I’m sure that most of us are all aware of Auschwitz, a place that conducted some of the most heinous crimes known to man. But it is definitely not common knowledge that Auschwitz has forty separate sub-camps, one of those many camps was Birkenau. Or if we are being technical, the camp would be called Auschwitz-Birkenau. There are so many controversial topics surrounding Birkenau, such as: The doctors and their experiments, treatment of the prisoners, living conditions, and even some terrorizing stories. Which, we will be going over of course, but I personally feel that it’s necessary to go through the history of Birkenau. Knowing what Birkenau was used for versus what it was intended for makes you wish that this building was never turned into a concentration camp.
Birkenau during the war, conducted some of the most disgusting acts on other human beings, and for what? Just because they are of a certain culture or religion? Birkenau was the largest of more than 40 of Auschwitz’ sub-camps (http://auschwitz.org/en/history/auschwitz-ii/early-concepts/). Birkenau was run for three years, it became a branch of Auschwitz on March 1942, and became a concentration camp. In Birkenau’s last year, 1944, Birkenau also concentrated prisoners before being transferred to labor camps in Germany. Birkenau held Jews, Gypsies, and Poles were all effected. In total: 90% of victims from Auschwitz died in Birkenau (approximately one million people), nine out of ten were Jews, 70 thousand were Poles, and 20 thousand Gypsies (http://auschwitz.org/en/history/auschwitz-ii/early-concepts/). Nothing can beat Birkenau’s uses during the war, but of course, it’s obviously very interesting to learn it’s uses before ‘Auschwitz’ and ‘concentration camp’ was stuck to the beginning and end of its name.
Auschwitz Birkenau’s construction began on October 1941 (http://auschwitz.org/en/history/auschwitz-ii/early-concepts/), the construction workers who worked on this probably had no idea what they were working for. Who knows, if they did know what Birkenau would later become a death camp, would they have agreed to help construct it? Birkenau was originally supposed to be a camp for 125 thousand prisoners of war (http://auschwitz.org/en/history/auschwitz-ii/early-concepts/) .
At least with the original concept, those prisoners deserved to be there. This all makes me wonder, why did Birkenau become a concentration camp? Birkenau finished construction around October-November 1941, but Birkenau opened up as a branch of Auschwitz on March 1942. What was Birkenau used for during the 6-7 months between its built and becoming a camp? Was the prisoner of war camp all just hearsay? Was Birkenau’s original purpose to become a concentration camp?
Birkenau’s main purposes ultimately might not have been real, but that’s just my opinion. Yes, I described Birkenau as this horrid place, and nothing in this section was really that horrid other than the number of deaths in Birkenau. But I assure you as we go on each section will slowly get more gruesome. Just wait until topic 4! Learning the history behind something is almost crucial before learning about something in more depth. So, now you know the history of this wretched place, so I’m sure we can agree that we can move onto some more interesting topics on Birkenau.
Hat’s and luggage’s in front of the railroad leading to Auschwitz and Birkenau
Living Conditions
We can only assume that a concentration camps living conditions will be horrible, but not as horrible as I expected. I knew that Birkenau wouldn’t be a five-star resort, but I didn’t think that the living conditions would be as disgusting as they are. But it is to be expected, Birkenau, as I stated before, is the largest out of forty sub-camps in the Auschwitz complex. So, we can tell that the health around the camp isn’t going to be very good. But then again, prisoners who got sent to Birkenau where either immediately sent to the gas chambers or experimented on and then later killed during or after experimentation.
Multiple diseases were spread throughout Birkenau, which caused dreadful conditions. Within the first months of people arriving to Birkenau they became struck with illnesses like the cold, pneumonia, and frostbite. Not only did prisoners suffer from illnesses, they also had to deal with horrible skin conditions caused by this. Skin conditions like Scabies, boils, rashes, and abscesses that resulted mostly from vitamin deficiency and infections (http://auschwitz.org/en/history/camp-hospitals/sicknesses-and-epidemics/ ). Above all of this, prisoners were also experimented on ruthlessly while they were sick, nobody ever got treated for their sickness’, causing them to have a long painful death depending on what illness/ experimentation they had received.
Aside from the health aspect of the living conditions, the actual living conditions are pretty twisted as well. Prisoners slept in wooden barracks, that contained three wooden bunks per row. As we can already tell, Birkenau was clearly very crowded so imagine living there during this time. There would be so many skin diseases and illnesses going around, you would probably be forced to share a wooden bunk with some random person if you wanted to get any sleep, and you would be a constant lab rat to the Nazi’s. Birkenau, which is located in Poland, is pretty cold, at an average temperature of 65 degrees (19 degrees Celsius), which drops a substantial amount during the night. It’s not like the barrack area has any heating, the only warmth you have at night is the stranger you are sharing a bunk with. The barracks was also damp, had leaky roofs, and straw mattresses.
Just imagine having to live with the uncomfortableness these poor people went through. Having so many illnesses, skin conditions, and sleeping on uncomfortable and itchy straw mattresses. Not to mention, being a lab rat against your own will just to eventually be thrown in the gas chamber or die because of the experiments, or even die from the conditions not caused from Nazi experimentation. Today, you can visit Birkenau and see the sleeping barracks and how little space everyone got to sleep in.
Treatment of Prisoners
If you were even questioned about being deemed ‘worthless’ under Hitler’s eyes you would already be treated like dirt by the German people and the authorities. So, imagine, how you would be treated if you were deemed ‘worthless’ under Hitler’s eyes. You would be shipped off to a concentration camp, treated less than dirt by authorities, and you would suffer from ridiculous illnesses to being experimented on 24/7. We’ve gone over what happens when those things happen, but we haven’t gone over how everyone was treated. Where Poles considered higher up than Jews? Or was it vice versa? Or possibly, were they all treated equally inside the camps?
Each prisoner got treated differently by the authorities, the Jews got treated ruthless, refined and cruel. SS men even went as far to say that the Jewish life is the least valuable of all. The Jews were starved, they would sleep in freezing temperatures, were forced to hard labor, got constantly harassed and abused by authorities, and as stated before, various kinds of experimentations. Jew prisoners were definitely treated the worst, they suffered the worst treatment and in the course of penal exercises called ‘Sport’. A high proportion of Jews get were sent to the penal company over all of the other prisoners (http://auschwitz.org/en/history/categories-of-prisoners/jews-in-auschwitz/treatment and https://www.escape2poland.co.uk/poland-guide/auschwitz-prisoners) .
Poles and Gypsies did get harassed and disrespected of their human rights, but not as badly as the Jews. As I’ve stated, Birkenau was in Poland. Hitler after he has taken over the country, he would take the citizens from that country and turn them into slaves, he would do this so:
1.) The German’s have more land to live in
2.) So, the German’s are the ‘superior race’
If Germany takes over a country the race that originally lived in that country would be punished by being forced to go to a concentration camp. The SS and German police had apparently been planning to take over the poles for a while, the head of the German and SS police reportedly said: “All skilled workers of Polish background are to be used in our war industry. Afterwards, Poles will disappear from the world, every German’s time is coming. That is why it is necessary for the great German people to see their main task in the destruction of all Poles.”. Gypsies were part of the Russian (Soviet Union) race, the Germans describe them as enemies of the Third Reich, causing them to be sentenced to isolation and extermination. In the first years after the Nazis came to power, they introduced a range of anti-Gypsy restrictions, including an obligation for them to register and submit to ‘racial examination’, later, they introduced limitations on freedom of movement. Before Gypsies got slightly more freedom they were regarded as, ‘racial aliens’, inferior, and ‘asocial’ (https://www.escape2poland.co.uk/poland-guide/auschwitz-prisoners) .
It’s safe to say that Jews got the worse of the treatment. Jews were Hitler’s main goal to ‘Make extinct’, so obviously Jews would be treated the worse. But Hitler’s main goal, was to make the German race superior, which means above all others.