‘Arbeit macht frei’

It is a German phrase that can be translated as “Work liberates” or “work makes one free”.

In 1942 it became one of the largest death camps as part of Hitler’s “Final Solution”.

‘Arbeit macht frei’

It is a German phrase that can be translated as “Work liberates” or “work makes one free”.

In 1942 it became one of the largest death camps as part of Hitler’s “Final Solution”.

AUSCHWITZ

What exactly was Auschwitz?

What exactly was Auschwitz?

Auschwitz was the largest camp established by the Germans during World War II. More than a million people - the vast majority of them Jews - died there between 1940, when it was built, and 1945, when it was liberated.

Nazi Germany began establishing Concentration Camps in 1933. They were places to hold political prisoners and opponents of the Nazi regime. They grew rapidly in number throughout the 1930s.

Where did the victims come from?

Where did the victims come from?

Hitler's Nazi regime intended to exterminate all the Jews in Europe - about nine million people when the war began.

Most at Auschwitz were Polish - Poland had the largest Jewish community in Europe at the beginning of the war. But victims were also brought by train from the many countries occupied by the Nazis or allied with them - including Hungary, Czechoslovakia, the Netherlands, Belgium and Yugoslavia.

How did they die?

How did they die?

After experimenting with various methods, they settled on gas chambers as the most efficient. Auschwitz had four large gas chambers, in which people were poisoned with a gas called Zyklon-B.

When prisoners arrived at Auschwitz, guards selected those who looked fit for work and sent the rest - children, the elderly, anyone who looked weak - directly to the gas chambers.

Those who survived selection had their heads shaved, and numbers tattooed on their arms. They were assigned striped prison clothing and set to work.

Why didn't the prisoners rebel? In fact, they did. Several hundred inmates learned in October 1944 that they were to be killed and rose up against the Nazis, killing three guards. They also blew up one of the crematoriums and a gas chamber with explosives smuggled in by inmates who were used as forced labour at an arms factory.

The Nazis crushed the uprising, killing almost everyone who was involved. The women who smuggled the explosives into the camp were hanged in public.

Why didn't the prisoners rebel?