The Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp complex was founded in May 1940 near the Silesian city of Auschwitz, 60 km from Krakow. During the war, about 1.4 million people became victims of the death camp, of which approximately 1.1 million were Jews.

By November 1944, when it became clear that the territory of Auschwitz would come under the control of the Red Army, the use of gas chambers in the concentration camp was ordered to stop, three of the four crematoria were closed, and one was converted into an air-raid shelter. A maximum of documents were destroyed, mass graves were tried to be disguised, approaches to the camp were mined, and prisoners were prepared for evacuation. This evacuation, called the "death march" because of the huge number of dead and killed along the way, began on 18 January. About 58 thousand prisoners went under escort to the territory of Germany.

Actions to liberate the death camp were carried out as part of the Vistula-Oder operation, in which divisions took part as part of the 60th Army of the First Ukrainian Front. According to the list of military personnel of the 60th Army according to socio-demographic characteristics (the document was declassified several years ago), Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated by soldiers of 39 nationalities. According to various estimates, from 234 to 350 Soviet soldiers and officers died in the battles for the liberation of the concentration camp.

The battle for Auschwitz began on January 24, 1945, when the 107th Rifle Division, under the command of the then Colonel Vasily Petrenko, attacked the village of Monovitsy. The commander of the assault detachment of the 106th Rifle Corps, Major Anatoly Shapiro, recalled those days as follows: “We had to take the village of Kostelitsa, so I remember its name (it is possible that the village of Kopciovice was meant. - Gazeta.Ru), in 12 km from the concentration camp.

The village was small, on both sides of it there were two tall churches. On the bell towers of these churches, the Nazis installed machine guns,

of which heavy fire was fired at the advancing Soviet troops (including my battalion). Our soldiers could not even raise their heads. The field in front of the village was completely mined. Our advance has stopped. After waiting for the night, we went around the fortified village and moved towards Auschwitz through a small forest, in which we also met fierce resistance from the Nazis. It was January 25, 1945."

On January 26, 1945, Soviet troops advanced according to the available map, according to which there should have been a dense forest ahead. But suddenly the forest ended, and a "fortified bastion" with brick walls, surrounded by barbed wire, appeared before the Soviet army.

Few people knew about the existence of a concentration camp in Auschwitz. Therefore, the presence of any buildings came as a surprise to the fighters.

“Until the last moment, we did not know that we were going to liberate the concentration camp. We went to the town of Auschwitz, but it turned out that the entire territory around this Polish town was in the camps, ”said Ivan Martynushkin, senior lieutenant, commander of a machine gun company of the 322nd rifle division.

On the night of January 27, 1945, Soviet troops came close to Auschwitz itself. “And here they almost did not meet the resistance of the enemy, only our sappers had a lot of work,” Shapiro recalled. “Someone told me that a few kilometers from the main camp, the Germans set up a factory for the production of Kohinoor pencils and prisoners work there. While the sappers cleared the area at the main gate of the camp, my assault squad made a forced march to this factory. I was struck by the silence that deafened when we entered its territory.

Photo report: Liberation of Auschwitz

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Through the wide entrance doors, a group of soldiers tumbled into the inside of a long two-story brick building, Shapiro continued: “In the half-lit room, we saw several long tables along which people continued to sit, or rather they were living skeletons. They stuffed pencil blanks with powdered graphite, paying no attention to us. As we later learned,

the norm for each prisoner was the production of a thousand pencils per shift. Those who did not comply with the norm were waiting for the gas chamber.

It seemed that there were no forces in the world that could tear the still living beings away from this occupation, although life had almost left them. It took some time for my soldiers to stop this lingering conveyor belt. We were instructed to feed people with a weak solution of broth, but most of them could not stand this food and soon died. Only glazed eyes with a pained expression could tell about the torments they had experienced.

In turn, Martynushkin with his company approached the fence of Auschwitz on January 26, when it got dark: “We did not go to the territory, but occupied some kind of guardhouse outside the camp. It was very hot there, the radiators were so hot that we completely dried out there overnight: the weather was damp, and we also had to cross some rivers along the way.

And the next day we started cleaning up around the camp. When we started moving around the village of Brzezinka, we were fired on - not from the camp, but from some two or three-story building, state-owned, maybe it was a school ... We lay low, did not move further and contacted the command: they asked that this building was hit by artillery. Let's break it down and move on. And they suddenly answered us that the artillery would not strike, because there was a camp, and there were people in the camp, and therefore we even had to avoid skirmishes so that stray bullets would not accidentally catch anyone. And then we realized what kind of fence it was.”

It was already light when the Soviet soldiers saw the prisoners who had left the barracks. “At first we decided that they were fascists or camp guards,” said Martynushkin. “But they, apparently, guessed who we were, and began to greet us with gestures, shouting something. We were separated by a solid fence, very high - four meters, no less than barbed wire.

B. Borisov / RIA Novosti Prisoners of the Auschwitz concentration camp look into the lens from behind barbed wire, January 27, 1945

At about three o'clock in the afternoon on January 27, 1945, Soviet soldiers were able to break open the gates of the camp. “In the afternoon, we passed through the main gate, over which hung a slogan made in wire: “Work makes you free,” Shapiro said. - How the Germans made people free from life through labor, we have already seen at the pencil factory. (...) It was possible to escape from the death camp only to the next world, through the chimney of the crematorium. The furnaces that burned the corpses worked around the clock, and the air was constantly filled with ash particles and the smell of burnt human meat.

The atmosphere was so poisoned by these particles that the poplars standing outside the wire fence of the camp lost their crown forever and stood bare all year.

By the time the Red Army soldiers entered the territory of Auschwitz, about 6 thousand prisoners remained in the camp - the sickest and weakest prisoners. In addition, there were “up to 100 Germans in the camps, mostly criminals, only random representatives of the incoming units deal with their fate,” the memorandum to the head of the political department of the 1st Ukrainian Front says.

“All the prisoners look extremely exhausted, gray-haired old men and young boys, mothers with babies and teenagers, almost all half-dressed. Among them are many crippled, with traces of torture, ”said the report to Georgy Malenkov, Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks.

“Some kept on their feet, even were able to work, but all had black, haggard faces.

There were also those who could not get up: they sat leaning against the walls of the barracks. We also looked into these barracks ... A terrible impression. The stench is such that I didn't even want to go in there.

On the bunks lay people who were unable to get up and go out. The air is already creepy, and some strange smell was added to it, maybe carbolic acid, ”recalled Martynushkin.

Boris Ignatovich/RIA Novosti Liberation of Auschwitz prisoners, January 27, 1945

Shapiro also spoke about the terrible smell in the barracks: “It was impossible to go inside the barracks without a protective gauze bandage. Uncleaned corpses lay on the two-story bunks. The reaction of the surviving prisoners to our appearance was the same as in the pencil factory. Half-dead skeletons sometimes crawled out from under the bunks and swore that they were not Jews. No one could believe in a possible liberation.”

“I saw children ... A terrible picture: stomachs swollen from hunger, wandering eyes; hands like whips, thin legs; the head is huge, and everything else, as it were, is not human - as if sewn on. The children were silent and showed only the numbers tattooed on their arm. These people had no tears. I saw them trying to wipe their eyes, but their eyes remained dry, ”wrote Vasily Petrenko, who commanded the 226th Infantry Division, in his memoirs Before and After Auschwitz.

After the barracks, the Red Army soldiers inspected the warehouses. Almost 1.2 million men's and women's suits, 43.3 thousand pairs of men's and women's shoes, 13.7 thousand carpets, a huge number of toothbrushes and shaving brushes, as well as other small household items were found on the territory of the concentration camp.

According to the memoirs of the liberators of Auschwitz, there were huge rooms in the concentration camp filled with human ashes, not yet packed in bags. In one of the rooms there were boxes filled to the brim with dental crowns and gold dentures.

“I was particularly struck by the mountains of bales of human hair that were sorted by quality.

Children's fibers, as softer ones, were used to stuff pillows, and adult hair was used to make mattresses. I could not look without tears at the mountains of children's underwear, shoes, toys taken from babies, at baby carriages, ”Shapiro wrote in his memoirs. But what really shocked them was a room filled with "delicate women's handbags, lampshades, wallets, purses and other leather goods" that were made from human skin.

Part of the Auschwitz complex was converted into a hospital for former prisoners, part of the camp was transferred to the jurisdiction of the NKVD and until 1947 served as a special prison for prisoners of war and displaced persons. In parallel, investigations were carried out on the territory. Their results were used during the trials of Nazi criminals.

In 1947, a museum was created in Auschwitz, which is included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. Since 2005, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz has been celebrated as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Auschwitz. Just facts and just memories. Our editors collected them with difficulty. We did the material in parts: we passed it on to each other and went to calm down. Such a place is Auschwitz, and such a date is 70 years since the terrible concentration camp was liberated by Soviet troops.

All over the world it is customary to use the German name of the concentration camp - "Auschwitz", and not the Polish "Auschwitz", because it was the German name that was used by the Nazi administration.

We arrived at Auschwitz in the middle of the night. Everything was designed to scare us to death: blinding searchlights, barking SS dogs, prisoners dressed as convicts who pulled us out of the cars.

Former Auschwitz prisoner Simone Weil

The Auschwitz concentration camp consisted of three main camps: Auschwitz 1, Auschwitz 2 and Auschwitz 3 and was the largest of the concentration camps and extermination camps established on Polish soil.

Once a day they gave sour soup from unpeeled swede, with earth, with worms. Then - a slice of bread a finger thick and marmalade from beets or small potatoes. And nothing more. Water is strictly limited. It was impossible to get drunk when you wanted.

Tattooing of the prisoner's number on the arm began in the concentration camp in 1943. According to the Auschwitz State Museum, this concentration camp was the only Nazi camp in which prisoners were tattooed with numbers.

The doctor at Auschwitz fought for the lives of those condemned to death by giving his own life. He had at his disposal only a few packs of aspirin and a huge heart. The doctor worked there not for the sake of fame, honor or satisfaction of professional ambitions. For him, there was only the duty of a doctor - to save lives in any situation.

Former prisoner of Auschwitz midwife Pani Stanislava Leshchinskaya

Auschwitz 1 was divided into blocks. Block 11 was the worst for the prisoners. There were punishments for violators of the rules of the camp. Four people were placed in so-called "standing cells" measuring 90x90 cm, where they had to stand all night. Sometimes the offenders were either put in an airtight cell where they died from lack of oxygen, or starved to death. Between blocks 10 and 11 there was a torture yard where prisoners were tortured and shot.

The reason for the frequent cases of suicide among the soldiers of the operational detachments was the constant sight of blood - it became unbearable. A few soldiers went mad, and most, doing their terrible work, became addicted to alcohol.

On September 3, 1941, the first test of Zyklon B gas etching was carried out in Block 11 Auschwitz 1. As a result of the test, about 600 Soviet prisoners of war and 250 other prisoners, mostly sick, died. The experience was deemed a success and one of the bunkers was converted into a gas chamber and crematorium.

In 1942-1943, about 20,000 kg of Zyklon B crystals were delivered to Auschwitz.

I was always horrified when I thought about mass executions, especially of women and children. I could hardly endure the mass executions of hostages and other types of executions carried out on the orders of the Reichsführer SS or the Reich Security Main Office. Now I was calm, because the massacre could be dispensed with, and the victims would not suffer until the very last minutes.

Commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp Rudolf Franz Hess about the gassing of prisoners

Speaking of the horrors of Auschwitz, they usually mean Auschwitz 2. There were 4 gas chambers and 4 crematoria.

The crematoriums burned all the time, these chambers smoked and smoked and smoked all the time.

Former prisoner of Auschwitz Igor Fedorovich Malitsky

When the crematoria could not cope with the destruction of the bodies of those killed in the gas chambers, they were burned in the ditches behind the crematorium. In the summer of 1944, the prisoners waited 6-12 hours for their turn to be destroyed in the gas chambers.

The two largest gas chambers were designed for 1,450 people, but the SS drove 1,600 to 1,700 people there. They followed the prisoners and beat them with sticks. Those behind pushed those in front. As a result, so many prisoners got into the cells that even after death they remained standing. There was nowhere to fall.

From the memoirs of the former prisoner of Auschwitz Shlomo Venezia

Prisoners were allowed to use the toilet twice a day. No more than thirty seconds were allowed for using the toilet and no more than thirty seconds for hygiene procedures.

The work went on continuously around the clock, day and night, and yet it was impossible to cope with it - there were so many things. Here, in a bale of children's coats, I once found the coat of my youngest daughter, Lani.

Former prisoner of Auschwitz Mordechai Cirulnicki

The camp clothes were quite thin and provided little protection from the cold. Linen was changed at intervals of several weeks, and sometimes even once a month, which led to epidemics of typhus and typhoid fever, as well as scabies.

Our barracks were poorly heated, and the children warmed themselves in the ashes of the crematorium ovens. When the head of the women's camp, Maria Mendel, at the sight of which everyone froze in horror, found us there, my girlfriends hid, but I did not have time. She stepped on my chest with her boot, and I heard my bones crack and my back was baked from the embers. Of course, I did not know then that I was lying on burnt human bones.

Former prisoner of Auschwitz Larisa Simonova

In the entire history of Auschwitz, about 700 escape attempts were made, 300 were successful. However, if someone escaped, then all the prisoners from his block were killed. It was an effective method to thwart escape attempts.

There were frequent cases of suicide - people could not stand the beatings, humiliation, hard work, bullying, hunger and cold and died, opening their veins, throwing themselves on barbed wire, through which a high voltage current passed.

Former prisoner of Auschwitz Anatoly Vanukevich

When Soviet soldiers occupied Auschwitz on January 27, 1945, they found about 7,500 surviving prisoners there. More than 58 thousand prisoners were taken out or killed by the Germans.

We saw emaciated people - very thin, exhausted, with blackened skin. They were dressed in different ways: someone only had a robe, someone threw a coat over the robe, someone wrapped himself in a blanket. One could see how their eyes shone with happiness because their liberation had come, that they were free.

Participant in the liberation of Auschwitz, Soviet war veteran Ivan Martynushkin

1185345 men's and women's suits, 43255 pairs of men's and women's shoes, 13694 carpets, a huge number of toothbrushes and shaving brushes, as well as other small household items were found on the territory of the concentration camp.

In our barracks, right on the earthen floor, a woman gave birth, a German woman approached her, picked up the child with a shovel and threw it alive into the stove-potbelly stove.

Former prisoner of Auschwitz Larisa Simonova

A museum was established in Auschwitz in 1947, which is included in the UNESCO World Heritage List.

I had no right to any feelings that would go against this. I was obliged to be even more severe, insensitive and merciless towards the fate of the prisoners. I saw everything very clearly, sometimes even too real, but I could not succumb to it. And before the ultimate goal - the need to win the war - everything that died along the way should not have kept me from activity and could not have any meaning.

Commandant of Auschwitz concentration camp Rudolf Franz Hess

In 1996, the German government declared January 27, the day of the liberation of Auschwitz, the official day of remembrance for the victims of the Holocaust.

The word Auschwitz (or Auschwitz) in the minds of many people is a symbol or even the quintessence of evil, horror, death, the concentration of the most unimaginable inhuman fanaticism and torture.
Many today dispute what former prisoners and historians say happened here. This is their personal right and opinion. But having been to Auschwitz and seeing with my own eyes huge rooms filled with ... glasses, tens of thousands of pairs of shoes, tons of cut hair and ... children's things ... You have an emptiness inside. And the hair is moving in horror. The horror of realizing that this hair, glasses and shoes belonged to a living person. Maybe a postman, maybe a student. Ordinary worker or merchant in the market. Or a girl. Or a seven year old. Which they cut off, removed, thrown into a common pile. To a hundred more of the same.
Auschwitz. A place of evil and inhumanity.

1. Young student Tadeusz Uzhinsky arrived in the first echelon with prisoners. The Auschwitz concentration camp began to function in 1940, being a camp for Polish political prisoners. The first prisoners of Auschwitz were 728 Poles from the prison in Tarnow. At the time of its foundation, there were 20 buildings in the camp - former Polish military barracks. Some of them were converted for mass detention of people, and 6 more buildings were additionally built. The average number of prisoners ranged from 13-16 thousand people, and in 1942 it reached 20 thousand. The Auschwitz camp became the base camp for a whole network of new camps - in 1941, the Auschwitz II - Birkenau camp was built 3 km away, and in 1943 - Auschwitz III - Monowitz. In addition, in 1942-1944, about 40 branches of the Auschwitz camp were built, built near metallurgical plants, factories and mines, which were subordinate to the Auschwitz III concentration camp. And the Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II - Birkenau camps have completely turned into a plant for the destruction of people.

2. Upon arrival at Auschwitz, the prisoners were selected and those of them who were found fit by the SS doctors for work were sent for registration. Rudolf Höss, the head of the camp, told them on the very first day that they "... arrived at the concentration camp, from which there is only one way out - through the crematorium pipe." personal numbers. Initially, each prisoner was photographed in three positions

3. In 1943, they introduced a tattoo of the prisoner's number on the arm. Infants and young children were most often numbered on the thigh. According to the Auschwitz State Museum, this concentration camp was the only Nazi camp in which prisoners were tattooed with numbers.

4. Depending on the reasons for the arrest, the prisoners received triangles of different colors, which, together with the numbers, were sewn onto camp clothes. Political prisoners were supposed to have a red triangle, criminals - green. Gypsies and anti-social elements received black triangles, Jehovah's Witnesses - purple, homosexuals - pink. The Jews wore a six-pointed star, consisting of a yellow triangle and a triangle of the color that corresponded to the reason for the arrest. Soviet prisoners of war had a patch in the form of the letters SU. The camp clothes were quite thin and provided little protection from the cold. Linen was changed at intervals of several weeks, and sometimes even once a month, and the prisoners did not have the opportunity to wash it, which led to epidemics of typhus and typhoid fever, as well as scabies

5. Prisoners in the Auschwitz I camp lived in brick blocks, in Auschwitz II-Birkenau - mainly in wooden barracks. Brick blocks were only in the women's section of the Auschwitz II camp. During the entire existence of the Auschwitz I camp, about 400 thousand prisoners of various nationalities, Soviet prisoners of war and prisoners of corps No. 11, who were awaiting the conclusion of the Gestapo police tribunal, were registered here. One of the disasters of camp life was verification, which checked the number of prisoners. They lasted for several, and sometimes more than 10 hours (for example, 19 hours on July 6, 1940). The camp authorities very often announced penal checks, during which the prisoners had to squat or kneel. There were verifications when they had to keep their hands up for several hours.

6. Housing conditions in different periods were very different, but they were always catastrophic. The prisoners, who were brought in at the very beginning by the first echelons, slept on straw scattered on the concrete floor.

7. Later introduced hay bedding. They were thin mattresses stuffed with a small amount of it. About 200 prisoners slept in a room that barely accommodated 40-50 people.

8. With the increase in the number of prisoners in the camp, it became necessary to compact their accommodation. There were three-tiered bunks. There were 2 people on one level. In the form of bedding, as a rule, there was rotten straw. The prisoners were covered with rags and what was. In the Auschwitz camp, the bunks were wooden, in Auschwitz-Birkenau both wooden and brick with wooden flooring.

9. The toilet of the Auschwitz I camp, compared to the conditions in Auschwitz-Birkenau, looked like a real miracle of civilization.

10. Toilet barracks in the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp

11. Washroom. The water was only cold and the prisoner had access to it for only a few minutes a day. The prisoners were allowed to wash extremely rarely, and for them it was a real holiday.

12. Plate with the number of the residential unit on the wall

13. Until 1944, when Auschwitz turned into an extermination factory, most of the prisoners were sent to grueling work every day. At first they worked on the expansion of the camp, and then they were used as slaves in the industrial facilities of the Third Reich. Every day, columns of emaciated slaves came and went through the gate with the cynical inscription "Arbeit macht Frei" (Work makes free). The prisoner had to do the work by running, without a second of rest. The pace of work, meager portions of food and constant beatings increased mortality. During the return of prisoners to the camp, dead or exhausted, who could not move on their own, were dragged or carried in wheelbarrows. And at this time, a brass band consisting of prisoners played for them near the gates of the camp.

14. For every inhabitant of Auschwitz, Block 11 was one of the scariest places. Unlike other blocks, its doors were always closed. The windows were completely walled up. Only on the first floor there were two windows - in the room where the SS men were on duty. In the halls on the right and left sides of the corridor, prisoners were placed awaiting the verdict of the emergency police court, which came to the Auschwitz camp from Katowice once or twice a month. Within 2-3 hours of his work, he passed from several dozen to over a hundred death sentences.

15. The cramped cells, in which there were sometimes a huge number of people awaiting sentence, had only a tiny barred window right up to the ceiling. And from the side of the street, near these windows, there were tin boxes that blocked these windows from the influx of fresh air.

16. Those sentenced before being shot were forced to undress in this room. If there were few of them that day, then the sentence was carried out right here.

17. If there were many sentenced, they were taken to the "Wall of Death", which was located behind a high fence with blank gates between buildings 10 and 11. Large digits of their camp number were applied with an ink pencil on the chest of the undressed people (until 1943, when tattoos appeared on the arm), so that later it would be easy to identify the corpse.

18. Under the stone fence in the courtyard of Unit 11, a large wall of black insulating boards was built, sheathed with absorbent material. This wall became the last facet of the lives of thousands of people sentenced to death by the Gestapo court for their unwillingness to betray their homeland, attempted flight and political "crimes".

19. Fibers of death. The condemned were shot by the reporter or members of the political department. To do this, they used a small-caliber rifle so as not to attract too much attention with the sounds of shots. After all, not far away was a stone wall, beyond which there was a highway.

20. In the Auschwitz camp there was a whole system of punishments for prisoners. It can also be called one of the fragments of their deliberate destruction. The prisoner was punished for picking an apple or finding a potato in the field, defecation while working, or for working too slowly. One of the most terrible places of punishment, often leading to the death of a prisoner, was one of the basements of the 11th building. Here, in the back room, there were four narrow vertical sealed punishment cells measuring 90x90 centimeters in perimeter. In each of them there was a door with a metal bolt at the bottom.

21. Through this door, the punished was forced to squeeze inside and closed it with a bolt. In this cage, a person could only be standing. So he stood without food and water for as long as the SS wanted. Often this was the last punishment in the prisoner's life.

23. In September 1941, the first attempt was made to mass exterminate people with gas. About 600 Soviet prisoners of war and about 250 sick prisoners from the camp hospital were placed in small batches in airtight cells in the basement of building 11.

24. Copper pipelines with valves have already been laid along the walls of the cells. Gas was supplied through them to the chambers ...

25. The names of the destroyed people were entered in the "Book of the Daily Status" of the Auschwitz camp

26. Lists of people sentenced to death by the emergency police court

27. Found notes left by those sentenced to death on scraps of paper

28. In Auschwitz, in addition to adults, there were also children who were sent to the camp with their parents. These were the children of Jews, Gypsies, as well as Poles and Russians. Most of the Jewish children perished in the gas chambers as soon as they arrived at the camp. The rest, after a strict selection, were sent to the camp, where they were subject to the same strict rules as adults.

29. Children were registered and photographed in the same way as adults and were identified as political prisoners.

30. One of the most terrible pages in the history of Auschwitz were medical experiments by SS doctors. Including over children. So, for example, Professor Karl Clauberg, in order to develop a quick method for the biological destruction of the Slavs, conducted sterilization experiments on Jewish women in building No. 10. Dr. Josef Mengele, within the framework of genetic and anthropological experiments, conducted experiments on twin children and children with physical disabilities. In addition, various experiments were carried out in Auschwitz with the use of new drugs and preparations, toxic substances were rubbed into the epithelium of prisoners, skin grafts were performed, etc.

31. Conclusion on the results of X-rays carried out during experiments with twins by Dr. Mengele.

32. Letter from Heinrich Himmler ordering the start of a series of sterilization experiments

33. Maps of records of anthropometric data of experimental prisoners in the framework of Dr. Mengele's experiments.

34. Pages of the register of the dead, which indicate the names of 80 boys who died after phenol injections as part of medical experiments.

35. List of released prisoners placed in a Soviet hospital for treatment

36. Since the autumn of 1941, a gas chamber began to function in the Auschwitz camp, in which Zyklon B gas is used. It was produced by the Degesch company, which in the period 1941-1944 received about 300 thousand marks of profit from the sale of this gas. To kill 1,500 people, according to the commandant of Auschwitz, Rudolf Hoess, about 5-7 kg of gas were needed.

37. After the liberation of Auschwitz, a huge number of used Zyklon B cans and cans with unused contents were found in the camp warehouses. For the period 1942-1943, according to documents, about 20 thousand kg of Zyklon B crystals were delivered to Auschwitz alone.

38. Most of the Jews doomed to death arrived at Auschwitz-Birkenau with the conviction that they were being taken "to a settlement" in Eastern Europe. This was especially true of Jews from Greece and Hungary, to whom the Germans even sold non-existent building plots and land or offered work in fictitious factories. That is why people sent to the camp for destruction often brought with them the most valuable things, jewelry and money.

39. Upon arrival at the unloading platform, all things and valuables were taken away from people, SS doctors selected the deported people. Those who were deemed incapacitated were sent to the gas chambers. According to Rudolf Goess, there were about 70-75% of those who arrived.

40. Things found in the warehouses of Auschwitz after the liberation of the camp

41. Model of the gas chamber and crematorium II of Auschwitz-Birkenau. People were convinced that they were being sent to the bathhouse, so they appear relatively calm.

42. Here the prisoners are forced to take off their clothes and driven to the next room, simulating a bath. Shower holes were located under the ceiling, through which water never flowed. About 2,000 people were brought into a room of about 210 square meters, after which the doors were closed and gas was supplied to the room. People were dying within 15-20 minutes. Gold teeth were pulled out from the dead, rings and earrings were removed, women's hair was cut off.

43. After that, the corpses were transported to the ovens of the crematoria, where the fire roared continuously. In the event of an overflow of the ovens or at a time when the pipes were damaged by overloading, the bodies were destroyed in the places of burning behind the crematoria. All these actions were carried out by prisoners belonging to the so-called "Sonderkommando" group. At the peak of the activity of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, its number was about 1000 people.

44. Photo taken by one of the members of the Sonderkommando, which shows the process of burning those dead people.

45. In the Auschwitz camp, the crematorium was located behind the camp fence. Its largest room was the mortuary, which was converted into a temporary gas chamber.

46. ​​Here, in 1941 and 1942, Soviet prisoners of war and Jews from the ghettos located on the territory of Upper Silesia were exterminated.

47. In the second hall there were three double furnaces, in which up to 350 bodies were burned during the day.

48. In one retort, 2-3 corpses were placed.

49. The crematorium was built by Topf & Sons from Erfurt, which in 1942-1943 installed stoves in four crematoria in Brzezinka.

50. Building No. 5 is now the most terrible. Here you can find material evidence of Nazi crimes in Auschwitz

51. Thousands of glasses, the arms of which are intertwined like the fates of people who took them off before the last trip to the "bath"

52. The next room is half filled with personal care products - shaving brushes, toothbrushes, combs ...

54. Hundreds of prostheses, corsets, crutches. The disabled were unsuitable for work, so upon arrival at the camp, only one fate awaited them - a gas chamber and a crematorium.

56. A two-story room, which, before the ceiling of the first floor, was filled with metal utensils that were in the prisoners' suitcases - bowls, plates, teapots ...

57. Suitcases with the names of deported people written on them.

58. All the property that the deported people brought was sorted, stored, and the most valuable was exported to the Third Reich for the needs of the SS, the Wehrmacht and the civilian population. In addition, prisoners' items were used by employees of the camp garrison. For example, they turned to the commandant with written requests to issue strollers, things for babies, and other items.

59. One of the most sinister rooms is a huge room, littered with mountains of shoes on both sides. Which was once worn by living people. They removed it in front of the "bath".

60. Silent witnesses of the last minutes of the life of their masters

62. The Red Army, which was liberating the camp in Auschwitz, found about 7000 kg of hair packed in bags in warehouses not burned by the Germans. These were the remnants that the camp authorities did not have time to sell and send to the factories. An analysis conducted at the Institute of Forensic Examinations showed that they had traces of hydrocyanic acid, a poisonous component that was part of Tsilon B. From human hair, German firms produced a tailor's bead.

63. Found children's things.

64. It is impossible to endure at their sight. I want to get out of here as soon as possible

66. And again mountains of shoes. Children's.

67. The steps of the barracks, which today house the expositions of the Auschwitz State Museum, are crushed by millions of human legs that have visited this museum of horror for almost 70 years

68. The gates of the death factory were closed on January 27, 1945, when 7 thousand prisoners left by the Germans waited for the Red Army detachments ...

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Photo album of the concentration camp "Auschwitz Birkenau" (Auschwitz)

"Album of Auschwitz" - about 200 unique photographs of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, compiled into an album by an unknown SS officer, will be exhibited at the Lumiere Brothers Center for Photography in Moscow.

Historians rightly regard the Auschwitz album as one of the most important testimonies of the fate of the millions who were killed. The Auschwitz album is essentially a one of a kind archive of documentary photographs of the active camp, with the exception of a few photographs of its construction in 1942-1943, and three photographs taken by the prisoners themselves.

The Auschwitz concentration camp was the largest Nazi death camp. More than 1.5 million people of different nationalities were tortured here, of which about 1.1 million were European Jews.

What is the Auschwitz concentration camp?

The complex of buildings for the detention of prisoners of war was built under the auspices of the SS on the directive of Hitler in 1939. The Auschwitz concentration camp is located near Krakow. 90% of those contained in it were ethnic Jews. The rest are Soviet prisoners of war, Poles, Gypsies and representatives of other nationalities, who in the total number of those killed and tortured amounted to about 200 thousand.

The full name of the concentration camp is Auschwitz Birkenau. Auschwitz is a Polish name, it is customary to use it mainly in the territory of the former Soviet Union.

Nearly 200 photographs of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp were taken in the spring of 1944, and methodically compiled into an album by an unknown SS officer. Subsequently, this album was found by a survivor of the camp, nineteen-year-old Lily Jacob, in one of the barracks of the Mittelbau-Dora camp on the day of his liberation.

Arrival of the train to Auschwitz.

In the pictures from the Auschwitz album we see the arrival, selection, forced labor or killing of Jews who entered Auschwitz in late May - early June 1944. According to some sources, these photographs were taken on the same day, according to others - over several weeks .

Why was Auschwitz chosen? This is due to its convenient location. First, it was on the border where the Third Reich ended and Poland began. Auschwitz was one of the key trading hubs with convenient and well-established transport routes. On the other hand, the closely approaching forest helped to hide the crimes committed there from prying eyes.

The first buildings were erected by the Nazis on the site of the barracks of the Polish army. For the construction, they used the labor of local Jews who fell into their bondage. At first, German criminals and Polish political prisoners were sent there. The main task of the concentration camp was to keep people dangerous to the well-being of Germany in isolation and use their labor. The prisoners worked six days a week, and Sunday was a day off.

In 1940, the local population living near the barracks was forcibly expelled by the German army in order to build additional buildings on the vacated territory, where later there were a crematorium and chambers. In 1942, the camp was fenced with a strong reinforced concrete fence and high voltage wire.

However, even such measures did not stop some of the prisoners, although cases of escape were extremely rare. Those who had such thoughts knew that if they tried, all their cellmates would be destroyed.

In the same year, 1942, at the NSDAP conference, it was concluded that the mass extermination of the Jews and the "final solution of the Jewish question" were necessary. At first, German and Polish Jews were sent to Auschwitz and other German concentration camps of the Second World War. Then Germany agreed with the Allies to conduct a "cleansing" in their territories.

It should be mentioned that not everyone easily agreed to this. For example, Denmark was able to save its subjects from imminent death. When the government was informed about the planned "hunt" of the SS, Denmark organized a secret transfer of Jews to a neutral state - Switzerland. Thus, more than 7 thousand lives were saved.

However, in the general statistics of the 7,000 people destroyed, tortured by hunger, beatings, overwork, diseases and inhuman experiments, this is a drop in the sea of ​​shed blood. In total, during the existence of the camp, according to various estimates, from 1 to 4 million people were killed.

In mid-1944, when the war unleashed by the Germans took a sharp turn, the SS tried to transport prisoners from Auschwitz west to other camps. Documents and any evidence of a merciless massacre were massively destroyed. The Germans destroyed the crematorium and gas chambers. In early 1945, the Nazis had to release most of the prisoners. Those who could not run were wanted to be destroyed. Fortunately, thanks to the advance of the Soviet army, several thousand prisoners were saved, including children who were being experimented on.

Camp structure

In total, Auschwitz was divided into 3 large camp complexes: Birkenau-Oswiecim, Monowitz and Auschwitz-1. The first camp and Birkenau were later merged into a complex of 20 buildings, sometimes several stories high.

The tenth unit was far from the last place in terms of terrible conditions of detention. Medical experiments were carried out here, mainly on children. As a rule, such "experiments" were not so much of scientific interest as they were another way of sophisticated bullying. Especially among the buildings, the eleventh block stood out, it caused horror even among the local guards. There was a place for torture and executions, the most negligent were sent here, tortured with merciless cruelty. It was here that attempts were made for the first time to mass and most “effective” extermination with the help of the Zyklon-B poison.

An execution wall was constructed between these two blocks, where, according to scientists, about 20,000 people were killed. Several gallows and burning stoves were also installed on the territory. Later, gas chambers were built that could kill up to 6,000 people a day. The arriving prisoners were divided by German doctors into those who were able to work, and those who were immediately sent to death in the gas chamber. Most often, weak women, children and the elderly were classified as disabled. The survivors were kept in cramped conditions, with little to no food. Some of them dragged the bodies of the dead or cut off the hair that went to textile factories. If a prisoner in such a service managed to hold out for a couple of weeks, they got rid of him and took a new one.

Some fell into the "privileged" category and worked for the Nazis as tailors and barbers. The deported Jews were allowed to take no more than 25 kg of weight from home. People took with them the most valuable and important things. All things and money left after their death were sent to Germany. Before that, the belongings had to be dismantled and sorted out everything of value, which was what the prisoners were doing in the so-called "Canada". The place acquired this name due to the fact that earlier "Canada" was called valuable gifts and gifts sent from abroad to the Poles. Labor on the "Canada" was relatively softer than in general in Auschwitz. Women worked there. Food could be found among the things, so in "Canada" the prisoners did not suffer from hunger as much. The SS did not hesitate to molest beautiful girls. Often there were rapes.

Living conditions of the SS in the camp

auschwitz concentration camp auschwitz polandAuschwitz concentration camp (Oswiecim, Poland) was a real town. It had everything for the life of the military: canteens with plentiful good food, cinema, theater and all human benefits for the Nazis. While the prisoners did not receive even the minimum amount of food (many died of starvation in the first or second week), the SS men feasted incessantly, enjoying life.

Concentration camps, especially Auschwitz, have always been a desirable place of duty for the German soldier. Life here was much better and safer than that of those who fought in the East.

However, there was no place more corrupting all human nature than Auschwitz. A concentration camp is not only a place with good maintenance, where nothing threatened the military for endless murders, but also a complete lack of discipline. Here the soldiers could do whatever they wanted and to which one could sink. Huge cash flows flowed through Auschwitz at the expense of property stolen from deported persons. Accounting was done carelessly. And how could it be possible to calculate exactly how much the treasury should be replenished, if even the number of arriving prisoners was not taken into account?

The SS men did not hesitate to take their precious things and money. They drank a lot, alcohol was often found among the belongings of the dead. In general, employees in Auschwitz did not limit themselves to anything, leading a rather idle lifestyle.

Doctor Josef Mengele

After Josef Mengele was wounded in 1943, he was deemed unfit for further service and sent as a doctor to Auschwitz, the death camp. Here he had the opportunity to carry out all his ideas and experiments, which were frankly insane, cruel and senseless.

The authorities ordered Mengele to conduct various experiments, for example, on the topic of the effects of cold or height on a person. So, Josef conducted an experiment on temperature effects by enclosing the prisoner on all sides with ice until he died of hypothermia. Thus, it was found out at what body temperature irreversible consequences and death occur.

Mengele liked to experiment on children, especially on twins. The results of his experiments was the death of almost 3 thousand minors. He performed forced sex reassignment surgeries, organ transplants, and painful procedures in an attempt to change the color of his eyes, which eventually led to blindness. This, in his opinion, was proof of the impossibility for a "non-purebred" to become a real Aryan.

In 1945, Josef had to flee. He destroyed all reports of his experiments and, having issued fake documents, fled to Argentina. He lived a quiet life without deprivation and oppression, without being caught and punished.

When Auschwitz collapsed

At the beginning of 1945, the position of Germany changed. Soviet troops began an active offensive. The SS men had to begin the evacuation, which later became known as the "death march". 60,000 prisoners were ordered to walk to the West. Thousands of prisoners were killed along the way. Weakened by hunger and unbearable labor, the prisoners had to walk more than 50 kilometers. Anyone who lagged behind and could not move on was immediately shot. In Gliwice, where prisoners arrived, they were sent in freight cars to concentration camps in Germany.

The liberation of the concentration camps took place at the end of January, when only about 7 thousand sick and dying prisoners remained in Auschwitz who could not leave.

Transcarpathian Jews are waiting for sorting.

Many trains came from Berehove, Mukachevo and Uzhgorod - the cities of Carpathian Rus - at that time part of Czechoslovakia occupied by Hungary. Unlike the previous trains with the deportees, the wagons with the Hungarian exiles from Auschwitz arrived directly to Birkenau along the freshly laid tracks, the construction of which was completed in May 1944.

Laying paths.

The paths have been extended in order to speed up the process of selecting prisoners for those who can still work and be subject to immediate destruction, as well as to more efficiently sort their personal belongings.

Sorting.

After sorting. Working women.

Workable women after pest control.

Distribution to a labor camp. Lily Jacob is seventh from the right in the front row.

Most of the "able-bodied" prisoners were transferred to forced labor camps in Germany, where they were used in the factories of the military industry, which were under air attack. Others - mostly women with children and the elderly - were sent to the gas chambers upon arrival.

Able-bodied men after pest control.

More than a million Jews from Europe died in the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp. On January 27, 1945, Soviet troops under the command of Marshal Konev and Major General Petrenko entered Auschwitz, which at that time contained more than 7,000 prisoners, including 200 children.

Zril and Zeilek, brothers of Lily Jacob.

The exhibition will also include videos of survivors of Auschwitz, who recall the horror they had to endure as children. Interviews by Lily Yakob herself, who found the album, Tibor Beerman, Aranka Segal and other witnesses of one of the most terrible events in the history of mankind are provided for the exhibition by the Shoah Foundation - Institute for Visual History and Education of the University of Southern California.

Truck with things of newcomers to the camp.

Auschwitz children

Distribution to a labor camp.



After sorting. Unemployable men.

After sorting. Unemployable men.

Prisoners declared unfit for work.

Jews recognized as incapacitated are awaiting a decision on their fate near crematorium No. 4.

Selection of Jews on the Birkenau railway platform, known as the ramp. In the background is a column of prisoners on the road to Crematorium II, the building of which is visible at the top center of the photo.

A truckload of new arrivals' belongings passes a group of women, possibly on their way to the gas chambers. Birkenau functioned as a huge enterprise of extermination and plunder during the period of mass deportations of Hungarian Jews. Often, the destruction of some, disinfestation and registration of others were carried out simultaneously so as not to delay the processing of constantly arriving victims.

The Auschwitz prisoners were released four months before the end of World War II. By that time there were few of them left. Nearly one and a half million people died, most of them were Jews. For several years, the investigation continued, which led to terrible discoveries: people not only died in gas chambers, but also became victims of Dr. Mengele, who used them as guinea pigs.

Auschwitz: the history of one city

A small Polish town, in which more than a million innocent people were killed, is called Auschwitz all over the world. We call it Auschwitz. A concentration camp, experiments on women and children, gas chambers, torture, executions - all these words have been associated with the name of the city for more than 70 years.

It will sound rather strange in Russian Ich lebe in Auschwitz - "I live in Auschwitz." Is it possible to live in Auschwitz? They learned about the experiments on women in the concentration camp after the end of the war. Over the years, new facts have been discovered. One is scarier than the other. The truth about the camp called shocked the whole world. Research is ongoing today. Many books have been written and many films have been made on the subject. Auschwitz has entered our symbol of a painful, difficult death.

Where did mass murders of children take place and terrible experiments were carried out on women? In Which city do millions of inhabitants on earth associate with the phrase "factory of death"? Auschwitz.

Experiments on people were carried out in a camp located near the city, which today is home to 40,000 people. It is a quiet town with a good climate. Auschwitz is first mentioned in historical documents in the twelfth century. In the XIII century there were already so many Germans here that their language began to prevail over Polish. In the 17th century, the city was captured by the Swedes. In 1918 it became Polish again. After 20 years, a camp was organized here, on the territory of which crimes took place, the likes of which mankind had not yet known.

Gas chamber or experiment

In the early forties, the answer to the question of where the Auschwitz concentration camp was located was known only to those who were doomed to death. Unless, of course, do not take into account the SS. Some of the prisoners, fortunately, survived. Later they talked about what happened within the walls of the Auschwitz concentration camp. Experiments on women and children, which were conducted by a man whose name terrified the prisoners, is a terrible truth that not everyone is ready to listen to.

The gas chamber is a terrible invention of the Nazis. But there are things even worse. Christina Zhivulskaya is one of the few who managed to get out of Auschwitz alive. In her book of memoirs, she mentions a case: a prisoner, sentenced to death by Dr. Mengel, does not go, but runs into the gas chamber. Because death from poisonous gas is not as terrible as the torment from the experiments of the same Mengele.

The creators of the "factory of death"

So what is Auschwitz? This is a camp that was originally intended for political prisoners. The author of the idea is Erich Bach-Zalewski. This man had the rank of SS Gruppenführer, during the Second World War he led punitive operations. With his light hand, dozens were sentenced to death. He took an active part in the suppression of the uprising that took place in Warsaw in 1944.

The assistants of the SS Gruppenfuehrer found a suitable place in a small Polish town. There were already military barracks here, in addition, the railway communication was well established. In 1940, a man named came here. He will be hanged at the gas chambers by the decision of the Polish court. But this will happen two years after the end of the war. And then, in 1940, Hess liked these places. He set to work with great enthusiasm.

Inhabitants of the concentration camp

This camp did not immediately become a "factory of death". At first, mainly Polish prisoners were sent here. Only a year after the camp was organized, a tradition appeared to display a serial number on the prisoner's hand. More and more Jews were brought in every month. By the end of the existence of Auschwitz, they accounted for 90% of the total number of prisoners. The number of SS men here also grew steadily. In total, the concentration camp received about six thousand overseers, punishers and other "specialists". Many of them were put on trial. Some disappeared without a trace, including Josef Mengele, whose experiments terrified the prisoners for several years.

We will not give the exact number of victims of Auschwitz here. Let's just say that more than two hundred children died in the camp. Most of them were sent to the gas chambers. Some fell into the hand of Josef Mengele. But this man was not the only one who conducted experiments on people. Another so-called doctor is Carl Clauberg.

Starting in 1943, a huge number of prisoners entered the camp. Most had to be destroyed. But the organizers of the concentration camp were practical people, and therefore decided to take advantage of the situation and use a certain part of the prisoners as material for research.

Carl Cauberg

This man supervised the experiments conducted on women. His victims were predominantly Jews and Gypsies. The experiments included the removal of organs, the testing of new drugs, and irradiation. What kind of person is Karl Cauberg? Who is he? In what family did you grow up, how was his life? And most importantly, where did the cruelty that goes beyond human understanding come from?

By the beginning of the war, Karl Cauberg was already 41 years old. In the twenties, he served as chief physician at the clinic at the University of Königsberg. Kaulberg was not a hereditary doctor. He was born into a family of artisans. Why he decided to connect his life with medicine is unknown. But there is evidence according to which, in the First World War, he served as an infantryman. Then he graduated from the University of Hamburg. Apparently, medicine fascinated him so much that he refused a military career. But Kaulberg was not interested in medicine, but in research. In the early forties, he began to search for the most practical way to sterilize women who did not belong to the Aryan race. For experiments, he was transferred to Auschwitz.

Kaulberg's experiments

The experiments consisted in the introduction of a special solution into the uterus, which led to serious violations. After the experiment, the reproductive organs were removed and sent to Berlin for further research. There is no data on exactly how many women became victims of this "scientist". After the end of the war, he was captured, but soon, just seven years later, oddly enough, he was released according to an agreement on the exchange of prisoners of war. Returning to Germany, Kaulberg did not suffer from remorse at all. On the contrary, he was proud of his "achievements in science." As a result, complaints began to come in from people who had suffered from Nazism. He was arrested again in 1955. He spent even less time in prison this time. He died two years after his arrest.

Josef Mengele

The prisoners called this man "the angel of death". Josef Mengele personally met the trains with new prisoners and conducted the selection. Some went to the gas chambers. Others are at work. The third he used in his experiments. One of the prisoners of Auschwitz described this man as follows: "Tall, with a pleasant appearance, like a movie actor." He never raised his voice, he spoke politely - and this terrified the prisoners in particular.

From the biography of the Angel of Death

Josef Mengele was the son of a German entrepreneur. After graduating from high school, he studied medicine and anthropology. In the early thirties, he joined the Nazi organization, but soon, for health reasons, left it. In 1932, Mengele joined the SS. During the war he served in the medical troops and even received the Iron Cross for bravery, but was wounded and declared unfit for service. Mengele spent several months in the hospital. After recovery, he was sent to Auschwitz, where he launched his scientific activities.

Selection

Selecting victims for experiments was Mengele's favorite pastime. The doctor only needed one look at the prisoner in order to determine the state of his health. He sent most of the prisoners to the gas chambers. And only a few captives managed to delay death. It was hard to deal with those in whom Mengele saw "guinea pigs."

Most likely, this person suffered from an extreme form of mental disorder. He even enjoyed the thought that he had a huge number of human lives in his hands. That is why he was always next to the arriving train. Even when it was not required of him. His criminal actions were guided not only by the desire for scientific research, but also by the desire to rule. Just one word of his was enough to send tens or hundreds of people to the gas chambers. Those that were sent to the laboratories became the material for experiments. But what was the purpose of these experiments?

An invincible faith in the Aryan utopia, obvious mental deviations - these are the components of the personality of Josef Mengele. All his experiments were aimed at creating a new tool that could stop the reproduction of representatives of objectionable peoples. Mengele not only equated himself with God, he placed himself above him.

Josef Mengele's experiments

The angel of death dissected babies, castrated boys and men. He performed operations without anesthesia. Experiments on women consisted of high voltage shocks. He conducted these experiments in order to test endurance. Mengele once sterilized several Polish nuns with X-rays. But the main passion of the "doctor of death" was experiments on twins and people with physical defects.

To each his own

On the gates of Auschwitz was written: Arbeit macht frei, which means "work sets you free." The words Jedem das Seine were also present here. Translated into Russian - "To each his own." On the gates of Auschwitz, at the entrance to the camp, in which more than a million people died, a saying of the ancient Greek sages appeared. The principle of justice was used by the SS as the motto of the most cruel idea in the history of mankind.