Holocaust at Auschwitz
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“It is hope that compels man to hold on for one more day of life, because that day maybe the day of liberation. Ah, and not even the hope for a different, better world, but simply for life, a life of peace and rest. Never before in the history of mankind had hope been stronger than man, but never also has it done so much harm as it has in this war, in this concentration camp. We were never taught how to give up hope, and this is why today we parish in gas chambers.” Ð- Borowski We often wonder what the reasons for the concentration camps were? We sit back in our nice warm home with our families at our side, and watch on the History Channel all of the documentaries on the holocaust, and we ask ourselves many questions one of the most important is ÐWhy?. One question I always ask myself is, ÐCould it happen again, but not just to Jews but to Americans?. Many people shun the thought of it, but sooner or later we will have to face reality that it could happen, despite our brute military force, there is no telling what will happen from day to day. The one question I am going to answer is, ÐHow much do you actually know about Auschwitz?.
Most of my research was done by reading interviews that have been done with survivors. It was very awful what happened to many of the people and their families, along with the experiments that they did with the camp prisoners. Could you imagine seeing your family one minute, being told they were going to the showers, then never see them again? Then one day told to go through the laundry and finding your loved ones clothing, but, no body to go with it? That was everyday life at Auschwitz. The most medical of all the killing methods was the phenol injection, which was institutionalized during the relatively early phases of Auschwitz. Many other camps used gas, then burned the bodies, because they had no room nor time to dig graves for the thousands of people they killed everyday. Mass grave yards were not unpopular though. The definition for the word holocaust is “Great destruction resulting in the extensive loss of life, especially by fire.” And what happened during the second world war was very much a holocaust. You could go as far as to say, there are many holocausts happening around the world even now.
Oswiecim was one of the largest concentration/extermination camps, it was within 50 miles of Auschwitz. Beginning in June of 1940 the Nazis brought trains of prisoners to the camp, soon after Auschwitz became known as one of the harshest camps known. As the trains with Jewish transports stopped at the rampa (railway platform) in Birkenau, the people inside were brutally forced to leave the cars in a great hurry. They had to leave behind all their personal belongings and were made to form two lines, men and women separately. These lines had to move quickly to the place where S.S. officers were conducting the selection, directing the people either to one side (the majority) to die in the gas chambers or to the other, which meant designation for forced labor. Those who were sent to the gas chambers were killed that same day, and their corpses were burned in the crematoria. The belongings left in the cars by the incoming victims were gathered by a forced-labor detachment ironically called “Kanada”. Those victims not sent to the gas chambers were sent to a part of the camp called the “quarantine, ” where their hair was shorn Ð- men and women alike Ð- and they were given striped prisoners garb.
As of March 1942, special trains organized by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt containing Jews from the occupied countries in Europe, began arriving in Auschwitz almost daily. Sometimes several trains (usually freight) arrived on the same day.