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Dachau concentration camp

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Dachau
Concentration camp
American troops guarding the main entrance to Dachau just after liberation, 1945
Dachau concentration camp is located in Germany
Dachau concentration camp
Location of Dachau in Lower Bavaria
LocationUpper Bavaria, Southern Germany
Operated byGerman Schutzstaffel (SS),
U.S. Army (after World War II)
Original usePolitical prison
Operational1933–1960
InmatesPoles, Jews, Russians, Ukrainians, French, Yugoslavs, Czechs, Germans, Austrians, Lithuanians
Killed31,951 (reported)
Liberated byUnited States, 29 April 1945
WebsiteDachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site
Aerial photo of the camp
The main gate at Dachau, marked with the slogan, Arbeit macht frei

Dachau concentration camp (Template:Lang-de, IPA: [ˈdaxaʊ]) was the first of the Nazi concentration camps opened in Germany, intended to hold political prisoners. It is located on the grounds of an abandoned munitions factory near the medieval town of Dachau, about 16 km (9.9 mi) northwest of Munich in the state of Bavaria, in southern Germany.[1] Opened in 1933 by Heinrich Himmler, its purpose was enlarged to include forced labor, and eventually, the imprisonment of Jews, ordinary German and Austrian criminals, and eventually foreign nationals from countries which Germany occupied or invaded. It was finally liberated in 1945.

In the postwar years it served to hold SS soldiers awaiting trial, after 1948, it held ethnic Germans who had been expelled from eastern Europe and were awaiting resettlement, and also was used for a time as a United States military base during the occupation. It was finally closed for use in 1960. Several memorials have been installed there, and the site is open for visitors.

History

After the takeover of Bavaria on 9 March, 1933, Heinrich Himmler, then Chief of Police in Munich, began to speak with the administration of an unused gunpowder and munitions factory. He toured the site to see if it could be used for quartering protective-custody prisoners. The Concentration Camp at Dachau was opened 22 March 1933, with the arrival of about 200 prisoners from Stadelheim Prison in Munich and the Landsberg fortress (where Hitler had written Mein Kampf during his imprisonment).[2] Himmler announced in the Münchner Neuesten Nachrichten newspaper that the camp could hold up to 5,000 people, and described it as "the first concentration camp for political prisoners"[1] to be used to restore calm to Germany.[3] It became the first regular concentration camp established by the coalition government of the National Socialist Party (Nazi Party) and the German Nationalist People's Party (dissolved on 6 July 1933).

The prisoners of Dachau concentration camp originally were to serve as forced labor for a munition factory, and to expand the camp. It was used as a training center for SS guards and was a model for other concentration camps[4] The camp was about 990 feet wide and 1,980 feet long (300 × 600 m) in rectangular shape. The camp entrance was secured by a large iron gate that had the inscription: “Arbeit macht frei” (“Work makes you free”). As of 1938, the procedure for new arrivals occurred at the Schubraum, where prisoners were to hand over their clothing and possessions[5]

The camp included an administration building that contained offices for the Gestapo trial commissioner, SS authorities, the camp leader and his deputies; administration offices that consisted of large storage rooms for the personal belongings of prisoners; the bunker; roll-call square where guards would also inflict punishment on prisoners, especially those who tried to escape; the canteen, where prisoners served SS men with cigarettes and food; the museum containing plaster images of prisoners who suffered from bodily defects; the camp office; the library; the barracks; and the infirmary, which was staffed by prisoners who had previously held occupations such as physicians or army surgeons.[6]

After 1942, the number of prisoners regularly held at the camp continued to exceed 12,000.[7] Dachau originally held Communists, leading Socialists and other “enemies of the state” in 1933, but over time the Nazis began to send German Jews to the camp. In the early years of imprisonment, Jews were offered permission to emigrate overseas if they “voluntarily” gave their property to enhance Hitler’s public treasury.[7] Once Austria was annexed and Czechoslovakia was defeated, the citizens of both countries became the next prisoners at Dachau. In 1940, Dachau became filled with Polish prisoners, who constituted the majority of the prisoner population until Dachau was officially liberated.[8]

Prisoners were divided into categories. At first, they were classified by the nature of the crime for which they were accused, but eventually were classified by the specific authority-type under whose command a person was sent to camp.[9] Political prisoners who had been arrested by the Gestapo wore a red badge, "professional" criminals sent by the Criminal Courts wore a green badge, Cri-Po prisoners arrested by the criminal police wore a brown badge, "work-shy and asocial" people sent by the welfare authorities or the Gestapo wore a black badge, Jehovah’s Witnesses arrested by the Gestapo wore a violet badge, homosexuals sent by the criminal courts wore a pink badge, emigrants arrested by the Gestapo wore a blue badge, "race polluters" arrested by the criminal court or Gestapo wore badges with a black outline, second-termers arrested by the Gestapo wore a bar matching the color of their badge, "idiots" wore a white armband with the label Blöd (idiot), and Jews, whose incarceration in the Dachau concentration camp dramatically increased after Kristallnacht, wore a yellow badge, combined with another color.[10]

The Dachau Concentration camp was heavily defended and secured to ensure that no prisoners escaped. A ten-foot-wide (3 m) area of ground called “the neutral zone” was around each camp building. This was to mark where prisoners were not to trespass. A four-foot-deep and eight-foot-broad (1.2 × 2.4 m) ditch lay behind the “neutral-zone.” The whole camp was surrounded by electrically charged barbed wire and a wall. On the west side of the wire was a deep canal filled with water, which was connected with the river Amper.[8]

General overview

Dachau served as a prototype and model for the other Nazi concentration camps that followed. Almost every community in Germany had members taken away to these camps. Newspapers continually reported "the removal of the enemies of the Reich to concentration camps." As early as 1935, a jingle went around: "Dear God, make me dumb, that I may not to Dachau come" ("Lieber Gott, mach mich dumm, damit ich nicht nach Dachau kumm").[11]

The camp's layout and building plans were developed by Kommandant Theodor Eicke and were applied to all later camps. He had a separate secure camp near the command center, which consisted of living quarters, administration, and army camps. Eicke became the chief inspector for all concentration camps, responsible for organizing others according to his model.[12]

The entrance gate to Dachau carries the phrase "Arbeit macht frei" (English translation: "Work makes free").

The camp commander gives a speech to prisoners about to be released as part of a pardoning action near Christmas 1933.

The camp was in use from 1933 to 1960, the first twelve years as an internment center of the Third Reich. From 1933 to 1938, the prisoners were mainly German nationals detained for political reasons. Subsequently, the camp was used for prisoners of all sorts, from every nation occupied by the forces of the Third Reich.[13]

In the postwar years, the camp continued in use. From 1945 through 1948, the camp was used by the Allies as a prison for SS officers awaiting trial. After 1948, when hundreds of thousands of ethnic Germans were expelled from eastern Europe, it held Germans from Czechoslovakia until they could be resettled. It also served as a military base for the United States, which maintained forces in the country. It was closed in 1960. At the insistence of survivors, various memorials have been constructed and installed here.[14]

Demographic statistics vary but they are in the same general range. History will likely never know how many people were interned or died there, due to periods of disruption. One source gives a general estimate of over 200,000 prisoners from more than 30 countries for the Third Reich's years, of whom two-thirds were political prisoners, including many Catholic priests, and nearly one-third were Jews. 25,613 prisoners are believed to have died in the camp and almost another 10,000 in its subcamps,[15] primarily from disease, malnutrition and suicide. In early 1945, a typhus epidemic in the camp, caused by poor sanitation and overcrowding, followed by an evacuation, in which large numbers of the prisoners died. Toward the end of the war, death marches to and from the camp caused the deaths of numerous unrecorded prisoners. After liberation, prisoners weakened beyond recovery by the starvation conditions continued to die.[citation needed]

Crematorium in operation

Over the 12 years of use as a concentration camp, the Dachau administration recorded the intake of 206,206 prisoners and deaths of 31,951. Crematoria were constructed to dispose of the deceased. There is no evidence of mass murder within the camp. Visitors may now walk through the buildings and view the ovens used to cremate bodies, which hid the evidence of many deaths. It is claimed that in 1942, more than 3,166 prisoners in weakened condition were transported to Hartheim Castle near Linz, and were executed by poison gas because they were unfit.[13]

Together with the much larger Auschwitz concentration camp, Dachau has come to symbolize the Nazi concentration camps. Konzentrationslager (KZ) Dachau lives in public memory as the second camp to be liberated by British or American Allied forces. It was one of the first places that firsthand journalist accounts and newsreels revealed to the rest of the world.[citation needed]

Main camp

Purpose

Roll-call of Jewish prisoners (wearing Star of David badges), 20 July 1938

Once the Nazis came to power they quickly moved to suppress all real and potential opposition. For example, between 1933 and 1945, the Sondergerichte, "special courts" set up by the Nazi regime, ordered the execution of 12,000 Germans.[16] Especially during their first years, these courts "had a strong deterrent effect" against opposition to the Nazis; the German public was intimidated through "arbitrary psychological terror".[17]

The term originated in the "reconcentration camps" set up in Cuba by General Valeriano Weyler in 1897. "Concentration" implies gathering together in one place a group of people who are in some way undesirable, where they can be watched by those who incarcerated them. The United States had its own form of concentration camps: transition internment for native Americans during the Indian Removal of the 1830s. During World War II, it established Japanese American internment camps in the West, relocating immigrants and their descendants from Pacific coastal areas. Similarly, the British created concentration camps to hold prisoners during the Boer Wars in South Africa.

Dachau was opened in March 1933.[1] The press statement given at the opening stated:

On Wednesday the first concentration camp is to be opened in Dachau with an accommodation for 5000 people. 'All Communists and—where necessary—Reichsbanner and Social Democratic functionaries who endanger state security are to be concentrated here, as in the long run it is not possible to keep individual functionaries in the state prisons without overburdening these prisons, and on the other hand these people cannot be released because attempts have shown that they persist in their efforts to agitate and organize as soon as they are released.[1]

Inspection by the Nazi party and Himmler at Dachau on 8 May 1936.

Between the years 1933 and 1945, more than 3.5 million Germans were imprisoned in such concentration camps or prison for political reasons,[18][19][20] Approximately 77,000 Germans were killed for one or another form of resistance by Special Courts, courts-martial, and the civil justice system. Many of these Germans had served in government, the military, or in civil positions, which were considered to enable them to engage in subversion and conspiracy against the Nazis.[21]

Organization

Prisoners' barracks in 1945

The camp was divided into two sections: the camp area and the crematorium. The camp area consisted of 69 barracks, including one for clergy imprisoned for opposing the Nazi regime and one reserved for medical experiments. The courtyard between the prison and the central kitchen was used for the summary execution of prisoners. The camp was surrounded by an electrified barbed-wire gate, a ditch, and a wall with seven guard towers.[12]

In early 1937, the SS, using prisoner labor, initiated construction of a large complex of buildings on the grounds of the original camp. The construction was officially completed in mid-August 1938 and the camp remained essentially unchanged and in operation until 1945. Dachau thus was the longest running concentration camp of the Third Reich. The area in Dachau included other SS facilities beside the concentration camp—a leader school[citation needed] of the economic and civil service, the medical school[citation needed] of the SS, etc. The camp at that time was called a "protective custody camp,"[citation needed] and occupied less than half of the area of the entire complex.

Demographics

Polish prisoners in Dachau toast their liberation from the camp. Poles constituted the largest ethnic group in the camp during the war, followed by Russians, French, Yugoslavs, Jews, and Czechs.

The camp was originally designed for holding German and Austrian political prisoners and Jews, but in 1935 it began to be used also for ordinary criminals. Inside the camp there was a sharp division between the two groups of prisoners; those who were there for political reasons and therefore wore a red tag, and the criminals, who wore a green tag.[22] Dachau was used as the chief camp for Christian (mainly Catholic) clergy.

During the war, other nationals were transferred to it, including French, in 1940 Poles, 1941 people from the Balkans, Czechs, Yugoslavs, and in 1942, Russians.[22][22]

The average number of Germans in the camp during the war was 3000. Just before the liberation many German prisoners were evacuated, but 2000 of these Germans died during the evacuation transport. Evacuated prisoners included such prominent political and religious figures as Martin Niemöller, Kurt von Schuschnigg, Édouard Daladier, Léon Blum, Franz Halder and Hjalmar Schacht.[22]

In August 1944 a women's camp opened inside Dachau. In the last months of the war, the conditions at Dachau deteriorated. As Allied forces advanced toward Germany, the Germans began to move prisoners from concentration camps near the front to more centrally located camps. They hoped to prevent the liberation of large numbers of prisoners. Transports from the evacuated camps arrived continuously at Dachau. After days of travel with little or no food or water, the prisoners arrived weak and exhausted, often near death. Typhus epidemics became a serious problem as a result of overcrowding, poor sanitary conditions, insufficient provisions, and the weakened state of the prisoners.

Owing to repeated transports from the front, the camp was constantly overcrowded and the hygiene conditions were beneath human dignity. Starting from the end of 1944 up to the day of liberation, 15,000 people died, about half of all the prisoners held at KZ Dachau. Five hundred Soviet POWs were executed by firing squad. The first shipment of women came from Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Though at the time of liberation the death rate had peaked at 200 per day, after the liberation by U.S. forces the rate eventually fell to between 50 and 80 deaths per day. In addition to the direct abuse of the SS and the harsh conditions, people died from typhus epidemics and starvation. The number of inmates had peaked in 1944 with transports from evacuated camps in the east (such as Auschwitz), and the resulting overcrowding led to an increase in the death rate.[22]

Clergy

Main article: Priest Barracks of Dachau Concentration Camp
Friedrich Hoffman, a Czech priest, testifies at the trial of former camp personnel and prisoners from Dachau. In his hand he holds records showing that hundreds of priests died at the camp after being exposed to malaria during Nazi medical experiments.

In effort to counter the strength and influence of spiritual resistance, Nazi security services monitored clergy very closely.[23] Priests were frequently denounced, arrested and sent to concentration camps, often simply on the basis of being "suspected of activities hostile to the State" or that there was reason to "suppose that his dealings might harm society".[24] Despite SS hostility to religious observance, the Vatican and German bishops successfully lobbied the regime to concentrate clergy at one camp and obtained permission to build a chapel, for the priests to live communally and for time to be allotted to them for the religious and intellectual activity. Priests Barracks at Dachau were established in Blocks 26, 28 - and 30, though only temporarily. 26 became the international block and 28 was reserved for Poles - the most numerous group.[25]

Of a total of 2,720 clergy recorded as imprisoned at Dachau, the overwhelming majority, some 2,579 (or 94.88%) were Catholic. Among the other denominations, there were 109 Evangelicals, 22 Greek Orthodox, 8 Old Catholics and Mariavites and 2 Muslims. In his Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945, Paul Berben noted that R. Schnabel's 1966 investigation, Die Frommen in der Holle found an alternative total of 2,771 and included the fate all the clergy listed, with 692 noted as deceased and 336 sent out on "invalid trainloads" and therefore presumed dead.[26] Over 400 German priests were sent to Dachau.[27] Total numbers incarcerated are nonetheless difficult to assert, for some clergy were not recognised as such by the camp authorities, and some - particularly Poles - did not wish to be identified as such, fearing they would be mistreated.[28]

The Nazis introduced a racial hierarchy - keeping Poles in harsh conditions, while favouring German priests.[29] 697 Poles arrived in December 1941, and a further 500 of mainly elderly clergy were brought in October the following year. Inadequately clothed for the bitter cold, of this group only 82 survived. A large number of Polish priests were chosen for Nazi medical experiments. In November 1942, 20 were given phlegmons. 120 were used by Dr Schilling for malaria experiments between July 1942 and May 1944. Several Poles met their deaths with the "invalid trains" sent out from the camp, others were liquidated in the camp and given bogus death certificates. Some died of cruel punishment for misdemeanors - beaten to death or run to exhaustion.[30]

The Clergy Barracks of Dachau : Clergy by nationality[31]
Nationality Total number Released Transferred elsewhere Liberated 29/4/45 Deceased
Poland 1780 78 4 830 868
Germany 447 208 100 45 94
France 156 5 4 137 10
Czechoslovakia 109 1 10 74 24
Netherlands 63 10 0 36 17
Yugoslavia 50 2 6 38 4
Belgium 46 1 3 33 9
Italy 28 0 1 26 1
Luxembourg 16 2 0 8 6
Denmark 5 5 0 0 0
Lithuania 3 0 0 3 0
Hungary 3 0 0 3 0
Stateless 3 0 1 2 0
Switzerland 2 1 0 0 1
Greece 2 0 0 2 0
Britain 2 0 1 1 0
Albania 2 0 2 0 0
Norway 1 1 0 0 0
Rumania 1 0 0 1 0
Spain 1 0 0 1 0
Total 2720 314 132 1240 1034

Staff

Among the staff, mostly SS males, 19 female guards served at Dachau, most of them until liberation.[32] Sixteen have been identified as Fanny Baur, Leopoldine Bittermann, Ernestine Brenner, Anna Buck, Rosa Dolaschko, Maria Eder, Rosa Grassmann, Betty Hanneschaleger, Ruth Elfriede Hildner, Josefa Keller, Berta Kimplinger, Lieselotte Klaudat, Theresia Kopp, Rosalie Leimboeck, and Thea Miesl.[33] Women guards also were assigned to the Augsburg Michelwerke, Burgau, Kaufering, Mühldorf, and Munich Agfa Camera Werke subcamps. In mid-April 1945, many female subcamps at Kaufering, Augsburg and Munich were closed, and the SS stationed the women at Dachau. It is reported that female SS guards gave prisoners guns before liberation to save them from postwar prosecution.[citation needed] Wilhelm Ruppert was charged with killing several prisoners.

Several Norwegians worked as guards at the Dachau camp.[34]

Satellite camps and sub-camps

Satellite camps under the authority of Dachau were established in the summer and fall of 1944 near armaments factories throughout southern Germany to increase war production. Dachau alone had more than 30 large subcamps in which over 30,000 prisoners worked almost exclusively on armaments.[35]

Overall, the Dachau concentration camp system included 123 sub-camps and Kommandos which were set up in 1943 when factories were built near the main camp to make use of forced labor of the Dachau prisoners. The sub-camps were liberated by various divisions of the American army that unexpectedly came across them on their way to capture Munich. American soldiers in the 63rd Infantry Division liberated seven of the eleven Kaufering sub-camps on 29 and 30 April 1945. The 63rd Infantry Division was recognized as a liberating unit by the U.S. Army’s Center of Military History and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2000.[36]

Out of the 123 sub-camps, eleven of them were called Kaufering, distinguished by a number at the end of each. All Kaufering sub-camps were set up to specifically build three underground factories (Allied bombing raids made it necessary for them to be underground) for a project called Ringeltaube (wood pigeon), which planned to be the location in which the German jet fighter plane, Messerschmitt Me 262, was to be built. In the last days of war, in April 1945, the Kaufering camps were evacuated and around 15,000 prisoners were sent up to the main Dachau camp. Approximately 14,500 prisoners in the eleven Kaufering camps died of hunger, cold weather, overwork, and typhus.[36]

Liberation

Main camp

Female prisoners at Dachau wave to their liberators.

As the opposition began to advance on Nazi Germany, the SS began to evacuate the first concentration camps in summer 1944.[37] Thousands of prisoners were murdered before the evacuation due to being ill or unable to walk. At the end of 1944, the overcrowding of camps began to take its toll on the prisoners. The hygienic conditions and the supplies of food rations became disastrous. In November a typhus fever epidemic broke out that took thousands of lives.[38]

In the second phase of the evacuation, in April 1945, Himmler gave direct evacuation routes for remaining camps. Prisoners that were from the northern part of Germany were to be directed to the Baltic and North Sea coasts to be drowned. The prisoners from the southern part were to be gathered in the Alps, which was the location in which the SS wanted to resist the Allies (p. 196). On 28 April 1945, an armed revolt took place in the town of Dachau. Both former and escaped concentration camp prisoners, and a renegade Volkssturm (civilian militia) company took part. At about 8:30 AM the rebels occupied the Town Hall. The advanced forces of the SS gruesomely suppressed the revolt within a few hours.[39]

Bodies in the Dachau death train

Being fully aware that Germany was about to be defeated in World War II, the SS invested its time in removing evidence of the crimes they committed in the concentration camps. The SS began destroying incriminating evidence in April 1945 and planned on murdering the prisoners using codenames “Wolke A I” (Cloud A I) and “Wolkenbrand” (Cloud fire). However, these plans never ended up being carried out. In mid-April, plans to evacuate the camp started by sending prisoners toward Tyrol. On April 26, over 10,000 prisoners were forced to leave the Dachau concentration camp on foot, in trains, or in trucks. The largest group of some 7,000 prisoners was driven southward on a foot-march lasting several days. More than 1,000 prisoners did not survive this march. The evacuation transports cost many thousands of prisoners their lives.[40] On 26 April 1945 prisoner Karl Riemer fled the Dachau concentration camp to get help from American troops and on April 28 Victor Maurer, a representative of the International Red Cross, negotiated an agreement to surrender the camp to U.S. troops. That night a secretly formed International Prisoners Committee took over the control of the camp. On 29 April 1945 the Dachau concentration camp was officially liberated by U.S. Army troops.[41]

Satellite camps

During the liberation of the sub-camps surrounding Dachau (which happened on the same day as the main camp's surrender on 29 April) the advance scouts of the US Army's 522nd Field Artillery Battalion, a Nisei-manned segregated Japanese-American Allied military unit, liberated the 3,000 prisoners of the "Kaufering IV Hurlach"[42] slave labor camp.[43] Perisco describes an Office of Strategic Services (OSS) team (code name LUXE) leading Army Intelligence to a "Camp IV" on 29 April. "they found the camp afire and a stack of some four hundred bodies burning... American soldiers then went into Landsberg and rounded up all the male civilians they could find and marched them out to the camp. The former commandant was forced to lie amidst a pile of corpses. The male population of Landsberg was then ordered to walk by, and ordered to spit on the commandant as they passed. The commandant was then turned over to a group of liberated camp survivors."[44]

Killing of camp guards

Main article: Dachau liberation reprisals
Moments after American soldiers killed SS troops in the coalyard at Dachau

The American troops killed some of the camp guards after they had surrendered. The number of guards killed is disputed as some Germans were killed in combat, some were shot while attempting to surrender, and others were killed after their surrender was accepted. In 1989 Brigadier General Felix L. Sparks, the Colonel in command of a battalion that captured the camp in 1945, stated:

The total number of German guards killed at Dachau during that day most certainly does not exceed fifty, with thirty probably being a more accurate figure. The regimental records of the 157th Infantry Regiment (United States) for that date indicate that over a thousand German prisoners were brought to the regimental collecting point. Since my task force was leading the regimental attack, almost all the prisoners were taken by the task force, including several hundred from Dachau.[45]

The "American Army Investigation of Alleged Mistreatment of German Guards at Dachau" found that about 15 Germans were killed (with another 4 or 5 wounded) after their surrender had been accepted. Two other reports collated years after the incident put the figure between 122 and 520 Germans killed after their surrender had been accepted.[citation needed]

As a result of the American Army investigation court-martial, charges were drawn up against Sparks and several other men under his command but, as General George S. Patton (the then recently appointed military governor of Bavaria) chose to dismiss the charges, the witnesses to the killings were never cross-examined in court and no one was found guilty.[45] Many guards were also killed by the liberated prisoners, which made the issue more complex. Lee Miller visited the camp just after liberation, and photographed several guards who died at the prisoners' hands.

American troops also forced local citizens to the camp to see for themselves the conditions there and to help clean the facilities. Many local residents were shocked about the experience and claimed no knowledge of the activities at the camp.[citation needed] Photographs of this event are stored at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.[46]

Post-liberation Easter

Liberated Dachau camp prisoners cheer U.S. troops

May 6 (23 April on the Orthodox calendar) was the day of Pascha, Orthodox Easter. In a cell block used by Catholic priests to say daily Mass, several Greek, Serbian and Russian priests and one Serbian deacon, wearing makeshift vestments made from towels of the SS guard, gathered with several hundred Greek, Serbian and Russian prisoners to celebrate the Paschal Vigil. A prisoner named Rahr described the scene:[47]

In the entire history of the Orthodox Church there has probably never been an Easter service like the one at Dachau in 1945. Greek and Serbian priests together with a Serbian deacon adorned the make-shift 'vestments' over their blue and gray-striped prisoners' uniforms. Then they began to chant, changing from Greek to Slavic, and then back again to Greek. The Easter Canon, the Easter Sticheras—everything was recited from memory. The Gospel—In the beginning was the Word—also from memory. And finally, the Homily of Saint John—also from memory. A young Greek monk from the Holy Mountain stood up in front of us and recited it with such infectious enthusiasm that we shall never forget him as long as we live. Saint John Chrysostomos himself seemed to speak through him to us and to the rest of the world as well!

File:Survivors liberation dachau.jpg
Cheering crowds of liberated survivors

There is a Russian Orthodox chapel at the camp today, and it is well known for its icon of Christ leading the prisoners out of the camp gates.

The U.S. 7th Army's version of the events of the Dachau Liberation is available in Report of Operations of the Seventh United States Army, Vol. 3, page 382.

After liberation

After liberation, the camp was used by the US Army as an internment camp. It was also the site of the Dachau Trials, a site chosen for its symbolism. In 1948 the Bavarian government established housing for refugees on the site, and this remained for many years.[48] The Kaserne quarters and other buildings used by the guards and trainee guards served as an American military post for many years. It had its own elementary school: Dachau American Elementary School, a part of the Department of Defense dependent school system.

Onscreen

In music

In theatre

  • Dachau is the concentration camp in which two homosexual prisoners desperately try to hold on to their humanity in the 1979 play Bent by Martin Sherman.

The memorial site

Memorial at the camp in 1997
Aerial photo of the memorial in 2010

Between 1945 and 1948 when the camp was handed over to the Bavarian authorities, many accused war criminals and members of the SS were imprisoned at the camp.

Owing to the severe refugee crisis mainly caused by the expulsions of ethnic Germans, the camp was from late 1948 used to house 2000 Germans from Czechoslovakia (mainly from the Sudetenland). This settlement was called Dachau-East, and remained until the mid-1960s.[49] During this time, former prisoners banded together to erect a memorial on the site of the camp, finding it unbelievable that there were still people (refugees) living in the former camp.

The display, which was reworked in 2003, takes the visitor through the path of new arrivals to the camp. Special presentations of some of the notable prisoners are also provided. Two of the barracks have been rebuilt and one shows a cross-section of the entire history of the camp, since the original barracks had to be torn down due to their poor condition when the memorial was built. The other 32 barracks are indicated by concrete foundations.

The memorial includes four chapels for the various religions represented among the prisoners.

The local government resisted designating the complete site a memorial. The former SS barracks adjacent to the camp are now occupied by the Bavarian Bereitschaftspolizei (rapid response police unit).[50]

List of personnel

Commanders

Other staff

Adolf Eichmann on trial in 1961

SS and civilian doctors

Dr. Hans Eisele in American internment

List of notable prisoners

The commemorative mass grave dedicated to the unknown dead at Dachau

Clergy

Main article: Priest Barracks of Dachau Concentration Camp

Dachau had a special "priest block." Of the 2720 priests (among them 2579 Catholic) held in Dachau, 1034 did not survive the camp. The majority were Polish (1780), of whom 868 died in Dachau.

More than two dozen members of the Religious Society of Friends (known as Quakers) were interned at Dachau. They may or may not have been considered clergy by the Nazis, as all Quakers perform services which in other Protestant denominations are considered the province of clergy. Over a dozen of them were murdered there.

Communists

Jewish

Politicians

A memorial at the camp with Never again written in several languages

Resistance fighters

Royalty

Scientists

Among many others, 183 professors and lower university staff from Kraków universities, arrested on 6 November 1939 during Sonderaktion Krakau.

Writers

Others

  • The camp courtyard
    The camp courtyard
  • Memorial to the victims of Dachau (October 2007)
    Memorial to the victims of Dachau (October 2007)
  • Sign on the gravel road leading to the entrance
    Sign on the gravel road leading to the entrance
  • The Crematorium
    The Crematorium
  • New crematorium (picture taken on October 2007)
    New crematorium (picture taken on October 2007)
  • Original crematorium (picture taken on October 2007)
    Original crematorium (picture taken on October 2007)
  • Crematorium at Dachau
    Crematorium at Dachau
  • The sign outside the building Crematorium says in German: "Think about how we died here"
    The sign outside the building Crematorium says in German: "Think about how we died here"
  • Protestant Church of Reconciliation (June 2005)
    Protestant Church of Reconciliation (June 2005)
  • Catholic Mortal Agony of Christ chapel (June 2005)
    Catholic Mortal Agony of Christ chapel (June 2005)
  • Jewish Memorial (June 2005)
    Jewish Memorial (June 2005)
  • Tower (June 2005)
    Tower (June 2005)
  • The Perimeter Fence
    The Perimeter Fence
  • Marker where barracks building #9 stood (June 2005)
    Marker where barracks building #9 stood (June 2005)
  • View of roll-call area from one of the buildings (June 2005)
    View of roll-call area from one of the buildings (June 2005)
  • Prisoner bunks (June 2005)
    Prisoner bunks (June 2005)
  • Prisoner bunks (June 2005)
    Prisoner bunks (June 2005)
  • Triple bunks in the barracks
    Triple bunks in the barracks
  • Prisoner sinks (June 2005)
    Prisoner sinks (June 2005)
  • Prisoner toilets (June 2005)
    Prisoner toilets (June 2005)
  • The entrance and the northern part of the "Bunker" (September 2007)
    The entrance and the northern part of the "Bunker" (September 2007)
  • The east wing of the "Bunker" (camp prison), normally closed to visitors
    The east wing of the "Bunker" (camp prison), normally closed to visitors

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d "Ein Konzentrationslager für politische Gefangene In der Nähe von Dachau". Münchner Neueste Nachrichten ("The Munich Latest News") (in German). The Holocaust History Project. 21 March 1933. The Munich Chief of Police, Himmler, has issued the following press announcement: On Wednesday the first concentration camp is to be opened in Dachau with an accommodation for 5000 persons. 'All Communists and—where necessary—Reichsbanner and Social Democratic functionaries who endanger state security are to be concentrated here, as in the long run it is not possible to keep individual functionaries in the state prisons without overburdening these prisons, and on the other hand these people cannot be released because attempts have shown that they persist in their efforts to agitate and organise as soon as they are released.' Cite error: The named reference "MNN" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  2. ^ Marcuse, Harold. Legacies of Dachau: The Uses and Abuses of a Concentration Camp, 1933-2001, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001. p. 21
  3. ^ Neuhäusler, Johann. What Was It Like in the Concentration Camp at Dachau?: An Attempt to Come Closer to the Truth, Munich: Manz A.G., 1960. p. 7
  4. ^ ="Dachau Liberated." History.com. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 27 March 2013.
  5. ^ The Dachau Concentration Camp, 1933 to 1945: Text and Photo Documents from the Exhibition, with CD. Dachau: Comité International De Dachau, 2005. p. 61
  6. ^ Neuhäusler (1960), What Was It Like..., pp. 9-11
  7. ^ a b Neuhäusler (1960), What Was It like..., p. 13
  8. ^ a b Neuhäusler (1960), What Was It like..., p. 14
  9. ^ Neurath, Paul Martin, Christian Fleck, and Nico Stehr. The Society of Terror: Inside the Dachau and Buchenwald Concentration Camps, Boulder, CO: Paradigm, 2005. Print. p. 53
  10. ^ Neurath et al. (2005), The Society of Terror, pp. 54-69
  11. ^ Janowitz, Morris (September, 1946). "German Reactions to Nazi Atrocities". The American Journal of Sociology. 52 (2). The University of Chicago Press: 141–146. doi:10.1086/219961. JSTOR 2770938. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) The word "dumm" here means "stupid" rather than "mute"; a variant in which the word "stumm" (Eng.:"mute") is also extant.
  12. ^ a b "Dachau". Holocaust Encyclopedia. Washington, D.C.: United States Holjkihjiohoocaust Memorial Museum. 2009.
  13. ^ a b Edkins 2003, p. 137
  14. ^ Edkins 2003, p. 138
  15. ^ Zámečník, Stanislav; Paton, Derek B. (Translator) (2004). That Was Dachau 1933-1945. Paris: Fondation internationale de Dachau; Cherche Midi. pp. 377, 379. {{cite book}}: |first2= has generic name (help)
  16. ^ Peter Hoffmann, The History of the German Resistance, 1933-1945, p. xiii
  17. ^ Andrew Szanajda, The Restoration of Justice in postwar Hesse, 1945-1949, p. 25. Quote: "In practice, it signified intimidating the public through arbitrary psychological terror, operating like the courts of the Inquisition." "The Sondergerichte had a strong deterrent effect during the first years of their operation, since their rapid and severe sentencing was feared."
  18. ^ Henry Maitles "NEVER AGAIN!: A review of David Goldhagen, 'Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust'", Socialist Review, further referenced to G. Almond, "The German Resistance Movement", Current History 10 (1946), pp409–527.
  19. ^ David Clay, Contending with Hitler: Varieties of German Resistance in the Third Reich, p. 122 (1994) ISBN 0-521-41459-8
  20. ^ Otis C. Mitchell, Hitler's Nazi State: The Years of Dictatorial Rule, 1934-1945 (1988), p. 217
  21. ^ Peter Hoffmann, The History of the German Resistance, 1933–1945, p. xiii
  22. ^ a b c d e 7th Army, U.S. (1945). Dachau. University of Wisconsin Digital Collection.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  23. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; pp. 141-2
  24. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; pp. 142
  25. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; p.145-6.
  26. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; pp. 276-277
  27. ^ Ian Kershaw; The Nazi Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation; 4th Edn; Oxford University Press; New York; 2000; pp210-11
  28. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; p.157
  29. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; p.148.
  30. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; p.148-9.
  31. ^ Paul Berben; Dachau: The Official History 1933-1945; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ISBN 085211009; pp. 276-277
  32. ^ Daniel Patrick Brown, THE CAMP WOMEN, The Female Auxiliaries who Assisted the SS in Running the Nazi Concentration Camp System
  33. ^ Brown, THE CAMP WOMEN,
  34. ^ "(translation of title: — Norwegian guards worked in Hitler's concentration camps)"''- Norske vakter jobbet i Hitlers konsentrasjonsleire''"". Vg.no. 2010-01-01. Retrieved 2012-07-06.
  35. ^ "Dachau". Ushmm.org. Retrieved 2013-07-29.
  36. ^ a b Liberation of Kaufering IV Sub-camp of Dachau near Hurlach. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 March 2013. <http://www.scrapbookpages.com/DachauScrapbook/DachauLiberation/KauferingIVLiberation.html>
  37. ^ =The Dachau Concentration Camp, 1933 to 1945: Text and Photo Documents from the Exhibition, with CD. Dachau: Comité International De Dachau, 2005. Print. Page 194
  38. ^ The Dachau Concentration Camp, 1933 to 1945: Text and Photo Documents from the Exhibition, with CD. Dachau: Comité International De Dachau, 2005. Print. Page 197
  39. ^ The Dachau Concentration Camp, 1933 to 1945: Text and Photo Documents from the Exhibition, with CD. Dachau: Comité International De Dachau, 2005. Print. Page 199
  40. ^ The Dachau Concentration Camp, 1933 to 1945: Text and Photo Documents from the Exhibition, with CD. Dachau: Comité International De Dachau, 2005. Print. Page 200
  41. ^ The Dachau Concentration Camp, 1933 to 1945: Text and Photo Documents from the Exhibition, with CD. Dachau: Comité International De Dachau, 2005. Print. Page 201
  42. ^ "Kaufering IV - Hurlach - Schwabmunchen". Kaufering.com. 2008-01-19. Retrieved 2012-07-06.
  43. ^ "Central Europe Campaign - (522nd Field Artillery Battalion)". Retrieved 2009-03-17.
  44. ^ Joseph E Persico (1979). Piercing the Reich. Viking Press. p. 306. ISBN 0-670-55490-1.
  45. ^ a b Albert Panebianco (ed). Dachau its liberation 157th Infantry Association, Felix L. Sparks, Secretary 15 June 1989. (backup site)
  46. ^ "Photograph". Ushmm.org. Retrieved 2012-07-06.
  47. ^ "Gleb Alexandrovitch Rahr - Prisoner R (Russian) - Pascha (Easter) in Dachau". Orthodoxytoday.org. Retrieved 2012-07-06.
  48. ^ Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site (pedagogical information) Template:De icon
  49. ^ Legacies of Dachau: The Uses and Abuses of a Concentration Camp, 1933-2001 Harold Marcuse
  50. ^ Sven Felix Kellerhoff (2002-10-21). "Neue Museumskonzepte für die Konzentrationslager". WELT ONLINE (in German). Axel Springer AG. Retrieved 2008-06-02. . . . die SS-Kasernen neben dem KZ Dachau wurden zuerst (bis 1974) von der US-Armee bezogen. Seither nutzt sie die VI. Bayerische Bereitschaftspolizei. (. . . the SS barracks adjacent to the Dachau concentration camp were at first occupied by the US Army (until 1974) . Since then they have been used by the Sixth Rapid Response Unit of the Bavarian Police.)
  51. ^ "The Nizkor Project". transcript from the 1961 Eichmann trial. Shofar FTP archive and the Nizkor project. Retrieved 2009-02-02.
  52. ^ "people/e/eichmann.adolf/transcripts/Sessions/Session-075-05". transcript from the 1961 Eichmann trial. Shofar FTP archive and the Nizkor project. Retrieved 2009-02-02.
  53. ^ "The Trial of German Major War Criminals Sitting at Nuremberg, Germany 4th April to 15th April, 1946: One Hundred and Eighth Day: Monday, 15th April, 1946 (Part 1 of 10)". the Nizkor Project. 1991–2009. Retrieved 5 March 2010.
  54. ^ Klee, Kulturlexikon, S. 227.
  55. ^ Klee, Kulturlexikon, S. 232.
  56. ^ Alan Gratz, "Prisoner B-3087", pp.1240-245 (2013) ISBN 978-0-545-45901-3
  57. ^ Green, William (2009-09-04). "Franz Olah dies aged 99". austriantimes.at. Canterbury, Kent, U.K.: AN News and Pictures. Retrieved 5 March 2010.
  58. ^ "The Only Black Prisoner at Dachau Prepares Food With Another Survivor". Jewish Virtual Library. May 1945. Retrieved 26 September 2012.
  59. ^ "Photograph: "Two survivors prepare food outside the barracks. The man on the right, presumably, is Jean (Johnny) Voste, born in Belgian Congo, who was the only black prisoner in Dachau. Dachau, Germany, May 1945."". US Holocaust Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 September 2012.
  60. ^ "Blacks During the Holocaust". Holocaust Encyclopedia. US Holocaust Memorial Museum. Retrieved 26 September 2012.

Bibliography

  • Bishop, Lt. Col. Leo V.; Glasgow, Maj. Frank J.; Fisher, Maj. George A., eds. (1946). The Fighting Forty-Fifth: the Combat Report of an Infantry Division. Baton Rouge, Louisiana.: 45th Infantry Division [Army & Navy Publishing Co.] OCLC 4249021.
  • Buechner, Howard A. (1986). Dachau—The Hour of the Avenger. Thunderbird Press. ISBN 0-913159-04-2.
  • Edkins, Jenny (2003). Trauma and the memory of politics. Cambridge [u.a.]: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-53420-8.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
  • Kozal, Czesli W.; Ischler, Paul (Translator) (2004). Memoir of Fr. Czesli W. (Chester) Kozal, O.M.I. Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate. OCLC 57253860. {{cite book}}: |first2= has generic name (help)
  • Marcuse, Harold (2001). Legacies of Dachau: The Uses and Abuses of a Concentration Camp, 1933-2001. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-55204-2.
  • Roberts, Donald R. ; edited by Heather R. Biola (2008). The other war, a World War II journal. Elkins, W.V.: McClain Printing Co. ISBN 978-0-87012-775-5. {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) Includes report written for: United States. Army. Infantry Division, 9th. Office of the Surgeon. Interrogation of SS Officers and Men at Dachau.
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