Alma Soller McLay | |
---|---|
Born | December 28, 1919 Narrowsburg, New York, US |
Died | April 5, 2017 Torrance, California, US |
Occupation | Stenographer |
Known for | Member of the U.S. team at the Nuremberg trials after World War II |
Alma Florence Soller McLay (December 28, 1919 – April 5, 2017) was a member of Robert H. Jackson's team that prosecuted Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg after World War II.
Alma Florence Soller was born in Narrowsburg, New York, the daughter of George David Soller (1879–1928) and Margaret Slater Soller (1892–1990). She was raised on her parents' chicken farm with three older siblings, William, George, and Beulah. [1] She trained as a secretary before World War II. [2]
Soller began to work for the United States Department of Defense in 1941. At the end of World War II she met then U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, who asked her to join his team and document what would be the Nuremberg trials as transcriber, [2] together with Elsie L. Douglas. [3] Jackson's biographer, John Q. Barrett, said that McLay "probably never got the full credit she deserved for her work transcribing the testimony, often in various languages and in shorthand, and collating the evidence." [2] The nature of the recording technology used in the trials made audio records fragile, and the stenographers' work more critical in documenting the historic process. [4] [5]
Alma Soller later married Stanley McLay, an Air Force colonel and industrial economist, [6] [7] and they moved to Rancho Palos Verdes, California in 1954. She had three children, Derek, Murdoch, and Alma. [2] Alma Soller McLay was widowed when Stanley died in 1991; [8] she died in 2017, aged 97 years, [6] in Torrance, California. She was the last surviving member of the 18-person American team at Nuremberg. [9] [10]
The Nuremberg trials were held by the Allies against representatives of the defeated Nazi Germany for plotting and carrying out invasions of other countries across Europe and atrocities against their citizens in World War II.
Judgment at Nuremberg is a 1961 American epic legal drama film directed and produced by Stanley Kramer, and written by Abby Mann. It features Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Maximilian Schell, Werner Klemperer, Marlene Dietrich, Judy Garland, William Shatner, and Montgomery Clift. Set in Nuremberg, West Germany, the film depicts a fictionalized version – with fictional characters – of the Judges' Trial of 1947, one of the twelve Nuremberg Military Tribunals conducted under the auspices of the U.S. military in the aftermath of World War II.
Robert Houghwout Jackson was an American lawyer, jurist, and politician who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1941 until his death in 1954. He had previously served as United States Solicitor General and United States Attorney General, and is the only person to have held all three of those offices. Jackson was also notable for his work as Chief United States Prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals following World War II.
The Doctors' Trial was the first of 12 trials for war crimes of high-ranking German officials and industrialists that the United States authorities held in their occupation zone in Nuremberg, Germany, after the end of World War II. These trials were held before US military courts, not before the International Military Tribunal, but took place in the same rooms at the Palace of Justice. The trials are collectively known as the "subsequent Nuremberg trials", formally the "Trials of War Criminals before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals" (NMT).
The Katzenberger Trial was a notorious Nazi show trial. A Jewish businessman and leading member of the Nuremberg Jewish community, Lehmann (Leo) Katzenberger, was accused of having an affair with a young "Aryan" woman, and on 14 March 1942 was sentenced to death. The trial's presiding judge, Oswald Rothaug, was later tried at the Nuremberg trials and sentenced to life imprisonment. The Katzenberger Trial later provided a subplot in the 1961 film Judgment at Nuremberg.
Telford Taylor was an American lawyer and professor. Taylor was known for his role as lead counsel in the prosecution of war criminals after World War II, his opposition to McCarthyism in the 1950s, and his outspoken criticism of American actions during the Vietnam War.
Thomas Joseph Dodd was an American attorney and diplomat who served as a United States Senator and Representative from Connecticut. He is the father of U.S. Senator Christopher Dodd and U.S. Ambassador Thomas J. Dodd Jr.
Henry T. King Jr. was an American attorney who served as a U.S. Prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials in 1946–47. Late in his career, he became a law professor and an activist, writer, and lecturer working on international law and war crimes; David M. Crane has described King as "the George Washington of modern international law".
Superior orders, also known as the Nuremberg defense or just following orders, is a plea in a court of law that a person, whether a member of the military, law enforcement, or the civilian population, should not be considered guilty of committing crimes that were ordered by a superior officer or official.
Vivien Spitz, born Vivien Ruth Putty, was an American court reporter at the Nuremberg trials after World War II. From 1972 to 1982, she was Chief Reporter of Debates in the United States House of Representatives.
The following is a bibliography of works devoted to the Nuremberg Trials.
Lt. Colonel Douglas McGlashan Kelley was a United States Army Military Intelligence Corps officer who served as chief psychiatrist at Nuremberg Prison during the Nuremberg War Trials. He worked to ascertain defendants' competency before they stood trial.
Nuremberg is a 2000 Canadian-American television docudrama in 2 parts, based on the book Nuremberg: Infamy on Trial by Joseph E. Persico, that tells the story of the Nuremberg trials. Actual footage of camps, taken from the documentary Nazi Concentration and Prison Camps (1945), was included in this miniseries.
Horace L. Hahn was an American actor best known for working with Cecil B. DeMille on several films as a young man, including a supporting role in This Day and Age (1933). He also served in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II, and assisted Justice Robert H. Jackson as an interrogator in connection with the prosecution of Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg Trials.
Whitney Robson Harris was an American attorney, and one of the last surviving prosecutors from the Nuremberg Trials.
Francis M. Shea was an American lawyer, law professor and United States government official.
Hitler's Generals on Trial: The Last War Crimes Tribunal at Nuremberg is a 2010 book by Canadian historian Valerie Hébert dealing with the High Command Trial of 1947–1948. The book covers the criminal case against the defendants, all high-ranking officers of the armed forces of Nazi Germany, as well as the wider societal and historical implications of the trial. The book received generally positive reviews for its mastery of the subject and thorough assessment of the legacy of the trial.
Raymond D'Addario was an American photographer, known especially for his images of the Nazi leaders during the Nuremberg trials.
Robert G. Storey, Sr. (1893-1981) was a Texas lawyer whose legal career included being elected the president of the Dallas Bar Association, of the State Bar of Texas, and later of the American Bar Association. Storey was involved in the International Military Tribunal at the Nuremberg trials from 1945 to 1946. He spent much of his career promoting the rule of law in the United States and internationally with a dedicated focus on the advancement of legal education. Storey was a proponent of the "world peace through law" movement and maintained a lifelong interest in international law and international affairs.