Auschwitz II (or Auschwitz-Birkenau): A Factory of Suffering and Murder
We reached Auschwitz-Birkenau later on in the afternoon, the sun had passed it's peak and was beginning to set. As a consequence it was getting colder and colder by the minute. Wrapping up even more, we left the coaches and entered the second camp. The first thing that struck me about Birkenau is that it is so close to Oswiecim, you could see the edge of the town only a few hundred metres away, you might think: how could people have lived so close to a concentration camp and not do anything about what was going on inside? Well, the truth was that many of the houses near to the camp in Oswiecim were cleared of their residents when the Nazi’s set up camp there and were filled with Germans (mostly officers and the like who would be running the concentration camp). This was also the case in other parts of Poland – part of Hitler’s policy of Lebensraum (living space.)
It is hard to describe what it was like going to Birkenau as it was so much bigger than Auschwitz I that it is hard to comprehend. When we arrived there we went straight up to the top of the tower that stands over the entrance to the camp – also known as The Gate – this gave us a view across the whole camp. It was incredibly huge stretching far out in all directions. A point to remember about Auschwitz II is that from the moment it began to be built it was never finished. It was always expanding in order for it to incorporate more prisoners. Hence, if you search the internet you are likely to find maps showing areas of the camp that were under construction or were planned to be built before the Soviet liberation in 1945.
Seeing the camp from above was nothing like actually walking around it. We went through some of the barracks which were made of wood, unlike the barracks in Auschwitz I, originally the barracks in Birkenau were meant to house horses – there were still iron rings on the wall where horses were meant to be tied up. These wooden shelters provided little shelter from the harsh elements, as we experienced ourselves with the freezing conditions and we were wrapped up warm with coats, gloves and scarfs! The prisoners were only allowed to wear one layer of clothing! During the winter the area is freezing cold, while in the summer the area is like a swamp. The only source of heat was a brick furnace running down the middle which was practically useless during the bitter winter nights. Each of the barracks was full of bunks, usually around 8 people shared one bed between them. If you couldn't find a decent spot to sleep then your chance of survival was very slim indeed.
Sanitation was always an issue because of the sheer amount of people living in the camp. The toilet facilities were meant for 200 people, but the actual number that had to use them was many times this. Each person was given only 2 minutes to use the toilet and wash. You can see the indignity of it – having to use the toilet in front of hundreds of people each pushing to use it themselves too. Disease was rife in the camp, particularly in the gypsy section, where whole families were cramped in together.
Next we made our way down the central train tracks into the heart of the camp. When Birkenau was first built, the trains carrying people for the camp had to stop just outside the gate to offload them, however the train tracks were later extended so they could be brought right into the camp. Once off the train a selection process was made by SS physicians - people who were fit for work and those that weren’t. Usually 70-75% of the people coming off the trains were deemed unfit for work – the old, pregnant women, children and those already weakened by the journey to Birkenau were sent straight to the gas chambers. These people were never registered at the camp, so it is hard to know the exact figure for how many people were killed there. Most historians estimate it to be around 1,100,000 and 1,500,000. The ‘lucky’ ones selected to work, mostly young, fit men and women, were separated into different sections of the camp – on one side the women and on the other the men. They were then set to work, for instance at the IG Farben industries located nearby, where they would work until they died. The selection process was brutal and the people selected for immediate death were often sent to wait in the nearby woods – not knowing what awaited them. It was like some morbid day outing, with children playing together unaware as to what would happen.
We were then shown the remains of Crematorium III and IV. The Nazi’s had blown them up as they abandoned the camp, but some of the structures remain (see the photographs at the bottom of this page). According to German calculations 1,440 corpses could be burnt in Crematorium III alone every 24hours, however, many eyewitness accounts claim it was actually higher than this.
Feeling numb, not only from the cold but emotionally too, we made our way over to the area of the camp known as ‘Kanada.’ It was known as such because it was here that all the belongings of people brought to the camp were taken to this sorting area once they had been confiscated. Working in Kanada was one of the ‘best’ places to work in Auschwitz. Not only was it indoors- essential if you wished to survive the cold winters- but it was possible to take extra layers of clothing and other items that could help you survive without it being noticed. None of the buildings in this area remain, except for the ‘Sauna’ house. It was here that the prisoners selected for work were brought to be registered and then tattooed with their identification number. They were then forced to strip naked and be disinfected – an attempt by the SS to stop the spread of disease in the camp – and then given their stripped uniforms
It was in the sauna building that there is an exhibition of the photographs of people who came to the camp. Walls full of photos of the dead – whole families together on the walls. Here is a photo showing one of the walls. To see the faces of the people brutally murdered by the Nazis was distressing – it suddenly made it all very personal. When you say over 1 million people died at the camp, it is impossible to comprehend the number, the people are faceless it is easy to distance yourself from it. But then you see these faces in the photographs- ordinary people, like you and me- smiling out at you, they don’t know what’s going to happen to them. Murdered because of their religion or their parent’s religion.
It was from there that we made our way back to the large memorial situated between Crematorium III and IV. We gathered as a group and as darkness began to fall around us, a few poems were read and Rabbi Marcus sang a Hebrew song. We were then given a minutes silence to contemplate what we had seen. The photos in the sauna house stuck with me, I have pictures like those of my family at home – I couldn’t stop thinking about my family, my friends. I wondered how anybody could stand by and let such a terrible thing happen. We then each lit a candle and put it on the wall of Crematorium IV in tribute to those that had died.
We made our way silently back to the coaches. I walked up the central rail track back towards the entrance to the camp, it was dark and slippery under foot. It was then that it hit me that it wasn’t just the victims that were ordinary people but the perpetrators too. Those SS guards they had families, they had children, and they were human – not monsters like the media would like us to think. Because of their own prejudices they had allowed themselves to become involved.
It was as we were travelling back through Poland in the coach, that I thought that even though most people agree that the Holocaust was the most terrible act of human cruelty we still haven’t learnt from it. Look at what happened in Rwanda, or just recently in the Sudan. And the world stands by and does nothing. The UN, which is meant to prevent that sort of thing, does nothing. Our politicians allow hundreds of people to die needlessly everyday and let the killers get away with it. If that was happening in a country in the ‘West’ do you think it would be ignored?
From the moment we arrived it was an insane sort of day. Here we were, at a real concentration camp where over a million people had died and there were tourists going around. Not like us from an educational group, but tourists taking photographs. It seemed wrong to me at the time, but now that I think about it, maybe it isn't such a bad thing. After all, if more people are learning about what happened there then surely it is less likely to happen again?
What I learnt from Auschwitz was two-fold: firstly, is that we shouldn’t dehumanise any of the people involved. And secondly, that even with the benefit of hindsight, man is slow to learn his mistakes.
Crematoria III
As always, all comments and questions are welcomed. chocolaterocker@hotmail.com
The Gate: a photo taken just after the camp was liberated.
Crematoria IV
Memorial at Auschwitz-Birkenau