One of the oldest Polish cities, Auschwitz was completely destroyed by the Tatar-Mongols, and later rebuilt. But the most terrible period in the 800-year history of the city was the period of the Great Patriotic War, when a German concentration camp was operating in Auschwitz.
Instructions
Step 1
It is unlikely that in the history of mankind there will be a place of mass murder of people like Auschwitz (Auschwitz). Now the city has cultural institutions whose task is to present Auschwitz as a city of peace, but this was not always the case.
Step 2
The Germans occupied Polish territory in 1939 and renamed the city Auschwitz. They created a complex of three death camps: Auschwitz 1, Auschwitz 2 and Auschwitz 3. Birkenau, or Auschwitz 2 - this is the concentration camp that is meant when talking about Auschwitz.
Step 3
There were wooden one-story barracks with prisoners of war. More than 1 million people of different nationalities died in this place during the five years of the war, but 90% of them were Jews. The prisoners were brought by train daily and divided into four parts.
Step 4
The first group of arrivals was sent to the gas chambers for several hours. This is how 75% of people died: women, children, old people and those unfit for work. Bodies from the gas chambers were burned in crematoria. The commandant of the concentration camp, Rudolf Hess, believed that the impulses of humanity should be suppressed and acted with iron determination, following Hitler's orders.
Step 5
The second group of prisoners was turned into slaves for industrial enterprises. Hundreds of thousands of people died in factories from beatings, disease and executions. Some managed to escape: Oskar Schindler bought 1,000 Jews from the Germans for his factory. 300 women from Schindler's list by mistake ended up in Auschwitz, but they managed to be taken to Krakow. In memory of these events, a feature film "Schindler's List" was made.
Step 6
The third group of prisoners included dwarfs and twins. They were sent to medical experiments. The fourth group consisted of women who were used by the Germans as slaves to serve and sort the property of the prisoners who arrived.
Step 7
People could stay in the camp for no more than three months. They fed them rotten vegetables, there were no socks or underwear. The toilet was allowed to be used no longer than 30 seconds twice a day. The same amount was allocated to hygiene procedures. Feces tanks were cleaned with bare hands.
Step 8
In 1943, some managed to escape from the concentration camp thanks to the actions of a resistance group from among the prisoners. In January 1945, Auschwitz was occupied by Soviet soldiers. 7, 5 thousand people remained in the camp, whom the Germans did not manage to take out. Among the survivors, Viktor Frakl is an Austrian psychologist and psychiatrist who wrote the book Say Yes to Life. Stubbornness of the spirit. Psychologist in a concentration camp."
Step 9
The exact death toll at Auschwitz is unknown because the documents have been destroyed. Historians agree on the figure of 1.6 million people, most of whom are Jews. The expression "to fly into the chimney" in camp jargon meant to be burned in the crematorium. Now there is a museum in Auschwitz.