# Auschwitz Concentration Camp



## thekatt (Jan 13, 2010)

Auschwitz-Birkenau was the principal and most notorious of the six concentration and extermination camps established by Nazi Germany to implement its Final Solution policy which had as its aim the mass murder of the Jewish people in Europe. Built in Poland under Nazi German occupation initially as a concentration camp for Poles and later for Soviet prisoners of war, it soon became a prison for a number of other nationalities. Between the years 1942-1944 it became the main mass extermination camp where Jews were tortured and killed for their so-called racial origins. In addition to the mass murder of well over a million Jewish men, women and children, and tens of thousands of Polish victims, Auschwitz also served as a camp for the racial murder of thousands of Roma and Sinti and prisoners of several European nationalities.

I was not going to post these pictures, I took of Auschwitz, but due to the sign over the main gates being stolen, and fears that the camp,s closure is being called for, by some elements ,I have now decided to do so. This is Auschwitz, and not Birkenau, I will post the pictures I took of Birkenau later. This is very personal to me, and I have friends who,s parents were inmates here.
































































Andy


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## Cake! (Jan 13, 2010)

Sobering imagery. Words fail to describe the awfulness of what happened there.

Some well composed shots there.


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## hpipe (Jan 13, 2010)

Thank you for letting us see these pictures Andy. I 100% agree with Cake.


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## diehardlove (Jan 13, 2010)

wow moving pictures


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## el gringo (Jan 13, 2010)

Its a very moving place to visit, hard to describe the strange atmosphere present there. Thanks for posting the photos. I can't believe there is talk of closing the place.


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## Labb (Jan 13, 2010)

Thanks for posting these pictures. Very good.


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## Krypton (Jan 13, 2010)

Nice photos. I think i have some somewhere, but they were on 35mm. I actually found birkenau more moving than auschwitz.


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## klempner69 (Jan 13, 2010)

Did you see the alledged Fire pool that resembles a normal swimming pool?Very emotive explore this one.


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## the harvester (Jan 13, 2010)

Great pictures of a not so great place, I read someplace that the sign that was stolen has since been recovered, it was recovered only recently so maybe it had not been re-instated when you visited?


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## night crawler (Jan 13, 2010)

Looking at the photo's gives a sense of the desolation the poor souls must have felt being behind the wire. I can't see them closing the place it would be an insult to those who dies there and should be kept open for others to see how low people stooped


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## klempner69 (Jan 13, 2010)

It wont close as its a World Heritage Site,but I would expect more visible security to be seen around the sites.


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## neill (Jan 13, 2010)

About 25 years ago when I was a student, six of us bought a minibus together and had a summer grand tour of Europe. The tour included Germany which we spent sometime in Munich and were staying north of the city in the town Dachau. We spent many evenings in the 'Hogbrauhaus' beer hall in Munich city having a great time getting drunk. One luchtime back in the bar we got talking to an old german guy, he asked if we liked the city and where we were staying. When we told him Dachau town his face changed and he was silent for a while. He then told us he had lived in the town when he was a teenager during the war. When the town was captured by the allied forces he was forced to help 'clear' the Dachau concentration camp. We could see the horror on his face when he talked to us, he then made us promise to visit the concentration camp before we left. 'You must see and learn!' he kept saying. 

We visited the camp later that day and it was a something that I will never forget. It made my best friend cry like a baby as we walked around the place. There was a fenced off grass covered mound that was protected by armed German police, which we later found out to be the mound of ashes We were all so moved by what we saw and felt, that we did not speak to each other for the rest of the day, and drove through the night to France to be out of Germany.


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## Foxylady (Jan 14, 2010)

Thanks for posting, Andy. Always very sobering to see pics from here.

Neill, thankyou very much for relating your experience whilst visiting Dachau. That must have been very moving, especially after meeting someone who'd had to help clear the camp.


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## night crawler (Jan 14, 2010)

I never dralised Dachau was near Munich as I would have tried to vist but have no doubt I would have felt the same way. Thanks for telling the story. The photos on here tell me how lucky we are


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## fezzyben (Jan 17, 2010)

Very chilling photos especially all those zyklon b tins. Thanks for sharing FB.


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## thekatt (Jan 17, 2010)

Hi, next to the tins, in a display cabinet, was the hair of around 30,000 women, just needed to go outside and breath at that point.



Andy


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## djmartyc (Jan 23, 2010)

great pic's
my polish born grandfather died recently & here's a little story of his life 

http://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/...rvivor_and_war_veteran_Gerhard_dies__aged_83/


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## Cake! (Jan 24, 2010)

djmartyc said:


> great pic's
> my polish born grandfather died recently & here's a little story of his life
> 
> http://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/...rvivor_and_war_veteran_Gerhard_dies__aged_83/



Blimey... What a life
I raise a glass to Mr Gerhard Czapla


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## vanburen (Jan 24, 2010)

I dont want to sound like a twat,but when i went there was signs up asking people not to take photos INSIDE as a mark of respect i.e inside the crematorium/gas chamber and the room with the Zyclon B cannisters are.


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## night crawler (Jan 25, 2010)

To be honest mate I could not think of a better way of honouring their memory than by taking photos to remind people of what happened. To me the most chilling photo is the scaffold. Imagine having to stand in front of that and watch people being hung (strangled slowly by the look of things) it gives a feeling of helplessness just looking at it. I can't think of how the victim felt


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## thekatt (Jan 25, 2010)

vanburen said:


> I dont want to sound like a twat,but when i went there was signs up asking people not to take photos INSIDE as a mark of respect i.e inside the crematorium/gas chamber and the room with the Zyclon B cannisters are.



Hi, You,r right there are, if you read my post you will understand why I took pictures, apart from the fact I am Jewish, so it was a personal thing.




Andy


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## thekatt (Jan 25, 2010)

night crawler said:


> To be honest mate I could not think of a better way of honouring their memory than by taking photos to remind people of what happened. To me the most chilling photo is the scaffold. Imagine having to stand in front of that and watch people being hung (strangled slowly by the look of things) it gives a feeling of helplessness just looking at it. I can't think of how the victim felt



Hi, the scaffold was erected to execute Rudolf Hoss, the camp commandant, it was erected half way between his house and the gas chambers, on the route he used to walk.

Four days before he was hanged, Höss sent a message to the state prosecutor, including these comments:

“	My conscience compels me to make the following declaration. In the solitude of my prison cell I have come to the bitter recognition that I have sinned gravely against humanity. As Commandant of Auschwitz I was responsible for carrying out part of the cruel plans of the 'Third Reich' for human destruction. In so doing I have inflicted terrible wounds on humanity. I caused unspeakable suffering for the Polish people in particular. I am to pay for this with my life. May the Lord God forgive one day what I have done.”

Andy


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## night crawler (Jan 25, 2010)

You never said? even so that is what it depicts to me but proably a fitting place for Rudolf Hoss to die where he could reflect on what he did


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## thekatt (Jan 25, 2010)

night crawler said:


> You never said? even so that is what it depicts to me but proably a fitting place for Rudolf Hoss to die where he could reflect on what he did



HI, yes I should have said, sorry to have not made that clear.


Andy


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## djmartyc (Jan 25, 2010)

Cake! said:


> Blimey... What a life
> I raise a glass to Mr Gerhard Czapla



thank you cake we are all very proud to of had him as a grandfather


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## thekatt (Jan 25, 2010)

djmartyc said:


> great pic's
> my polish born grandfather died recently & here's a little story of his life
> 
> http://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/...rvivor_and_war_veteran_Gerhard_dies__aged_83/



HI, You must be very proud, it,s a strange thing, people who have been through and survived such things, always know, what life is really worth, it,s a lesson to us all, and hopefully we can learn by example.


Andy


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## hnmisty (Jan 25, 2010)

Very moving photos. It really is a place of hell on earth and I think its very important that its memories stay alive so the world never has to witness that kind of slaughter again.
5 million homosexuals, prostitutes, the mentally and phyically handicapped, political oponents and other races perished in those cmaps as well as 6 million Jews. I can't even imagine it.

My mum was born in 1946 and grew up in post-war London, she used to work with a German woman who no one else wanted to speak to because she was German. My mum gave her a lift home once and she invited her into her flat. On the mantle piece she had photos of her family and she pulled up her sleeve to show my mum the number tattoed there. She had been in Auschwitz and her family had all died in there. The only reason she was kept alive was because she was multi-lingual. And no one wanted to know her simply because of her nationality.


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## djmartyc (Jan 25, 2010)

thekatt said:


> HI, You must be very proud, it,s a strange thing, people who have been through and survived such things, always know, what life is really worth, it,s a lesson to us all, and hopefully we can learn by example.
> 
> 
> Andy


thank's andy yeah very proud!i remember as a kid he'd be chatting away & then suddenly he go into polish without realising lol


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## Deegee99 (Jan 27, 2010)

In 1979 I visited Belsen when I was a serving soldier in the 1st Battalion The Staffordshire Regiment, we were on exercise in Germany at the time and we were all coached over to what remained of the camp to see what was left there. My most distinct memory of Belsen was the lack of life there, no birds, no noise, it was a very eerie experience. Walking about around the mounds there which had small plaques telling of the obscene numbers of people buried in mass graves. It was so hard to take in, I remember every member of my company walking about not speaking, completely subdued and in shock at what they were seeing. Not the best experience I have ever had but one I am never going to forget.


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## Freyaamane (Feb 16, 2010)

Thanks for posting, I actually started crying when i saw these photos... I've visited Aushwitz a couple of years ago and it was a unforgetable experience. I am Polish and 2 of my grandparents died there, i know them only from stories but its still an important part of my heritage that I hope to will never be forgoten.


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## casio123 (Feb 17, 2010)

Thank you for putting the photos up and to who have put their bit up of the past coniction to it,very sad but needid to be documentid. So thanks


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