Life in Concentration Camps

"The people were liberated, mankind was not."

                              -Dick Cheney (pbs.org)

       Adolf Hitler decided to systematically exterminate all people who opposed his way of running the government; thereby elevating his beloved Aryan Race to the elite status he believed it was (Cash, Dave).  He did this regardless of age, gender, or economic status (Cash, Dave).  Concentration camps were built all over Germany and used as a place to torture and kill thousands of innocent people (Cash, Dave). Going to these camps, the prisoners were told to bring their most valuable possessions to comfort them.  As soon as they would arrive, the Nazis would take these possessions away to sell them (“Prisoners of the Camps.”).  Living conditions in the concentration camps were harsh and inhumane because of the lack of food, poor shelter, heavy labor, and fear of torture and death (“Prisoners of the Camps.”).  Due to the lack of food, starvation was rampant.  Poor shelter and lack of clothing led to the spread of many diseases (“Prisoners of the Camps.”).  The fear of torture and death was a constant presence in the prisoner’s daily lives.

Housing

     Housing where the prisoners slept in the concentration camps was often barracks, huts, or tents (Lawton, Clive).  Such structures were extremely crowded and unbearable.  Inside these barracks were wooden bunks that the prisoners had to sleep on (Cash, Dave).  They were often four rows high and usually six compartments wide, accommodating four adults per section (Cash, Dave). Barracks were also poorly ventilated and overcrowded, causing diseases to spread rapidly (Cash, Dave).  These structures were lined up in rows and were surrounded by electric barbed wire, which prevented the prisoners from escaping (Lawton, Clive).  Placed strategically throughout the camps were also watch towers (Lawton, Clive).  In these towers were Nazi officers that were equipped with high-powered guns, able to shoot any prisoner for any reason.  Officers would often shoot the prisoners if they were attempting to escape, if they felt that they were misbehaving, or just because felt like it. Aleksander Kwasniewski, the President of Poland, once stated, “We’re in a place where no words can tell the truth about what happened…But they have to.  This was hell on earth” (“In Quotes: Auschwitz Anniversity.”).  At night, the prisoners would often look out their windows and see a red glow in the sky.  This was the glow of the incinerator, which was in operation twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.  (Cash, Dave). 

This picture was taken inside a barrack and shows the large

amount of people that had to sleep inside these structures. 

Daily Rations

     Prisoners trapped inside the concentration camps were given limited amounts of food.  They were emaciated and starved.  In the morning, they were given a so called “meal” that consisted of weak, or watered-down, coffee and a small portion of bread (Cash, Dave).  Midday meals consisted of watery turnip or cabbage soup (Cash, Dave).  For the evening meal, they were normally given a repeat of the morning meal (Cash, Dave).  The small amount of food that they were given was normally spoiled or carried diseases.  Vice President, Dick Cheney, had once commented, "The story of the camp reminds us that evil is real.  It must be called by its name and must be confronted” (“In Quotes: Auschwitz Anniversity.”).  Many camps did not have fresh water and if they did, then the water was normally polluted (Cash, Dave).  Contaminated drinking water cause the prisoners to become weaker faster.  Unsanitary and poorly prepared food alone killed thousands of prisoners in the concentration camps.

Work

     Every day, the prisoners would wake up to the sound of sirens signifying that it was time to work (Borade, Gaynor).   Most of the time, the work being done was meaningless.  They were forced to remove sacks of cement from train wagons and often put it back on the wagon later that day (YadVashem).  Prisoners would also have to move heavy rocks from one place to another for no purpose but to tire them out (Cash, Dave).  If the prisoners did not comply with the officers orders or if they were too weak and stopped working, then they would either be beaten or shot (Cash, Dave).  “It’s here, where absolute evil was perpetrated, that the will must resurface for a fraternal world, a world based on respect of man and his dignity”, exclaimed Kazimierz Orlowski, a former prisoner (“In Quotes: Auschwitz Anniversity.”).  To intimidate them, officers made the prisoners work the ovens.  The ovens were used to incinerate the corpses of murdered victims (“Prisoners of the Camps.”).

Prisoners of the Camps

     Concentration camp prisoners included political radicals, Communists, Jews, Romas (Gypsies), Jehovah’s Witnesses, male homosexuals, and common criminals (Cash, Dave).  Out of these groups of people, the Jews and the Gypsies received the worst treatment, while the criminals and political prisoners were treated the most fairly and humanely(Cash, Dave).  When these groups of people were sent to the camps, they would have to give up their own clothes to the Nazi officers.  Their clothes would then be sold (“Prisoners of the Camps.”).  Prisoners were forced to wear uniforms, also known as striped pajamas, and were given no shoes to wear. (“Prisoners of the Camps.”).   On their uniforms, they would have a certain color-coded star.  They would have these so that the officers could easily tell why they were sent to the camps. Political prisoners wore red triangles, the Gypsies had to wear black triangles, the Jehovah’s Witnesses and homosexuals had pink triangles, while the Jews had a yellow Star of David (“Prisoners of the Camps.”).  Almost daily, the Nazi officers would line up the prisoners for roll call.  Doing this helped them to keep track of how many people were being kept at the camps and would make sure that no prisoner escaped (Cash, Dave).  These roll calls would take place in all types of weather and would usually last hours.  This routine was feared by all prisoners because there would be times when the weaker prisoners would be selected and killed in front of everyone, mainly to intimidate the other prisoners (Cash, Dave). The officers also had the power to physically hurt any prisoner.  Officers would often severely beat people in the camps for usually no reason.  Nazi officers would also have random shooting attacks on the people of the camps.  If there was a violation of any order, then the prisoner would be brutally beaten.  “There were moments, moments which one really prefers not to think about.  We were beaten, kicked, degraded, but you didn’t know why, simply because we were different”, stated Franz Rosenback, a gypsy survivor of Auschwitz (pbs.org).

This picture shows the electric wire fences that would go around the perimeter of the camps.

It also shows the watch towers that the Nazi officers would stay in.

 Death

     Fear of death was constantly on the prisoner’s minds.  Some feared the torture, the disease, and the starvation so much that they took matters into their own hands by committing suicide.  Prisoners would often walk into the electric fences or deliberately disobey orders in order to be shot (Cash, Dave).  They felt that this was the one thing that they had control over (Cash, Dave).  Others died of starvation, disease, and exhaustion. The majority of the deaths occurred either in the gas chambers or by the firing squads (pbs.org).  Up to 2,500 people at a time were led into the gas chambers, under the impression of taking a shower (Lawton, Clive).  Nazi officers instructed these prisoners to remove their clothes and proceed into the shower (Lawton, Clive).  Instead of water, carbon monoxide was pumped through the pipes, killing all in the room (Lawton, Clive).  Other prisoners were then forced to remove these bodies to be buried in mass graves or incinerated in the ovens.  Arture Nebe was the unlikely founder of the gas chamber (pbs.org).  He had come home drunk from a party one night and passed out in his garage with his car still running (pbs.org).  Carbon monoxide gas from the exhaust nearly killed him, convincing him that gassing could be used against the prisoners.  This would be cheaper than bullets and would distance the officers from direct contact with their victims.  “Death, death, death. Death at night, death in the morning, death in the afternoon. Death. We lived death.  How could a human feel?” stated Pavel Stemin, a Polish prisoner (pbs.org).

This picture show the ovens that the

corpses would be place into to burn. 

Reference

 Bloomfield, Sarah J. “Remember the Holocaust, and the repel assaults on the truth.” EBSOhost. USA Today, 14 Apr. 2010. Web. 3 May 2010. <http://web.ebscohost.com/‌ehost/‌delivery?vid=7&hid=111&sid=c5f7f9d2-2f5d-416c-bc5e-2d0aac404fbf%40sessionmgr104>. 2.

Borade, Gaynor. “Life in Concentration Camps.” Buzzle.com. N.p., 2009. Web. 2 May 2010. <http://www.buzzle.com/‌articles/‌life-in-concentration-camps.html>. 1.

Cash, Dave. “Concentration Camps.” HolocaustSurvivors.org. John Menszer, 2000. Web. 11 May 2010. <http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/‌cgi-bin/‌data.show.pl?di=record&da=encyclopedia&ke=19>. 8.

Dachau Concentration Camp. N.d. flickr. anja_johnson, 13 Apr. 2010. Web. 12 May 2010. <http://www.flickr.com/‌photos/‌fotoecke/‌4517001111/>. 9.

Dachau Concentration Camp. N.d. flickr. anja_johnson, 13 Apr. 2010. Web. 12 May 2010. <http://www.flickr.com/‌photos/‌fotoecke/‌4516999807/>. 10.

“In Quotes: Auschwitz Anniversity.” BBC News. BBC, 27 Jan. 2005. Web. 6 May 2010. <http:/‌news.bbc.co.uk/‌2/‌hi/‌europe/‌4212671.stm>. 7.

Jewish victims of the Nazi holocaust during World War 2. N.d. flickr. BlatantNews.com, 15 Oct. 2009. Web. 12 May 2010. <http://www.flickr.com/‌photos/‌blatantnews/‌4014002396/>. 11.

Lawton, Clive A. Auschwitz. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Candlewick Press, 2002. Print. 3.

pbs.org. Community Television of Southern California, 2004. Web. 4 May 2010. <http://www.pbs.org/‌auschwitz/>. 4.

“Prisoners of the Camps.” United States Holocaust Museum. N.p., n.d. Web. 6 May 2010. <http:/‌www.ushmm.org/‌outreach/‌en/‌article.php?ModuleId=10007754>. 6.

YadVashem. Holocaust Survivor Testomonies: Slave Labor in the Concentration Camps. YouTube.com. N.p., 10 Feb. 2010. Web. 5 May 2010. <http://www.youtube.com/‌watch?v=od3IYMHRxRc>. 5.

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