answersLogoWhite

0

Auschwitz

Auschwitz was a Nazi controlled concentration, extermination and labor camp located in Poland. Opened in 1940, the camp was liberated in 1945 by Soviet troops. Questions and answers about Auschwitz can be found here.

731 Questions

How many Hungarian Jews were deported to Auschwitz?

437,685 Hungarian Jews were deported to Auschwitz. Al of the Hungarian Jews were deported to Auschwitz between May 1944 - July 1944.

________________

In an effort to make it a bit clearer:

The Hungarian action took place over three months, as this action was late into the war Eichmann was very efficient at extracting Jews from the general population (they were not put into ghettos in Hungary).

The exact number varies because the borders/boundaries varied over the war and some data is from the original boundaries and others from later boudaries.

It is safest to say abour 450 000 were deported, some went straight to labour/concentration camps, but most went to Auschwitz and most of these were killied within a day of arriving.

Which camp served as the administrative center for the whole of the Auschwitz complex?

In the case of Auschwitz, the original camp - Auschwitz I - was the administrative centre of the whole complex of camps, though for a few months Auschwitz II was virtually independent.

What is the purpose of a pow camp?

POW is the abbreviation of "Prisoners Of War". Its purpose is to hold the former combatants.

Who was the leader of the Auschwitz medical experiments?

The Doctor in Chief of ALL Nazi medical experiments was Dr. Eduard Wirths, who directed most of the experiment done to the prisoners in the concentrations camps during the nazi regime. the most infamous doctor at Auschwitz was Dr. Josef Mengele

How do the prisoners get from Birkenau to Auschwitz and what are their first impressions of this new camp?

Birkenau was the new camp.

They would get there by foot. At the time that they would travel from one to the other, it would be during the construction phase, ie. when they were still building brick buildings and the railway line would not go all of the way into Birkenau, it would still be uninhabitted. Their first impression would be that it was boring, there would have been a large field with some buildings on it and a tree line in the distance.

How far from civilization was Auschwitz?

it was civilization, Auschwitz was modernised murder, no hordes of barbarians there, just calm, organised, civilized murder.

___

There's rather more to civilization than technology.

___

Auschwitz was not located in some remote, dense forest. The main site covered a large area by 1942; it was about 3-4 miles from the town of Auschwitz in a fairly heavily populated part of southern Poland, and parts of it were quite close to the main railway station. (Auschwitz is a major rail junction). The site was surrounded by electrified barbed wire and an 'exclusion' zone of about 300-400 yards: civilians entering this zone could be shot.

What does ran out of mean?

The phrase "ran out of" means there's not any more of that item, whever the case may be. The phrase is used frequently in stores, in regarding to supplies "running out" . Oftentimes, the phrase "while supplies last" is used due to the small amount of that item that the stores owns.

Did Hitler set Auschwitz up?

He didn't do it personally but he did order it to be set up.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

There is no evidence to suggest the Hitler knew or cared about the existence of Auschwitz, he did not micro-manage the Holocaust, all he cared about was that his territories were being made 'Jew-free'.

It was established by Hoess on Himmler's orders.

Why was it significant that in Night no one on the train had ever heard of Auschwitz?

Auschwitz did not become widely known as a group of camps till about June 1944. It did not acquire today's associations till later.

Why is Auschwitz quite possibly the most grisly tourist center on earth?

Because it contains the place where more people died than any other place on earth.

What does The road to Auschwitz was built by hatred but paved with indifference mean?

It means that the population of Germany and Poland knew for the most part about the Holocaust but turned their heads and did nothing to prevent the genocide (paved with indifference)

----------------------

It is a metaphor: it means that though the initial work was done by hatred, this was but a small part, it took indifference to create the final product (the Holocaust). It means to say that whilst most of the people did not protest, a minority could do what they wanted.

Auschwitz is used here to mean the Holocaust, not the actual place.

When and How did Auschwitz Bireknau become the main death factory?

A parallel system to the main camp in Auschwitz began to operate at the Birkenau camp by 1942. The exception, though, was that the majority of "showers" used to delouse the incoming prisoners proved to be gas chambers. At Birkenau, only about 10 percent of Jewish transports were registered, disinfected, shaven and showered in the "central sauna" before being assigned barracks as opposed to being sent directly to the death chambers.

In the spring of 1942, two provisional gas chambers at Birkenau were constructed out of peasant huts, known as the "bunkers. "The first "bunker", with two sealed rooms, operated from January 1942 to the end of that year. The second, with four air tight rooms, became redundant in the spring of 1943, but remained standing and was used again in the autumn of 1944 when extra "capacity" was needed for the murder of Hungarian Jews and the liquidation of the ghettos. The second measured about 1.134 square feet. The victims murdered in the "bunkers" were first obliged to undress in temporary wooden barracks erected nearby. Their bodies were taken out of the gas chambers and pushed to pits where they were burned in the open. Between January 1942 and March 1943, 175,000 Jews were gassed to death here, of whom 105,000 were killed from January to March 1943.

Up to this point, though, Auschwitz-Birkenau accounted for "only" 11 percent of the victims of the 'Final Solution.' In August 1942, however, construction began on four large-scale gassing facilities. It appears from the plans that the first two gas chambers were adapted from mortuaries which, with the huge crematoria attached to them, were initially intended to cope with mortalities amongst the slave labor force in the camp, now approaching 100,000 and subject to a horrifying death rate. But from the autumn of 1942, it seems clear that the SS planners and civilian contractors were intending to build a mass-murder plant.

The twin pairs of gas chambers were numbered II and III, and IV and V. The first opened on March 31, 1943, the last on April 4, 1943. The total area of the gas chambers was 2,255 square meters; the capacity of these crematoria was 4,420 people. Those selected to die were undressed in the undressing room and then pushed into the gas chambers

It only took about 20 minutes for all the people inside to die.

In chambers II and III, the killings took place in underground rooms, and the corpses were carried to the five ovens by an electrically operated lift. Before cremation gold teeth and any other valuables, such as rings, were removed from the corpses. In IV and V the gas chambers and ovens were on the same level, but the ovens were so poorly built and the usage was so great that they repeatedly malfunctioned and had to be abandoned. The corpses were finally burned outside, in the open, as in 1943. Jewish sonderkommandos worked the crematoria under SS supervision. Initially the new facilities were "underutilized." From April 1943 to March 1944, "only" 160,000 Jews were killed at Birkenau.

But, in May 1944, a railroad spur line was built right into the camp to accelerate and simplify the handling of the tens of thousands of Hungarian and other Jews deported in the spring and summer of 1944. From then to November 1944, when all the other death camps had been abandoned, Birkenau surpassed all previous records for mass killing. The Hungarian deportations and the liquidation of the remaining Polish ghettos, such as Lodz, resulted in the gassing of 585,000 Jews. This period made Auschwitz-Birkenau into the most notorious killing site of all time.

What was the process that was followed by the guards when a new batch of prisoners arrived at auschwitz?

If they had a profession they were allowed to work , otherwise they were sent straight to the gas chambers

How was it possible for a modern state to carry out the systematic murder of a whole people for no reason for other than that they were Jews?

HITLERHitler started the Hitler Youth before he came to power so when he did all the kids in the youth prgoram would eb old enough to do anything fro him because they were taught since they were little to hate Jews. Germany was also going through economic depression and needed a "scape-goat," and the Jews were a very convenient scape-goat because many people already hated them. Hitler used his intelligence to convinve people that it was all the Jews fault and people followed him and planned prosecutions. He also used propoganda to urge people to join his cause.

What is the distance between Warsaw and karkow?

The distance between Warsaw and Krakow is 293.4 kilometers or 182.31 miles. The driving time from Warsaw to Krakow is 3 hours and 45 minutes.