World War 2: A Liberation Story

The Holocaust

Stormtroopers forced all members of Warsaw Ghetto
to move with their arms in the air during the uprising ----->

The Holocaust is used to describe the genocide of about 6 million European Jews during World War II, but the total number of deaths during the Holocaust are estimated to be between 9- 11 million. The Warsaw Ghetto was created on October 16, 1940. Nazi Germany controlled Poland’s capital, Warsaw and created the largest Jewish ghetto. At the time of its creation The Warsaw Ghetto had an estimated 440,000 people, estimates of over 100,000 of the Ghetto’s residents died of disease or starvation. Unknowingly to members of Warsaw ghetto Jewish residents began to be moved to concentration camps. In the end of 1942 members of the Ghetto realized that they were apart of an extermination process and began to rebel.
January 18, 1943 marked the first armed rebellion by the Jewish community against the Germans. The Jewish Military Union and the Jewish Combat Organization took control of the ghetto. These fighters were armed with mostly pistols and revolvers, but had very little ammunition. Polish Resistance units tried to smuggle ammunition to the struggling Jewish forces and fought German units near the Ghetto walls. April 29, 1943 marked a turning point for the Nazi army, the rebel Jewish Military Union lost the last of its leaders. An estimated 13,000 Jewish residents were killed during the uprising and the remaining members of the ghetto were moved to concentration and extermination camps.
Life in a concentration camp is nearly indescribable. Each prisoner had few accommodations and most of their personal affects were taken from them. A Jewish survivor of Majdanek concentration camp in Poland recounted an average day. At 3 a.m. everyone would get up and make their beds so that

Auschwitz warehouse filled
with confiscated clothing---->

it looks like a matchbox. They would then immediately leave the barracks and stand outside trembling, groups of ten or twenty people huddled together for warmth. At 5 a.m. they would get half a liter of black, bitter coffee. After a headcount many people would leave for work. Some built railroad tracks and other built a road. The SS men beat prisoners mercilessly for no reason. At noon there was a break for a meal, half a liter of soup was given to the prisoners, yet no one was allowed to use spoons. They

<----Women sleeping in an Auschwitz barracks

were forced to drink the soup out of the bowl, or lick it like dogs. 1 p.m. until 6 p.m. was work. Some days lunch was given with the evening meal, by then it was sour and cold. After work prisoners would again line up for a head count. They were often left in line for an hour or two while German officers publicly punished prisoners. The punished prisoners were stripped naked, laid on benched, and whipped with 25 to 50 lashes. Every prisoner was forced to watch the brutal beatings and listen to their cries.
Auschwitz concentration camp was the largest Nazi Germany concentration camp. Auschwitz contained three main camps: Auschwitz I, II, and III. Rudolf Hoss, camp commandant testified at the Nuremberg Trials that up to 2.5 million people died at Auschwitz, but current calculations estimate that 1.1 to 1.6 million died, ninety percent of whom were Jewish. Auschwitz I was the original concentration camp and was the site of an estimated 70,000 deaths. Auschwitz II was the extermination camp where roughly 950,000 Jewish and 75,000 Polish people were killed. Auschwitz III was the labor camp. Allied forces first heard of these mass killings in April of 1943, but quickly claimed that it was an exaggeration. Allied forces were finally convinced by mid 1944 by Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, two escapees from Auschwitz. In January of 1945 German SS blew up the gas chambers in Auschwitz II. January 17^th 1945 Nazis began to evacuate Auschwitz, leaving behind roughly 7,500 prisoners. The Soviet Union liberated these 7,500 prisoners on January 27^th 1945.

Majdanek was the first major camp discovered by the Soviet Army on July 23, 1944. Auschwitz was liberated by the Soviets on January 27^th, 1945. The United States liberated Buchenwald on April 11^th. Dachau was liberated by the United States on April 29^th. Buchenwald was built by the prisoners during the summer of 1937. Thousands of workers were murdered by work, torture, beatings or starvation.

<----Auchwitz prisoners seeing their liberators

Starving prisoners at Mauthausen liberated on May 5, 1945--->

Thousands of inmates were murdered in the infirmary by lethal injection. An underground organization was created in Buchenwald. The camp was evacuated on April 8^th 1945; the remaining inmates seized control of the camp using guns they had collected since 1942. The US 6^th Armored Division, the US Third Army liberated the remaining members of Buchenwald on April 11^th. Over 1000 prisoners were liberated. liberated these 7,500 prisoners on January 27th.

<----American soldiers lead newly liberated survivors of Buchenwald Liberation came too late for six million European Jews, who lost their lives to Socialist Nazi Party.

<---Dwight Eisenhower and General Omar Bradley inspecting a grave at a concentration camp