During the time of the Holocaust, many destructive concentration camps were built. Adolf Hitler built these camps to kill the Jews as well as other undesirables throughout Germany and all of Europe. These camps had atrocious living conditions with many of the prisoners dying of starvation, disease, and execution. In addition to torturing and eventually executing most of the prisoners in the camps, the Germans also used them to perform hard manual labor that was necessary to support the war effort. Three of the most well-known and most frequented camps during this time include Dachau, Bergen Belsen, and Auschwitz.
Dachau was one of the concentration camps established in March 1933. Hitler described it as “the first concentration camp for political prisoners”. During the first year of the camp, about 4,800 prisoners were held there but as the war progressed, about 10,000 prisoners were held there. This camp was divided into two sections which were those areas dedicated to prisoner labor and those that were used for the crematoria (2). The crematoria was where the prisoners were killed. They were killed with either with gas chambers, shooting, or experimenting. Most of the time, the doctors experimented on young children and especially twins. This area was very close to the barracks where the prisoners lived. This allowed some prisoners the learn about their impending fate, thus causing them to consider escape. These deplorable conditions also made the camp smell like burning flesh and dead bodies. Before the prisoners were killed, they were forced to work. Prisoners worked in gravel pits, built roads, and drained marshes. The weak ones were instantly killed upon arrival. By war’s end, about 188,000 prisoners were killed in this concentration camp (2). Bergen-Belsen camp was established in 1940. In the beginning, it was only a POW camp until 1943, at which point it became a concentration camp. There were three components of this camp which were the POW camp, the “resistance camp”, and the “prisoners camp”. The prisoner’s camp also consisted of the “recuperation camp”, the “small womens camp”, and the “large womens camp” (1). There were multiple prisoners from different backgrounds such …show more content…
It is said between 1940 and 1945, about Jews 1 million were deported to the camp and about 900 thousand had died (4). Thousands of other nationalities had also died during this time period. The main camp was Auschwitz 1 which is where the prisoners lived and worked. This part of the camp also had a crematorium and a gas chamber. SS physicians also carried out experiments on the prisoners. This let the Germans to find other methods of killing the prisoners as well. Auschwitz 2 had the largest population out of the three subcamps. This camp also included a place to live and work for the prisoners. In October of 1942, Auschwitz 3 was made. This subcamp was also called Buna or Monowitz (4). This camped housed prisoners that were assigned to work at the synthetic rubber works. On January 27, 1945, the Soviet Army had entered Auschwitz and liberated around 7,000 prisoners which were either ill or dying. These were the prisoners left over from when the SS started to evacuate and march the prisoners west. So many had died in this camp that there is not a number for how many had