Concentration Camps

A concentration camp is where prisoners of war, enemy aliens, and political prisoners are detained and confined, typically under harsh conditions, or place or situation characterized by extremely harsh conditions. The first concentration camps were established in 1933 for confinement of opponents of the Nazi Party. The supposed opposition soon included all Jews, Gypsies, and certain other groups. By 1939 there were six camps: Dachau, Sachsenhausen, Buchenwald, Mauthausen, Flossenburg, and

Ravensbruck.

Auschwitz

Auschwitz, or Auschwitz-Birkenau, is the best-known of all Nazi death camps, though Auschwitz was just one of six extermination camps. It was also a labor concentration camp, extracting prisoners' value from them, in the form of hard labor, for weeks or months. Auschwitz was the end of the line for millions of Jews, gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, and other innocents.

Some spend almost two years in this most infamous of concentration camps. The average prisoner only survived eight weeks in Auschwitz. Some learned the ins and outs of survival in Auschwitz. Auschwitz was the largest concentration and extermination camp constructed in the Third Reich. Located 37 miles west of Krakow, Poland, Auschwitz was home to both the greatest number of forced laborers and deaths.

The history of the camp began on April 27, 1940 when Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS and Gestapo, ordered the construction of the camp in northeast Silesia, a region captured by the Nazis in September 1939. The camp was built by three-hundred Jewish prisoners from the local town of Oswiecim and its surrounding area. In June of 1940 the camp opened for Polish political prisoners. By 1941 there were about 11,000 prisoners, most of whom were Polish. From May 1940 to the end of 1943, Rudolf Hess was head commander of Auschwitz. Under his leadership, Auschwitz quickly became known as the harshest prison camp in the Nazi regime. Polish prisoners were forced to stand at attention for roll call for hours on end naked in the cold, snowy tundra of Polish winter. Following its first year of existence, Heinrich

Himmler visited Auschwitz and told Hess that its labor resource was to be expanded to 100,000 prisoners, making it one of the largest of the concentration camps. In order to accommodate this many people, a second, much larger, section of Auschwitz (Auschwit...

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...as chambers built in nearby Hartheim castle. Forced labor in SS Stone Works and

Messerschmidt aircraft factory. 120,000 people killed.

Ravensbruck:

Created on May 15, 1939. First Commandant: Max Koegel. 70,000 inmates at peak. 107,000 inmates passed through. Used for killing sick prisoners and for medical experiments on Jewish women, especially sterilization. Forced labor for Siemens corporation.

Sachsenhausen:

Created on April 23, 1936. First Commandant: Herman Baranowski. 35,000 inmates at peak. 135,000 people passed through camp. Separate sub-camps for

Jews, political prisoners, homosexuals, draft evaders, etc. Contained gas chamber and crematorium. Used for mass murder of 11,000 Soviet POW's. Forced labor for Heinkel aircraft works. 30-35,000 total deaths.

Crematorium II:

Functioned as a homicidal gas chamber and incineration installation from 15th

March 1943, before its officially coming into service on March 31st, to

November 27th, 1944, annihilating a total of approximately 400,000 people.

Most of them Jewish women, children and old men.

Crematorium III:

Was used in similar fashion from June 25th 1943 to November 27th ,1944, killing about 350,000 victims.