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AUSCHWITZ CAMP OF DEATH
(Underground Report)
Sponsored by
NATIONAL C.I.O. WAR RELIEF COMMITTEE
AuschwitzCamp of Death was originally published in March 1944 as OwicimCamp of Death by Poland Fights, New York. Frontispiece is the original cover by Teresa Zarnower.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS
REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER
FOREWORD
For more than four years, Polesmen, women, and children, old and young, of all classes and professionshave been abused and tortured with the utmost wantonness and brutality by the German invaders of Poland. Whoever, today or in the future, speaks of the travail of humanity during these grief-stricken and tragedy-marred war years, must certainly pay humble and profound tribute, to the people of Poland who have suffered at the hands of the Gestapo, of despoilers of their culture and traditions, of economic bandits, and in the bestiality of prisons and concentration camps.
The Camp of Death is the moving and almost incredible story of Owicim concentration camp. The account was written under the tension of the vibrant poignancy that is an inseparable part of the miseries Poland has endured. It was written by a Polish Underground Labor historian, experienced in the underground struggle, who drew his material from actual contact with persons who underwent, and saw others suffer, the things that he describes. As the writer says, The Camp of Death was to be a compilation of the viciousness of Nazism as seen at Owicim, so that all who read might understand and make a just evaluation of that which Poland faces, of the problem of ridding all Europe of a scourge that gives rise to such things as Owicim.
While some who read this account may spend hours of unrest and anguish when they think of it, this story, nonetheless, deserves reading, for it tells, only too well, that which might have overrun Europe, and eventually the world, had it been allowed to fester and spread without opposition.
In another sense, The Camp of Death is a memorial cut out of the heart of living Poland. No one, of whatever race, creed, or class, of whatever shade of political and social orientation, can fail to see that the people of Poland have paid dearly for the shortsightedness, selfishness, and lack of realism of the world. There are others, not Polestoo many otherswho have shared a fate similar to that met at Owicim. This story is also a memorial to them.
It should be the determination of everyone who reads this pamphlet to prevent, as much as in him lies, future history from repeating these last suffering years. As For Your Freedom and Ours is a watchword of Polish democratic faith, so those who have died at Owicim, who have died in defiance of Nazism, have died also For Your Freedom and Ours.
FLORENCE J. HARRIMAN
Chairman, American Free World Association
Former U.S. Minister to Norway
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Friendly relations prevail among the various national groups in the camp. The Poles and the left wing Austrians and Czechoslovakians are on the best terms with each other...On the whole, the prisoners of various nationalities are getting along well in the camp...
We must realize that the world is concerned about Owicim not because it has served as a prison for so many, nor because thousands of people have already been murdered there, and no one knows how many more may expect a similar fate. Primarily, the world is concerned with Owicim because of the moral problems it poses, because, as the tragic symbol of Nazi domination over Europe and Nazi inhumanity, it presents in a nucleus the problems faced by the community of oppressed European nations.
From Wolnosc (Freedom), the oldest Polish underground Labor paper, August 1943.
Reproduction of cover page of Owicim, Camp of Death, published underground in Poland.
Map showing location of major concentration camps in Poland.
1. THE CAMP OF DEATH
( translated from Polish Underground Labor publication )
But Thou, oh Lord! who from on high
Sendest Thine arrows against the homelands defenders
We beseech Thee, for the sake of this handful of bones!
Make the sun shine at least on our death!
Let the day come forth from the highest part of Heaven!
Let the world see uswhen we are dying!
Juliusz Slowackii (One of the greatest of Polish poets, lived from 1809-1849)
OWICIM concentration camp, Auschwitz in German [ed. note: we will refer to the camp by Auschwitz, its more familiar German name, throughout the book], has for two years symbolized the sinister reality of Polish life under German occupation. The shadow of Auschwitz falls over the whole of Poland, for the most remote corners of the country have yielded their sons and daughters to its torture chambers.
According to verified information up to July 1942, 125,000 persons passed through the camp, while, during all of the camps existence, barely 7,000 persons have been released. This figure includes twelve persons who escaped or who were transferred to other camps. At that time 24,000 men and women remained alive. Consequently, 94,000 people have perished in Auschwitz.
In addition to Auschwitz, there are a series of other camps, organized somewhat later; Treblinka, Belzec, and others in the past year in almost every administrative district. Life in any of these camps is an inferno equal to that of Auschwitz. However, in Auschwitz, the methods of cruelty have been lowered to their vilest depth, and applied in every form.
For a long time, complete secrecy shrouded the sufferings in the camp. He who fell into its net kept its dreadful secrets with him until his death. At first, a few letters from a prisoner would come, short and strange because they were in German, according to regulations, and censored by the Germans. The official words, Ich bin gesund ( I am well ), had no meaning. Later, more ominous signs would come: clothes that were of no more use to their recent owner; an official notification of the time of death; the query as to whether the family wished to obtain the ashes of the deceased. Frequently, only a few days would lapse between the receiving of the Ich bin gesund written by the prisoners own hand and the arrival of his death notice. Often, many months silence would fill the gap between the false hope of the letters written by a loved ones hand, and the dreadful reality of the ashes sent in a tiny box.
