Auschwitz included two more camps in which prisoners were used for forced labor and strictly for annihilation. Auschwitz II also named Auschwitz-Birkenau was constructed on October 1941. It was ruled by the order of Heinrich Luitpold Himmler commander of the "Schutzstaffel" more common to be known as the SS (Protection Squadron), and was located in the village of Birkenau, near the Polish city of Oswiecim. Himmler was known to be as the most powerful man in Nazi Germany and one of the people who was responsible for the Holocaust. Together this combination was the largest of all the Nazi death camps across Europe could hold up to 150,000 inmates at any given time. Trains where the number one source of transfers done by the Nazis. The trains …show more content…
Due to deportations from all of those countries, the German plan to murder the Jews of Europe achieved its highest goal. In mid November of 1943, the SS ordered that Auschwitz II -Birkenau and Auschwitz III – Monowitz would become independent concentration camps. Auschwitz I remained under the SS Garrison commander of all SS units assigned to Auschwitz and was considered the dominant one of all commandments. SS Garrison was made up of Germans who held German citizenships. It also included SS men who previously had a citizenship in occupied countries or in the Third Reich countries like in Romania, Slovakia and Hungary. SS offices that held prisoners records and valuables along those who managed prisoners labor deployment continued to centrally run from Auschwitz I. On November 1944, Auschwitz II and Auschwitz I was reunified. (Auschwitz-Birkenau: History & …show more content…
Zyklon-B gas was introduced into this concentration camp system, which meant only one thing. Murder. They have disguised the chambers as big holy shower rooms so that it would trick the people into thinking they were going to just shower. The Nazi's camouflage was very successful in misleading the Jews until the very last moment. Rumors about the death camps were met with skepticism. No one with any common sense could believe such gruesome acts were carried out. Unfortunately the success of the gas has become permanent for all gas chambers of Auschwitz because it killed over hundreds of people in just minutes. And it was the perfect killling machine under disguise. Crematory ovens were also built around March of 1943 to get rid of all the corpses left behind or for strict annihilation. The Nazi's have operated the gas chambers up until Fall of 1944. On October 7,1944, hundred of prisoners were assigned to get cremated at the crematory. Once they have realized they were going to get killed, the prisoners stood up against the SS guards. Three of the SS guards were killed and the prisoners blew up the crematorium and the gas chamber. The way they were able to get the explosives was by smuggling it through Jewish women into the camp who were originally assigned for forced labor at a nearby army ground. The Germans of course retaliated back and killed everyone involved in the scheme. The Jewish
In this paper, we will explore the camp that is Bergen-Belsen and its workers, campy system, liberation and trial.
“If there is a God, he will have to beg my forgiveness.” (Quote from concentration) This quote was carved into the wall by a Jewish prisoner. Kaiserwald was one of many concentration camps used for the destruction of the Jewish race during the holocaust.
Nearly all of the deportees who were sent to the centers were instantaneously guided to the gas chambers to die, except for a select few who were chosen to be sonderkommandos. Over two million Jews were murdered inside killing centers either by smothering with poison gas or by shooting with guns (Killing Centers ). The gas-van was a product of the Third Reich; it consisted of a van with a gas-tight cabin attached on its understructure used to kill victims by the motor-exhausts led into that cabin (The Development of the Gas-Van in the Murdering of the Jews). The Germans executed over 150,000 people at Chelmno between December 1941 and March 1943 and then again in June and July 1944 by means of gassing vans (Killing Centers ). The Germans also found the use of gas chambers to be more effective and usually killed thousands of people daily. Within minutes of being inside a gas chamber, pris...
While being forced to live in Auschwitz they endured many cruel and harsh punishments. The main form of punishment was the gas chambers. These chambers were cells that were made underground and were able to be sealed. Zyklon-B was the poison used to gas and kill the Jewish people. “It takes about 10 minutes to kill 2,000 to 3,000 people in the gas chamber.” (Saldinger p.57) After gassing they would then be extracted from the chamber and taken to the crematorium where the bodies would be disposed of. Sometimes it wasn’t even the guards who would dispose of the bodies, most of the time it was the prisoners who were forced to extract their own people from the chambers. This was just one of the many forms of punishment; there were many more and some were just as bad.
In 1933, Heinrich Himmler, the Chief of Police in Munich at the time, conversed with officials of a abandoned gunpowder factory, later, Himmler traveled to this factory to see if it could hold prisoners. In that same year, the first elimination camp was opened. The building of Dachau, concentration camp, led to the construction of hundreds of other camps used to eliminate the Jews.
Thousands upon thousands of innocent Jews, men, women, and children tortured; over one million people brutally murdered; families ripped apart from the seams, all within Auschwitz, a 40 square kilometer sized concentration camp run by Nazi Germany. Auschwitz is one of the most notorious concentration camps during WWII, where Jews were tortured and killed. Auschwitz was the most extreme concentration camp during World War Two because innumerable amounts of inhumane acts were performed there, over one million people were inexorably massacred, and it was the largest concentration camp of over two thousand across Europe.
The Third Reich sought the removal of the Jews from Germany and eventually from the world. This removal came in two forms, first through emigration, then through extermination. In David Engel’s The Holocaust: The Third Reich and the Jews, he rationalizes that the annihilation of the Jews by the Germans was a result of how Jews were viewed by the leaders of the Third Reich-- as pathogens that threatened to destroy all humanity. By eliminating the existence of the Jews, the Third Reich believed that it would save the entire world from mortal danger. Through documents such as Franzi Epsteins’s, “Inside Auschwitz-A Memoir,” in The Jew in the Modern World: A Documentary History by Paul Mendes-Flohr and Jehuda Reinharz, one is able to see the struggle of the Jews from a first-hand account. Also, through Rudolf Hoess’s “Commandant of Auschwitz,” one is able to see the perspective of a commandant in Auschwitz. In Auschwitz: A History, Sybille Steinbacher effectively describes the concentration camp of Auschwitz, while Hermann Langbein’s People in Auschwitz reflects on Rudolf Hoess’s power and control in Auschwitz as commandant. Through these four texts, one is able to see the effects that the Third Reich’s Final Solution had on the Jews and the commandants.
In 1943 or as you may know it as The Holocaust, there were many different ways they executed the people at the Auschwitz camp, including hanging, shooting their heads or even letting them starve to death. But I'm not going to talk about them. This may tickle your fancy or wreck with your emotions after seeing the movie. I'm going to be talking about the Gas Chamber. The Gas Chamber is probably the worst place to be EVER, because you're going to be standing in a grey metal room ,butt naked surrounded by hundreds, even thousands of other people. Everyone is crammed inside the room as Cyclone B (a highly used deadly mixture) was sprayed into the room, causing you to either burn to death, or have to sit around dying slowly over an amount of days
The Auschwitz complex was located in Poland and was composed of three main camps (Auschwitz). Auschwitz I, the central camp, was constructed in 1940 and covered approximately 15 square miles (Auschwitz). Auschwitz II, Auschwitz- Birkenau, was constructed in 1941 and became the extermination camp of the Auschwitz complex. In 1943, four large crematorium buildings were constructed (Auschwitz). The Auschwitz-Birkenau crematoriums were the targets of the proposed bombings during WWII. . Auschwitz III was constructed in 1943 and was primarily a labor camp (Auschwitz). These camps composed the largest and most infamous Nazi death camp.
In the film “A Day in Auschwitz” we learn about a woman named Kitty Hart, a holocaust survivor that was forced into Auschwitz only at the age of sixteen. In present day; we observe Kitty and two other young girls (Lydia and Natalia) walk around the camp while also being educated on the horrors that took place in auschwitz, and Kitty’s struggle for survival. The documentary also mentions Kitty’s mother, a smart, skilled, and talented woman that helped both her and her daughter escape Auschwitz.
After World War II the world began to here accounts of the atrocities and crimes committed by the Nazi’s to the Jews and other enemies of the Nazis. The international community wanted answers and called for the persecution of the criminals that participated in the murder of millions throughout Europe. The SS was responsible for playing a leading role in the Holocaust for the involvement in the death of millions of innocent lives. Throughout, Europe concentration camps were established to detain Jews, political prisoners, POW’s and enemies of the Third Reich. The largest camp during World War II was Auschwitz under the command of SS Lieutenant Colonel Rudolf Hoess; Auschwitz emerged as the site for the largest mass murder in the history of the world. (The, 2005)
The gas chambers were effective in executing swathes of prisoners at a time, and while the disposal of their corpses was not entirely considered good, it still created a machine that allowed the Nazis to achieve their mission with more
The holocaust was a horrific period of time where unbelievable criminal acts were carried out against the Jews, Gypsies, and other racial gatherings. These defenseless individuals were sent from unsanitary ghettos to death camps, one being Auschwitz. The Auschwitz death camp comprised of three camps, all in which are placed in Poland. Numerous forms of extermination came about overtime to speed up the killing process. Life at the death camps was cut short for those who weren’t fit to work; such as the elderly, women, the mentally disabled, and young children. The others were put work while being starved to death. Experiments were held on dwarfs, twins, and other misfits were carried out by Josef Mengele. These inhuman acts against the Jews were all held in secret from society by the Nazis until liberation day.
First, the Germans employed Nazi experts and increased their special squad units. Otto Moll was transferred to Auschwitz to lead the mass murder. (Braham). “Come on, come on, you lazy bastards, get a move on, faster!” Moll would shout to be cruel towards his workers (Eyewitness Auschwitz: Three Years in the Gas Chambers). The Nazis also hired Rudolf Höss to be commander of Auschwitz (Braham) and Adolf Eichmann to be in charge of the deportation the Hungarian Jews (1944). Also the Special Squad, the Sonderkommando and Canada, were improved drastically by utilizing more prisoners. The Sonderkommando, which operated the crematoriums, was increased from 224 to 860 (Braham). Next, the Canada, which sorted the loot of the gassed prisoners, was increased to more than 1,000 (Eyewitness Auschwitz: Three Years in the Gas...