie Fletcher’s Reporting the Nuremberg Trials is a heroic, but ultimately unsatisfying, scholarly effort to highlight the interface between journalism and jurisprudence. “Heroic” in that she pored over a massive amount of archival documentation, accompanied by a remarkable number of interviews (mostly reported in the past, and a few in the present). The attention to detail is evident throughout the book, but too much so – which leads to the “unsatisfying” aspect. The book presents a realistic and quite in-depth picture of the Nuremberg “environment” (urban and demographic) during the trial, as well as of the German citizenry’s attitude toward the trial (mostly antagonistic), and the personalities involved in the trial (defendants, judges, and especially the myriad reporters). However, it is lacking in any serious analysis of either the reporting itself or the many novel, jurisprudential elements inherent in such a legal enterprise. Regarding the trial’s journalism, Fletcher does “touch” in passing on a few aspects of the reportage, but journalism scholars looking for analytical and comprehensive insight into the merit or substance of the news coverage will find the work severely lacking. On the other hand, the book is top heavy on how the reporters covered the trial and their sundry schemes to bypass or overcome the obstacles they tried to overcome. For example, Fletcher outlines the various restrictions placed on reporters and the physical limitations inherent in such a post-war undertaking, especially in light of the fact that hundreds of reporters were only able to use a very small number of communications channels. With only two telegraph lines open to the world, one reporter had his secretary send long biblical verses through both lines when Göring finally took the stand, so that the reporter’s own story would scoop his competitors (p. 90)! The book unintentionally props itself up to be read as a “primer” for journalistic initiative, especially in times of communication scarcity. However, the book’s ultimate focus is on what can only be described as “gossip,” or more charitably, “background material.” This entails, among other things, which reporters were sleeping with whom, Allies and German alike (admirably, Fletcher highlights the journalistic trials and tribulations of the relatively few female reporters in the face of massive male chauvinism); the biographies of numerous reporters, most of whom were relatively young near the start of their careers (e.g., Walter Cronkite and his wife Mary; Howard K. Smith; William Shirer; and even Willy Brandt); the travails of the news photographers (no photos were allowed inside the courtroom for most of the trial) and illustrators (trying to capture the visual aspects of the trial); the after-hours shenanigans of the reporters, having to overcome long days of trial boredom and general ennui, stuck in a bombed-out city for months on end (e.g., half a page devoted to reporters adopting a rat as a pet); the trial judges’ personalities; security precautions (there were assassination attempts and Göring somehow managed to commit suicide right before his execution); the defendants’ demeanor throughout the trial; and so on. As for legal aspects, there is little here to interest jurisprudence scholars. Fletcher does touch on the novel aspects of putting war criminals on trial for crimes that weren’t enshrined in law when they were committed. But these infrequent forays into the legal aspects of the trials do not present anything new, nor are they dealt with in any depth. To be fair, the book’s title makes it clear that the focus will be on journalism and not on jurisprudence; in this it certainly holds to “truth in advertising” (my only quibble: the book’s subtitle is Reviewed by Sam Lehman-Wilzig W Reporting the Nuremberg Trials: How Journalists Covered Live Nazi Trials & Executions By Noël Marie Fletcher Yorkshire, Great Britain: Pen and Sword History (2024, 232 pp.)
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjgzNzA=