Gusen EN

The origins of National Socialism are associated with the establishment of the German Workers’ Party in 1919, which in the following year adopted the name of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP). The main points of the NSDAP’s political programme were to question the post-war European order, especially the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, and to demand the unification of all Germans within one state. The Nazis – as the party’s members were called – preached anti-liberal, anti-communist and anti-democratic slogans. Anti-Semitism played a special role among them.

From 1921, the party was headed by Adolf Hitler, who became its undisputed leader. Two years later, in Munich, the Nazis organised a military coup, and although it ended in failure, it paradoxically contributed to their popularity in the German society. After the suppression of the coup, its organisers were brought to trial and sentenced to prison. Hitler used his imprisonment to develop ideological assumptions and principles of the functioning of the Nazi party. He published them in 1925 in the book entitled “Mein Kampf” (My Fight), which later became the leading work of the Nazi ideology and propaganda.

Adolf Hitler, September 1930

(from the collection of Bundesarchiv,

Bild 102-10460)

In the second half of the 1920s, Hitler managed to create a strong foundation for the Nazi party’s activities. However, this period was a prosperous time for Germany, which did not act in favour of the National Socialists. The situation began to change dramatically from 1929, when Germany was engulfed in the great economic crisis. The living conditions of the population – deteriorating day by day – and the increasing unemployment became a social catalyst for support for the Nazis. Parliamentary rule was becoming more and more disliked in the country. Scapegoats were searched for and radical solutions were demanded. This situation was favourable to the Nazis, whose populist and radical slogans found fertile ground in society.

As a result, in just a few years, the Nazis managed to gain massive support among people frustrated by the economic crisis. This was reflected in the results of the elections to the Reichstag, where the group of Nazi deputies was systematically growing. In 1932, parliamentary representation of the National Socialist became the greatest political force, prompting President Paul von Hindenburg to entrust Hitler with the mission of forming a government. On 30 January 1933, Hitler took over as chancellor of Germany and soon led to the calling of new elections. After the arrest of communist deputies, the Nazis took complete control of the parliament.

As a consequence, Germany – in just a few months – changed from a democratic state into a totalitarian one. The emergency powers for the government enacted by the Reichstag gave Hitler the power to make statutory ordinances and repeal the constitution, which actually meant the end of the rule of parliamentary democracy in Germany. The final burial of the Weimar Republic took place after the dissolution of all political parties, except for the NSDAP, and after Hitler took over as president of the state in 1934. Having assumed this post, Hitler proclaimed himself leader and chancellor of the Reich (Führer und Reichskanzler). From then on, the Nazi leader concentrated in his hands the most important party and state functions. The state apparatus of Germany was thus merged with the party apparatus, and Hitler could act above the law.

Adolf Hitler, 1932

(from the collection of Bundesarchiv,

Bild 102-12922-lic / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Immediately after seizing power, the Nazis began to brutally violate fundamental civil liberties. Armed units of the SA (Sturmabteilung – Nazi party militia) took to the streets, taking revenge on political opponents who were imprisoned in concentration camps without court proceedings. The first one was established already in March 1933 in Dachau near Munich and became a model for others. The next camps were established in Sachsenhausen (1936), Buchenwald (1937), Neuengamme (1938), Flossenbürg (1938), Mauthausen (1938) – in Austria incorporated into the Reich. In 1934, the network of German camps was subordinated to the Reichsführer of SS (Die Schutzstaffel der NSDAP – paramilitary formation of the NSDAP) – the supreme commander, Heinrich Himmler, who from 1936 also served as the commander of the German police. In the initial period of the concentration camps’ existence, their task was to isolate and neutralise Nazi political opponents. Later on, Jews and other citizens considered as “asocial” were also sent to camps, and after the outbreak of war, camps became the place of detention for citizens of conquered countries. It is estimated that by 1939 over 170,000 people were imprisoned in the concentration camps in Germany. The Secret State Police (Gestapo) was created to fight the opposition. Gradually, Hitler’s elite side troops (SS) became to play increasingly important role, by taking control of the police and supervising the concentration camps.

KL Dachau prisoners during slave labour, 24 May 1933

(from the collection of Bundesarchiv, Bild 105-01-024 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

German Nazi concentration and extermination camps, as of 1944.

Almost immediately after taking power, the Nazis launched their anti-Semitic programme, the aim of which was to exclude Jews from public and social life in Germany. Discriminatory and defamatory regulations aimed at the Jewish population were successively issued. On 1 April 1933, a mass boycott of Jewish shops was organised. At the same time, there were numerous attacks on synagogues and Jewish premises. A series of laws discriminating against the Jewish population were gradually introduced. People of Jewish origin were removed from the cultural and social life. Access to the state education was closed to them, and the numerus clausus rule (limiting the number of Jewish students) was introduced at the universities. All these activities were aimed at the psychological preparation of German society to accept the legally sanctioned racial segregation, which was officially established in Nuremberg in September 1935 by the announcement of the so-called Nuremberg Laws. Based on these laws, Jewish population was excluded from political, social and cultural life and Jews were basically made second-class citizens. Nurembrg Laws also became the basis for the systematic and massive persecution of Jews in the following years. On the night of 9–10 November 1938, a huge anti-Jewish pogrom broke out throughout Germany, named Kristallnacht after the broken windows.

Destroyed window of a shop belonging to a Jewish owner. Berlin,

10 October 1938

(from the collection of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Public Domain)

It is estimated that 91 people were killed during the pogrom. In addition, about 30,000 Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps. As intended, immediately after the pogrom, the Nazis began to intensify the process of the so-called aryanisation of the country, consisting in the taking over of Jewish enterprises and property by the Germans. A decree was issued restricting Jews’ right to freedom of movement. These regulations drastically worsened the financial situation of the Jewish population in the Reich. That is why many Jews tried to save themselves by escaping abroad, but the restrictive emigration policy in most countries of the world allowed only 1/3 of all German Jews to emigrate. Those who remained had to face further persecution and then extermination.

The interior of a synagogue, destroyed during Kristallnacht, 1938

(from the collection of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Stadtarchiv Pforzheim)

Hitler was not satisfied with a one-party system. He strove to build a society that would identify itself with the principles of National Socialism in all aspects of its life. This goal was to be achieved by means of propaganda and indoctrination. The mass media, such as radio and press, were completely subordinated to this goal. In May 1933, an action of burning books, unprecedented since the Middle Ages, was organised against authors who were considered opponents of the Nazi regime. The Nazis also strove to subordinate all scientific and artistic activities in Germany. As a result, many creators of German culture, including famous artists, writers and scientists, afraid of reprisals, decided to emigrate. The young generation has undergone particularly intense indoctrination. Education in German schools was conducted in the spirit of Nazism. All existing youth organisations were banned and replaced by the youth wing of the NSDAP – Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth). At the same time, the cult of the leader began to be promoted in society – it demanded complete obedience to his orders and unlimited trust in everything he did.

As the country’s economic situation gradually improved, support for the Nazis was increasing. This was due to the fact that Hitler’s rise to power coincided with the end of the great economic crisis. The Nazis resumed and intensified the public works programme – started before 1933 – which made the number of the unemployed decrease by almost a half during one year. Thanks to carefully planned investments and the conversion of the German economy to war production, it was possible to create in the society a sense of economic revival.

Nazi Party Rally. Nuremberg, 10 September 1938

(from the collection of Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H12148 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

German society was impressed by the successes of the foreign policy of the Third Reich. Brave moves in the international arena acted as remedy to the offended national pride. Just a few months after taking power, Hitler announced that Germany was leaving the League of Nations. His goal was to free his countrymen from the restrictions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles and to gain the so-called living space for Germans in the East. This required the country to be prepared for war. In 1935–1936 Hitler announced the restoration of universal military service and the construction of military aviation. In 1936, he remilitarised the Rhineland, and a year later he made favourable political and military alliances with Italy and Japan, creating the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo axis. The annexation of Austria (Anschluss) in March 1938 and of Sudetenland in early October this year, and then the invasion on the Czech lands in March 1939 were crowning achievements of the Nazis’ in the international arena. Germans were convinced that the Nazis were fulfilling the dreams of many generations, therefore the vast majority of the population was either enthusiastic about the new regime or willingly supported it.

A screen shot from the movie In the Abyss. Gusen

Hitler’s belief in the inevitable, constant struggle between nations and races, coupled with his tendency to armed aggression as well as the open questioning of borders consistently led to the outbreak of war with the neighbouring states. Thanks to his skilful foreign policy, Hitler managed to dull the vigilance of the international community. Taking advantage of this situation, he initiated rapprochement with the Soviet Union, which was followed by the non-aggression pact signed in Moscow on 23 August 1939 between the Third German Reich and the USSR (the so-called Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact). The secret protocol accompanying this pact showed the true intentions of Hitler and Stalin, who were striving to change the borders in Central and Eastern Europe by force. This pact influenced the final decision on the German invasion of Poland, which began on 1 September 1939.

German aggression against Poland resulted in the official entry of Great Britain and France – Poland’s allies – into the war, which resulted in turning it into a global conflict. However, the military passivity of countries allied with Poland led Red Army enter the territory of the Second Polish Republic on September 17. Struggling alone with two enemies, Poland was finally defeated and then a long period of cruel German and Soviet occupation began.

Wehrmacht soldiers at the Polish–German border crossing point Sopot–Gdynia, 1 September 1939

(from the collection of the Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1979-056-18 A, photo by Hans Sönnke)

German aggression against Poland resulted in the official entry of Great Britain and France – Poland’s allies – into the war, which resulted in turning it into a global conflict. However, the military passivity of countries allied with Poland led Red Army enter the territory of the Second Polish Republic on September 17. Struggling alone with two enemies, Poland was finally defeated and then a long period of cruel German and Soviet occupation began.

World War II, which was initiated in 1939 by Germany’s aggression against Poland, is considered as the bloodiest conflict in the history of mankind. This war, unlike previous armed conflicts, was of total nature. The military operations, war crimes and genocidal policies of the occupiers, mainly of the Nazi Germany and Japan, carried out for 6 years in various parts of the world, led to the death of approx. 50 million people, mostly civilians.

Niemiecki i sowiecki oficer podają sobie dłonie jako sojusznicy w trakcie inwazji na Polskę.

Wrzesień 1939 (Domena Publiczna)

12-year-old Kazimiera Mika over the body of her older sister Andzia, killed during a German air raid.

Warsaw, 13 September 1939

(photo by Julien Bryan, Public Domain)

Mauthausen-Gusen was part of the complex of German Nazi concentration camps operating between 1938 and 1945 in the territory of Austria, which was incorporated into the Third Reich. Its establishment began in August 1938 with the creation of the Mauthausen concentration camp, located near the village of the same name, about 20 kilometres from Linz, near Austria’s largest granite quarry (Wiener Graben). KL Mauthausen was managed by the SS and was based on the model concentration camp in Dachau. Its first commander was Albert Sauer, who was replaced in February 1939 by Franz Ziereis, who held this position until the end of the camp's existence.

Initially, KL Mauthausen was used as a place of imprisonment and extermination mainly for the members of German and Austrian political opposition (socialists, communists, anti-fascists), Jehovah's Witnesses, Romani people, homosexuals and various categories of career criminals. From 1940 on, prisoners of other nationalities began to be deported to the camp, including mainly representatives of Polish intelligentsia and Spanish republicans, interned in France, whom the authorities of the puppet Vichy government handed over to Germany. In the second half of 1941, there was an influx of large numbers of Soviet POWs into the camp. Among the prisoners belonging to about 40 nationalities there were also large groups of Italians, French and citizens of Yugoslavia. KL Mauthausen also became a place of extermination of Polish, Hungarian and Austrian Jews.

At the turn of 1939 and 1940, the first branch of the main camp was established at the local quarries in nearby Gusen. In March 1944, a second sub-camp was set up nearby, named Gusen II to distinguish it from the original camp. In December 1944 a third sub-camp, called Gusen III was set up in the nearby village of Lungitz. Until the day of the liberation of the camp, more than 40 branches of KL Mauthausen were established, scattered all over Austria.

In these camps, the prisoners worked as slaves for German industry. Initially, they were used mainly for work in quarries, but in the second half of the war, they started to be used for working in the armaments industry. At the end of 1943, thousands of prisoners were used to build underground drifts, where the Germans moved their production facilities to protect them from Allied air raids. The beneficiaries of the prisoners' slave labour included - apart from the SS-owned quarries (Deutsche Erd- und Steinwerke, DEST) in the vicinity of the camps - a number of German and Austrian companies, including Steyr-Daimler-Puch, Messerschmitt GmbH, Bayer, Heinkel, Eisenwerke Oberdonau and Österreichische Sauerwerks.

In September 1944, a sub-camp for women was set up in KL Mauthausen, to which several thousand women prisoners from other concentration camps were transferred in the following months, mainly from Ravensbrück, Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald and Gross-Rosen.

In January 1945, Mauthausen became the centre for the evacuation of prisoners from other liquidated concentration camps. Over the next few months, about 35,000 prisoners from Auschwitz, Gross-Rosen, Sachsenhausen, Ravensbrück, and Mittelbau-Dora were sent there as part of the "death marches”. The overcrowding of the main camp and its branches, combined with an increasing lack of food, resulted in a drastic deterioration in the living conditions of prisoners, resulting in mass deaths. According to camp data, more than 11,000 deaths were recorded in April 1945 alone.

It is estimated that between 1938 and 1945, about 190,000 male prisoners from over 30 countries passed through the main camp of KL Mauthausen and its branches, of whom at least 90,000 have died. The list of the camps’ victims includes several thousand women, adolescents and children. KL Gusen was one of the worst concentration camps in the Reich, given the category III, which in the SS nomenclature meant that its main objective was the extermination of prisoners through labour.

KL Mauthausen-Gusen was established in December 1939 in Gusen, 4.5 kilometres to the west of Mauthausen. Like the main camp, it was built near the large quarries, and its inmates were supposed to provide free slave labour. These quarries (Gusen and Kastenhofen), known for their beautiful granite, were a good source of high income for the SS, which owned them.

Initially, the prisoners working in the local quarries (about 400 Austrian and German prisoners) were forced to march daily from and to the main camp. In time, however, to optimise working hours, the Mauthausen management decided to build barracks for prisoners and SS quarters in Gusen. Construction works began in spring 1940 and were completed in May of the same year. The camp was built by Austrian and Polish prisoners, transferred from Mauthausen.

In the spring of 1940, Poles arrested in special police actions carried out by the Germans in occupied Poland began to be sent to the camp. These deportations were connected with the SS authorities' decision to designate KL Mauthausen-Gusen as a place of extermination for the Polish intelligentsia, which was to be annihilated as the leading layer of Polish society. The first transport of 1082 Poles - prisoners of KL Dachau - arrived in Gusen on the day of its official opening, 25 May 1940. During the next few months, another 4,000 representatives of Polish intelligentsia were deported there. Apart from Poles, there were also several hundred Austrian prisoners in the camp at that time.

The camp area was unevenly shaped, so the prisoner's barracks, SS quarters, and production halls were located on different levels, partly supported by brick retaining walls, which protected them from landslides.

Initially, the prisoner part of the camp consisted of 34 wooden barracks, 24 of which were intended for living quarters for more than 7,000 prisoners. The remaining barracks housed warehouses, kitchens, barracks for guard companies, stone halls, auxiliary workshops and a hospital. In 1941, two large, two-storey brick buildings were built to replace three wooden barracks. In the spring of 1943, highly-skilled prisoners working at Steyr-Daimler-Puch and Messerschmitt's factories were accommodated there. At the turn of 1943 and 1944, another four barracks were added to the roll call square. There was also a local crematorium, opened in January 1941, where the corpses of prisoners were incinerated.

The prisoner part of the camp was tightly separated from the outside world. First, it was surrounded by a wooden fence with live barbed-wire. Apart from the fence, a three-metre wall made of granite from the surrounding quarries was added at a later time. The wall was crowned with watchtowers with firing stations equipped with machine guns, headlights and alarm devices.

The camp administration buildings, SS barracks and production halls were located outside the walls. A road led to this part of the camp through a large gate in the middle of the building called Jourhaus. Jourhaus housed the camp commandant's headquarters, and its basement held a camp prison, the so-called bunker, in which prisoners were tortured and murdered. This part of the camp also had buildings for the SS crew, such as a bathhouse, kitchen and a casino.

The Gusen camp was mainly used for incarcerating political prisoners, who in 1945 made up 65–70% of all prisoners in the camp. Most of them were sentenced to so-called "protective custody" (Schutzhaft), which was used against people suspected of having a hostile attitude towards the German Reich. In the group of political prisoners, the most numerous were Poles, Yugoslavs, French, Belgians and Italians. Spanish and Soviet POWs, as well as Polish and Hungarian Jews also made up a large group. At the end of the war, every fourth prisoner of Gusen belonged to the category of "civilian labourers", who were mainly Soviet citizens, deported to the Reich as forced labourers. There were also about 7,000 prisoners in Gusen who were held there "for protection" (Sicherungsverwarte). These prisoners were sent to the camps on the basis of judgements issued by German courts. Among them were both Germans and citizens of occupied countries, mainly Poland and the Soviet Union.

The total number of prisoners who were deported to Gusen during its operation (1939-1945) was over 70,000. It is estimated that more than half of them died or were murdered there. According to the categories used by the Germans, these prisoners represented about 30 different nationalities, among which the most numerous groups were Poles, Soviet citizens of various nationalities, Jews, Spaniards, Germans and Austrians, citizens of Yugoslavia, Italians and French.

Poles

The Poles were the largest national group of prisoners of the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp. Their large number was connected with the camp's designation as the site of destruction of the Polish intelligentsia as part of the "Intelligenzaktion" campaign carried out by the Germans. Therefore, the SS men supervising the construction of the camp in Gusen called it a death camp for the Polish intelligentsia ("Vernichtungslager fur die polnische Intelligenz"). The arrests of Poles in the occupied Polish lands included mainly teachers, Catholic priests, representatives of the landed gentry, freelancers, social and political activists, scout instructors and retired military men who were suspected of anti-German activity. Poles arrested at the turn of 1939 and 1940 were sent to Gusen through other concentration camps, such as Buchenwald, Dachau and Sachsenhausen.

The first Polish prisoners arrived in Gusen from Buchenwald as early as in March 1940. Together with Austrian and German prisoners from Mauthausen, they worked on the construction of the camp. The first large transport of Polish prisoners, with more than a thousand people, took place on the opening day of the camp, 25 May 1940. In total, during the first three months of the camp's operation, about 7,500 Polish prisoners from Dachau and Sachsenhausen arrived in there. From the beginning of 1943, Poles started to be transported to Gusen directly from prisons located in occupied Poland. In 1944, a large group of Warsaw insurgents was also sent to Gusen.

In the first year of the camp's operation, Poles made up more than 90% of the total number of prisoners, and despite the fact that in the following years this percentage dropped significantly as a result of the influx of prisoners of other nationalities, they were still the largest national group, which is why this camp was commonly referred to as a "Polish camp". In total, it is assumed that at least 25,000 Poles were deported to Gusen (there are large discrepancies in the figures; statistics cited in these materials come from the Mauthausen Memorial). The losses of Polish prisoners in Gusen are estimated at no less than 13,000, some of whom were murdered in the euthanasia centre in Hartheim.

Soviet citizens

By the end of 1941, transports of Soviet POWs began to arrive in Gusen, and their total number is estimated at about 4400. They were held in the Waffen-SS POW camp, which was located in a separate part of the camp grounds. The Soviet POWs were decimated in just two years as a result of hard labour, hunger and brutal treatment. Apart from prisoners of war, about 9,000 Soviet civilians were also deported to Gusen, and then forced to work in quarries and the arms industry. At least 2,700 of them are estimated to have died.

Jews

Individual Jews started arriving in Gusen from the beginning of 1940, along with transports of Polish political prisoners. The first large transports of Jews - numbering about 2000 prisoners - took place in the summer of 1944, when inmates from Płaszów, Auschwitz, and Flossenbürg were transferred to Gusen. The Jews deported from Auschwitz came mainly from Hungary. Upon arrival in Gusen, they were directed to build tunnels in Sankt Georgen. In August and September 1944, subsequent transports of Hungarian Jews arrived in Gusen. Jewish prisoners also made up a large percentage of those evacuated from Auschwitz in early 1945. The chances of their survival in the camp were very low. Some estimate that the total number of Jews deported to Gusen from various countries reached 10,000. Almost half of them died or were murdered in the camp.

Spanish

Another large group of prisoners deported to Gusen were Spanish Republicans, who were transferred in 1941 from German-occupied France, where they had been interned since the end of the civil war. During just one year, 4,000 Spanish prisoners were sent to the camp, making up nearly half of all newcomers. In total, more than 5,000 Spaniards were deported to Gusen, more than 4,000 of whom were murdered.

Germans and Austrians

The Austrians and Germans were prisoners of the Gusen camp since the beginning of its existence, and their ranks were made up by the so-called antisocials, homosexuals, and Jehovah's Witnesses. The majority of that group was made up of criminals, transferred to the concentration camp from prisons for the duration of the sentence for various crimes. Large groups of German prisoners of various categories began to be sent to Gusen from the end of 1942. Their total number is estimated at more than 5000. In spite of the fact that these prisoners had a greater chance of survival in general because of their roots, only about 1,200 of them survived the life in Gusen.

Yugoslavs

From 1942 onwards, Yugoslavian prisoners, mainly Slovenians and Serbs, were also deported to Gusen. Their number is estimated at about 3,200, of which at least 1,300 died. The largest transports took place at the turn of 1942 and 1943. At that time, about 900 Slovenes deported from the Italian-occupied territories were released from the camp. Only 854 Yugoslavians lived to see the liberation of the camp.

Italians

In the autumn of 1943, the occupation of Italy by the German army and the establishment of the fascist vassal state, started an onslaught of mass repressions against Jews and political opposition. As a result, many of them were sent to German concentration camps. A similar fate was met by Italian soldiers who were interned and sent to forced labour in Germany. The mass deportations of Italian citizens to Gusen began in February 1944. In the middle of the year, smaller groups of Italian prisoners were also transferred to Gusen from other concentration camps in the Third Reich. The situation of Italian prisoners in the camp was difficult because they were considered traitors by the SS and fascists by some of their fellow camp mates. According to estimates, at least 1,700 of 3,000 Italian prisoners died.

French

Individual French prisoners arrived in Gusen as early as in the spring of 1942. The first large transport took place in March 1943. In total, about 3,000 French citizens were deported to Gusen, of whom at least 1,000 died. The majority of the French were sent to the camp for political reasons, mainly as part of the "Night and Fog” (Nacht und Nebel) campaign, aimed against the growing resistance movement in Western Europe. By deporting resistance activists to concentration camps, the Germans wanted to terrorise French society. In April 1945, as a result of the initiative of the International Red Cross, more than 500 French prisoners were released from Gusen.

As part of the “Night and Fog” campaign, groups of resistance activists and fighters from Belgium and the Netherlands were also deported to Gusen.

Initially, living conditions in Gusen were harsh, because at the time of its launch, only some of the barracks were ready to hold prisoners. At that time, they were not even equipped with bunk beds, which is why the prisoners had to sleep on straw mattresses on the ground. The barracks were equipped with primitive sanitary facilities, and taps with running water were located in the pathways between the cell blocks. With time, the living conditions and sanitation improved, but food shortages started to get worse. The amount of food for prisoners was gradually reduced. Theoretically, prisoners were supposed to eat about 1275-1750 calories per day, which was not even half of what is necessary for workers to recuperate their strength. In reality, however, the prisoners ate much less, since the food products were often stolen by SS officers and prisoner functionaries along the entire supply chain. Care packages, which the prisoners could receive from their families from 1943 onwards, saved some prisoners from hunger to a small extent. However, these packages were only allowed for selected groups of prisoners.

Hunger, terror, as well as hard work in quarries and arms plants caused rapid exhaustion among prisoners. The fact that the prisoners started getting gradually weaker led to an increased number of accidents at work, often resulting in injuries, which were increasingly difficult to heal. In addition, the harsh climate was conducive to the spread of various diseases. The prisoners who were sick and unfit for work were treated as useless and often exterminated en masse. Persistent malnutrition, combined with hard physical labour and lack of proper medical care, especially in the last months of the war, quickly became the leading cause of inmates’ deaths.

The first camp commandant was Karl Chmielewski, who was transferred from Sachsenhausen to Mauthausen in early 1940. He was given the task of supervising the construction of the Gusen concentration camp. Chmielewski was known for his cruelty to prisoners, which is why he was nicknamed “the Devil of Gusen”. Not only did he order killing and torture, but he also personally participated in executions. He was the originator of the infamous “Todbade-Aktionen” - mass murder of prisoners through "death baths.” His abuse was directed in particular against Polish and Spanish prisoners. At the end of 1942, he was moved to another camp and soon afterwards accused of embezzlement and theft on a large scale. In the summer of 1944, the SS court sentenced him to 15 years in prison. The helm of the Gusen camp was taken over by Fritz Seidler, who held this position from October 1942 until the last day of the camp’s existence. He was also notorious for his cruel treatment of prisoners - he took an active part in murders and sentenced them to brutal punishments. He was responsible for gassing sick prisoners in Gusen I and the massacres in Gusen II that took place in April 1945.

Initially, the camp supervision in Gusen was carried out exclusively by the members of the SS, but at a later stage it was also handled by the Wehrmacht, mainly due to the arms production in the camp. During the period of the camp's operation, the number of its staff ranged from 600 to 3000. Members of the guard companies were not allowed into the camp, and they maintained contact with the prisoners through kapos or prisoner functionaries, mainly German and Austrian inmates. Because of their roots and criminal past, these prisoners held positions in the hierarchy of the Gusen camp - they were blockführers and work commando leaders, kapos and oberekpos.

Several SS doctors worked in Gusen, but instead of treating prisoners, they used them for testing drugs or training surgeries. The SS doctors at the camp were also responsible for selecting the sick prisoners, murdering them with phenol injections and sending them to their deaths in the gas chambers in Hartheim. Helmuth Vetter was the last doctor of the SS camp in Gusen, where he continued testing various medications on prisoners, carrying on the experiments he started in Auschwitz. In the Gusen camp hospital in the so-called pathological ward, there was an anatomical collection presenting prepared parts of bodies of prisoners, which were considered peculiar by SS doctors. The samples obtained from the murdered prisoners were transferred to the SS Medical Academy in Graz and to other German universities, where they were used for various pseudo-scientific purposes.

camp would result from forced labour, initially revolving around the Gusen quarries. The prisoners also worked in the nearby quarries of Kastenhofen and Westerplatte. The excavated granite was processed by prisoners in stone works and halls, and then transported to other German cities, where it was used to erect large state buildings, such as the German Reich Stadium in Nuremberg. Granite paving stones were also used for road construction, and the waste was processed into aggregate. Working conditions in the quarries were very harsh, and the inmates were forced to work for as long as 13 hours a day. The high rate of accidents at work resulted in high mortality rates, with the total number of victims of quarry work estimated at more than 3,000 prisoners.

Over time, the number of prisoners employed in the quarries was gradually reduced, as they were transferred to work in armaments plants. In early 1943, two large companies: Steyr-Daimler-Puch and Messerschmitt, moved part of their production lines to the Gusen concentration camps, and as a result of this move, thousands of prisoners were forced to work in the production of weapons and parts for fighter planes. In the following months, the production of the Gusen armaments plants was systematically expanded. At the turn of 1944 and 1945, more than half of the prisoners worked in the Steyr and Messerschmitt plants. Due to the increasing Allied air raids on armaments plants in Germany, the Nazi authorities decided to excavate enormous drifts in the hills surrounding Gusen and move the production lines there.

In 1944, the construction of similar drifts started in the vicinity of the nearby Sankt Georgen, where prisoners were transported via a specially built railway line. As a result, by the end of the war, the prisoners had managed to excavate several drifts and more than ten kilometres of tunnels in Gusen and Sankt Georgen, which were used by the armaments plants. The construction works caused numerous accidents and led to the death of a significant number of prisoners working there.

The growing demand of arms dealers for slave labour made it necessary to expand the camp, which led to the opening of Gusen II in March 1944, and at the end of the year, Gusen III camp was established in the nearby Lungitz. The expanded Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp became the largest concentration camp in Austria, with the largest number of prisoners working in the production of arms.

The mass extermination of prisoners in Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp was carried out throughout the entire period of the camp’s operation, but with varying intensity, depending on numerous factors, including categories of prisoners, the need for slave labour in the arms industry and, of course, the progress of the war.

Until 1942, Gusen prisoners were murdered mainly for political and racist reasons. Initially, representatives of the Polish intelligentsia and Spanish Republicans had the least chance of survival, and since 1941 this changed, with Soviet POWs and Jewish prisoners becoming the most vulnerable groups.

At the turn of 1941 and 1942 the prisoners who were sick and deemed unfit for work were murdered en masse in the so-called “death baths” - rushing the prisoners to the bathhouse, where icy water under pressure was poured all over them. After about half an hour of such a “bath”, the prisoners fainted, exhausted. Those who managed to survive soon died of pneumonia. The exact number of victims of this unusual form of mass murder is unknown, but it is estimated that it could have been between 700 and 2,000 prisoners. The sick inmates were murdered in a similar manner in Gusen II, where in the winter of 1945 thousands of naked prisoners were forced to stand in the freezing cold during the blizzard.

There was no local gas chamber in Gusen, but Zyklon B was most likely used several times in hospital barracks. Starting from 1941, the sick prisoners of KL Gusen were murdered by means of poison gas in the nearby euthanasia centre at the Hartheim Castle as part of an operation codenamed “Action 14f13”. The gassing of prisoners in Hartheim went on intermittently until 1944. It is estimated that about 2,000 prisoners were murdered there. At the end of 1942, the camp staff also used a special car to kill sick prisoners.

In the last weeks before the end of the war, the functionaries of the camp murdered prisoners selected for extermination with batons or by drowning them in water barrels.

The planned extermination through labour carried out in Gusen was therefore supported by the criminal activity of the members of the camp commandant and prisoner functionaries, who organised these brutal forms of extermination.

The camp regulations in Gusen were very strict. In 1940-1942, prisoners were for example forbidden to enter other blocks. Every day, the authorities checked the cleanliness in the barracks, along with the condition of clothes and shoes. The slightest shortcomings in these areas were punished by blockführers with exercises or standing punishments. Prisoners who tried to escape would face even worse punishments. Collective responsibility was very often used for violations of camp regulations.

The camp regime was eased at the beginning of 1943, after Steyr and Messerschmitt's plants started to produce armaments there. Since these companies demanded efficient workers, punishments were reduced and prisoner functionaries’ freedom to apply them was also limited. During breaks from work, prisoners were allowed to leave the barracks and visit their friends. The supervision of prisoners in the camp weakened and some groups of prisoners were allowed to receive care packages.

The easing of the regime in the camp had a positive impact on the prisoners’ social activity. The possibilities of self-defence against extermination and terror have also increased. Initially, the way to survive in the camp was to avoid conflicts with the functionaries, avoiding hard work and using rest time in a rational manner. Over time, various self-help groups started to emerge in the camp focusing on activities such as feeding prisoners. For this purpose, food from the camp kitchen and warehouses was smuggled in, some inmates also shared their food from care packages sent by their families. This was extremely important because Gusen was the only concentration camp in the Third Reich where the International Red Cross could not send food packages.

In order to maintain full physical strength and health, efforts were made to avoid injuries at work. In order to raise the prisoners’ morale, talks and discussions, literary and musical evenings, chess games and football matches were organised and held in the camp. There were also some educational activities and religious practices. Polish prisoners led the social and cultural activities in KL Gusen.

In the night of 2-3 May 1945, the majority of the SS crew left the camp, including its commandant Fritz Seidler, who later committed suicide after killing his wife and children for fear of being captured by the Allies. The camp was then taken over by the Viennese fire brigade, which most likely saved the prisoners from the planned extermination.

On 5 May 1945, the American army entered the camp and found about 21,000 exhausted and sick prisoners, mainly Polish and Soviet citizens. In the aftermath of the liberation, there were acts of lynching of prisoner functionaries in the camp - many of them were killed by an angry mob of the remaining prisoners. After a few days, the Americans established a military command in the camp and a field hospital in the former SS barracks, where the prisoners gradually recovered. Despite organised medical care, mortality rates remained high. At the end of August, after most of the prisoners had left the camp, it was finally liquidated. However, some of the Polish prisoners, due to the uncertain political situation, waited with their return to the country, as a result of which, the mass repatriation of former Gusen prisoners ended in 1946.

After liberation, the Allies often forced the local populace to clean up the Gusen area and to take care of the surviving prisoners, as part of their policy of re-education of the Austrians. Immediately after the liberation of the camp, the Americans also initiated an information campaign on the crimes committed in Mauthausen-Gusen, addressed to the world public and to the citizens of Austria and Germany. Evidence of the crime was collected and published in the media. A special US Army unit called the Signal Corps played an important part in this campaign, as its soldiers took a number of photographs of the Gusen camp immediately after its liberation.

Due to the enormity of the crimes committed in Gusen, it has become of paramount importance to pursue the perpetrators and bring them before the Allied military courts. In order to gather evidence, the Americans set up a special committee chaired by Major Eugene S. Cohen. Its report was later used as evidence during the main Nuremberg trial, as well as a basis for the prosecution in the First Mauthausen Camp Trial, which took place in the spring of 1946 before the US Military Tribunal in Dachau, against 61 people, many of whom were guards from Gusen. After a few days of trial, all the defendants were found guilty of war crimes and overwhelmingly sentenced to death.

Soon after the liberation of the camp, the material remains of the Gusen concentration camp began to disappear. The Americans allowed the local authorities to sell the construction material left behind. The camp was also partially looted by the local populace, who used the wood and rocks from the camp as building material. The area of the former camp and the drifts carved out by the prisoners ended up under the management of the occupying Soviet authorities, who seized the machines left there, blew up the underground tunnels and took over the quarries.

After the withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1955, the area of the former camp was divided into small plots, which became a site of a new housing estate. The furnace of the crematorium was to be demolished, and a commemorative plaque and stone, unveiled by Polish and French prisoners, were to be transferred to Mauthausen. At the end of 1960, however, former Italian prisoners began negotiations to purchase a plot of land on the site of the former camp, where the remains of the crematorium were located. In 1961, they managed to buy it and hand it over to the municipality, and in return, they obtained permission to erect a monument there.

In 2001, on the initiative of the Austrian and Polish authorities, the Polish-Austrian Gusen Memorial Committee was founded. As a result of joint activities, the KZ Gusen Information Centre was opened in 2004. Today, most of the land comprising the former Gusen camp is in private hands. The barracks were replaced by single-family houses and the camp’s main entrance gate (Jourhaus) has been converted into a private villa.

After the intervention of the Polish government, which attaches great importance to the commemoration of this special place, the Austrian authorities decided to make the former roll call square an urban conservation area. The issue of commemorating the site remains open.

Excerpt from the book by Stanisław Dobosiewicz entitled Mauthausen-Gusen. Obóz zagłady

The name Gusen was given to the camp after the long-exploited Gusen quarry. The nearby village and river, a left-bank tributary of the Danube, were also called that [...]

Source: Stanisław Dobosiewicz, Mauthausen-Gusen. Obóz zagłady, Warsaw, 1977, p. 9.

The road leading to the Gusen quarry. On the left side, there is a visible office barrack of the quarry management (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

A view of the Gusen camp after its liberation, 1945; the Gusen quarry is visible in the background (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Eugene S. Cohen, public domain)

Read the texts, look at the

photographs and consider the following questions:

What was the significance of the location of the Gusen camp near the quarry?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stefan Józewicz

I was transferred to Mauthausen to build a camp in Gusen in March 1940. The pace had to be accelerated [...], because of the “AKTION GEGEN DIE POLNISCHE INTELLIGENZ”* planned for April. […] When beating us, SS-men told us that we were building a camp for our lousy brothers from Poland, who are still spending their Easter quietly today, without realising what awaits them.

* Aktion gegen die Polnische Intelligenz (German) - campaign against the Polish intelligentsia.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009

Read the text and consider

the following questions:

1. When was the camp in Gusen established and what was its purpose?

A propaganda photo showing the arrest of Poles; the German text says: “Polish civilians caught in the act of shooting at German soldiers from hiding” (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Transport list with the names of prisoners who were transferred from KL Buchenwald to the Gusen camp on 8 March 1940

From the collections of the Institute of National Remembrance

Read the transport list and

complete the following tasks:

1. Expand the German abbreviations and acronyms on the list and identify what kind of personal details of the inmates are included in the list.

2. Who were the prisoners transferred to Gusen from Buchenwald camp and where did they come from?

3. Identify Polish prisoners and characterise them in terms of age, place of birth and profession.

Excerpt from the memorial about treating the population of former

Polish areas from a racial-political point of view, NSDAP document

The notion of Polish intelligentsia mainly includes Polish priests, teachers [...], doctors, dentists, veterinarians, officers, senior officials, great merchants, great landowners, writers, editors,

as well as all persons who received higher or secondary education.

Source: Memorial about treating the population of former Polish areas from a racial-political point of view, NSDAP document of November 1939, [in:] Władysław Bartoszewski, Palmiry, Warsaw, 1976 , p. 15.

Read the text and consider

the following questions:

1. Whom did the Nazis classify as Polish intelligentsia and why?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. What was the “Intelligenzaktion?” What was its purpose? When was it carried out?

Who was its victim?

2. Why did the German Nazis want to destroy the Polish intelligentsia?

Construction of retaining walls, levelling the area of the camp and protecting it from landslides, 1940 (from the collections of the Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-151 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Witold Domachowski

We were brought to the Gusen concentration camp, although in reality the camp wasn’t even there when we arrived. All we had there was electrified barbed wire and the first eight barracks. The rest of the area was nothing but a swamp, a bog.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 126.

Mauthausen-Gusen auxiliary camp; prisoners laying paving blocks in the roll call square

(from the collections of Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-295 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Janusz Gajewski

Ending up in a concentration camp still under construction is probably the worst thing that can happen. We were gathered in the roll call square. All we saw around us were only a couple of barracks, and there were plenty of building materials around - boards and bricks. The roll call square was not paved yet, it was covered with sand. Our cell block was a wooden barrack, with boards nailed in such a way that we could see everything through the holes between them. We were wondering what is going to happen in winter. The barracks were empty inside, with straw mattresses on the floor.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 126.

Roll call square under construction; with wooden barrack structures and a watchtower visible in the background; 1940 (from the collections of Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-295 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Soviet prisoner Vassilij Kononenko

We came and looked around: dirt, everything was black, people were raggedy, there were lice everywhere. […] it was an actual hell.

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

Read the texts and consider

the following questions:

1. What was the situation in the camp like during its construction?

2. Explain the words of Janusz Gajewski, who said that ending up in a concentration camp still under construction is probably the worst thing that can happen.

Plan of the Mauthausen-Gusen camp complex as of 1945

Plan of the Gusen camp, 15 June 1943, drawing by Marian Sławiński (Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji

w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Take a closer look at the plans

and the aerial photograph of the camp,

then complete the following tasks:

1. Locate the prisoner section of the Gusen camp and its main buildings on the plan.

2. Show where the SS crew members lived and where industrial plants were located.

Outside view of the Gusen concentration cap; with a wall and barbed wire visible in the foreground; with a roll call square and rows of barracks for inmates visible in the background (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Jalmer Lake, public domain)

A view of the interior of the Gusen camp, towards the quarry: the roll call square, the camp kitchen in the background, a fence line with a wall surrounding the camp, crowned by guard towers; outside the camp wall, there was a section inhabited by the SS crew, as well as industrial plants where the inmates worked (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

“Jourhaus” - a building with the main entrance gate to the camp, housing the commandant's office; in the basement of the building there was a camp prison, often referred to as the “bunker”

(from the collections of the Archive of Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-172 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. Where was the camp located? What do the plans of the camp complex tell us about the location of the Gusen camp?

2. Describe the layout of the camp, with the help of the following questions: What parts did the camp consist of? What were its most important buildings? How was the camp secured?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Jewish prisoner, Rabbi Yechezkel Harfenes

As a prisoner of many camps, I can say that Gusen was the worst. I don't mean that the conditions in others were not terrible, but compared to Gusen those camps seemed like a paradise. It can be proved by the fact, that Gusen was the least known camp. The reason is not that it was smaller, but that so few of the tens of thousands of its prisoners survived to tell the story of their nightmare.

Source: Thomas Schlager-Weidinger, D.r Johann Gruber. Christ und Märtyrer, Linz, 2009, p. 29; excerpt translated by Marek Zając.

Read the text and consider

the following questions:

1. Why did Rabbi Yechezkel Harfenes claim that the Gusen camp was unknown?

2. How do you understand his statement that other camps were paradise compared to Gusen?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Spanish prisoner Ramiro Santísteban Castillo

When the camp [Mauthausen] was overcrowded and new prisoners arrived – the place had to be emptied. How did they do it? They chose the transport to be sent to Gusen. Gusen was a slaughterhouse. You only went there to die.

Source: The Concentration Camp Mauthausen 1938–1945, Vienna, 2013, p. 161; excerpt translated by Marek Zając.

KL Mauthausen inmates arriving at the camp (from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Eugeniusz Śliwiński

They made us stand on the roll-call square and the Rapportführer came [...], a fat officer, assisted by many SS men, all with submachine guns. […] “You nasty dogs, this camp is your last station. Das ist ein Vernichtungslager Gusen.”* He pointed to the smoke coming out of the crematorium: “This is your only way out.”

* Das ist ein Vernichtungslager Gusen (German) - This is Gusen extermination camp.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 124.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Soviet prisoner Leonid Kuzmin

One guy with a red triangle came out. I am asking who he is. He says he's Czech. And adds: Whoever got here, will never leave.

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Władysław Gębik

Gusen belonged to the heaviest, that is, the third category of concentration camps. The prisoner here was deprived of all personal belongings, even a handkerchief or cloth, the only thing he had was a number attached to the left hand on a wire.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 46.

Read the texts and consider

the following questions:

1. Why did the Gusen concentration camp have such

a bad reputation among the inmates?

2. Does the term “extermination camp” properly reflect the character of KL Gusen?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Jan Zbigniew Wroniszewski

I started to talk to my father about the camp [...] he finally said: “Zbyszek, what are you talking about. After all, if it were as you say, none of you would survive and yet you did.” For me it was a shock. Not that my father denied it, but he thought I was exaggerating.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 326.

The surviving inmates from the Gusen concentration camp among the corpses left in the camp by the SS; May 1945 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Joseph Gottlieb, public domain)

A carriage filled with the corpses of deceased Gusen inmates after liberation; May 1945 (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Eugene

S. Cohen, public domain)

After the liberation, American soldiers found corpses of prisoners on the grounds of the Gusen camp, lying in dirty beds, in landfills, on the roads, in carts, in warehouses and in cold stores, where they awaited cremation; May 1945 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, public domain)

Prisoners of KL Gusen after liberation (from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

Likely inmates of KL Gusen after liberation (from the collections of the National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, public domain)

Surviving inmates and American soldiers on the main road of KL Gusen; with a watchtower in the background (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of John William Schafer, public domain)

Four men posing in front of the “Gusen Camp Cemetery” sign. After the liberation, several hundred prisoners died; they were buried in a cemetery established nearby (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Cemetery established near the Gusen camp after its liberation; May 1945 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Ronald Macklin, public domain)

Read the texts, look at the

photographs and consider

the following questions:

1. What can you say about the character of the camp based on these materials?

2. Why was it difficult for Jan Zbigniew Wroniszewski’s father to believe what his son

said about the Gusen camp?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. Name the categories of concentration camps in the Third Reich. What were the differences between them? Why was the Gusen camp given category III?

2. What was the role of the Gusen camp in the concentration camp complex managed

by KL Mauthausen?

A table illustrating the prisoner designations used in German Nazi concentration camps (International Tracing Service, Bad Arolsen, Internationaler Suchdienst; https://www.mauthausen-memorial.org/en/History/The-Mauthausen-Concentration-Camp-19381945/Groups-of-Prisoners)

Analyse the table and consider

the following questions:

1. What groups and subgroups of prisoners were specified in the table?

2. How did the system of classification and marking of prisoners work?

3. What was the purpose of such an extensive classification?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Tadeusz Jarzęcki

I'm the number here – nine three five zero and six – that's my name.

Source: Mauthausen-Gusen. Wiersze zza drutów, Warsaw 1995, p. 57.

Drawings by Maksymilian Chmielewski depicting prisoners of KL Gusen (Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Read the texts, look at the

drawings and consider

the following questions:

1. How do you understand the words of Tadeusz Jarzęcki, who said

that in the camp he was just a number, which was also his name?

Camp files of Polish political prisoner, inmate 382, Jerzy Kaźmierkiewicz (Wikimedia Commons, public domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kazimierkiewicz_georg_1_hpk.jpg)

Analyse the document and

complete the following tasks:

1. What information was the prisoner asked about during registration?

2. Read as much of the information on the card as you can and use the information to characterise the inmate.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Wiktor Kielich

There were also prisoners from Greece, Romania, Italy, France, Bulgaria and other countries. […] It was a real tower of Babel of the peoples of Europe.

Source: Wiktor Kielich, Schodami śmierci, Warsaw, 2011, p. 113.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Zdzisław Kudasiewicz

With Yugoslavs, Czechs, Russians, it was quite easy to communicate in Polish, and with Italians, Frenchmen, and Spaniards – I don't quite remember how, but probably with gestures. When we were supposed to do some business with each other, we always found a way to communicate, even though we didn't know their language at all.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 223.

Soviet POWs in KL Mauthausen-Gusen complex

(From the collections of Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-205 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Read the texts and consider

the following questions:

1. How did prisoners of different nationalities solve problems of communication in the camp?

Transport list of the first prisoners who arrived in Gusen on 25 May 1940 (from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen, https://www.mauthausen-memorial.org/en/Gusen/The-Concentration-Camp-Gusen/Prisoners/German-and-Austrian-Prisoners)

Analyse the document and complete

the following tasks:

1. What kind of information about the inmates can be found on the list?

2. Expand the abbreviations used to indicate the different categories of inmates.

3. What countries did the prisoners come from and how old they were when they ended up in Gusen?

Diary of a Polish prisoner from his imprisonment in the Gusen camp

with commemorative entries of his fellow inmates;

April 1945 (From the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German

Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Take a closer look at the pages

from the diary and

consider the following questions:

1. What could be the possible reasons for creating this diary?

2. What did other inmates want to say by leaving their entries?

3. Based on the text and the drawings in the diary, try to guess where did the inmates come from.

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. What was the purpose of introducing the classification of inmates and replacing their names with numbers?

2. What was the coexistence of prisoners of different nationalities in the camp like?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Janusz Gajewski

With time, the number of barracks started to grow, they were reinforced, sealed, some cabinets were added inside. Bunk beds were also built for the inmates, each held four of them. There was a stove, but it was at the blockführer’s office, which was the only warm place in the entire barrack, we had to endure cold winds. They said we needed fresh air, so we were ordered to open windows for the night. It was good when it was still autumn, but when winter came, and with it came snow and cold temperatures, the air was so fresh that one night my nearest neighbour froze to death. We woke up that morning and found him dead.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 126.

Wooden barracks, where KL Mauthausen inmates were held, with a camp road in the middle

(from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

The Gusen camp only had two brick residential buildings for prisoners who were highly-skilled workers at the Steyr-Daimler-Puch

and Messerschmitt arms factories (from the collections of the Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-175 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Read the texts, look at the

photographs and consider the following questions:

1. What were the living conditions in wooden and brick barracks?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Franciszek Znamirowski

The morning ringing was making the sleepy, tired prisoners jump out of the bunks, which was accompanied by screams and beating.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 42

The bell from KL Gusen; 1942 (from the collections of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim)

... proclaiming, as stated in the motto written on it, the beginning of all actions: Ob Tag, ob Nacht – Stets mit Bedacht – Der Glocke Ruf erklingt – Ein Zeichen – Deine Pflicht beginnt…

Whether during the day or at night - constantly with caution – the bell rings – A sign – Your duty begins...

[Jerzy Osuchowski]

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 42

Excerpt from the Regulations of the KL Sachsenhausen Model Camp

At the first ring, immediately get up [...] open the lower windows. Those lying on the upper beds make their beds immediately, those lying on the lower beds first wash themselves, and then make their beds. Entrance to the washroom with the upper body exposed.

Source: Regulations of the KL Sachsenhausen Model Camp, [in:] Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 41.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Grzesiuk

There was this bastard in the washroom who explained to those who came in shirts that it was forbidden to do so. He also explained it to me once – and since that day I have been living with a broken nose, because I got hit in the face, and when I fell, I was additionally given a couple of kicks in the face.

Source: Stanisław Grzesiuk, Pięć lat kacetu, Warsaw, 2018, p. 293.

The interior of the camp washroom (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Stysiński

In the camp it was not allowed to take even a moment’s reflection because you would end up dead; you had to be careful, have eyes in the back of your head.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 261.

Excerpt from the memoirs of French prisoner Louis Deblé

Imagine people who, after 15 or 16 hours of work, are beaten with clubs, surrounded by bandits; their bodies covered in vermin, boils and wounds that refuse to heal; in dirty clothes, in the constant stench of the crematorium – then you will understand what it meant to spend one day in the Gusen camp.

Source: Thomas Schlager-Weidinger, Dr. Johann Gruber. Christ und Märtyrer, Linz, 2009, p. 29; excerpt translated by Marek Zając.

The courtyard of the hospital barrack (no. 39) in the Gusen camp (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Soviet prisoner Leonid Kuzmin

In the evening [...] we lined up in four ranks, the barrack orderlies were putting in the mattresses. They were filled with decaying chipwood. On command: one-two-three, lie down! – we had to lie down just as we stood. They gave us one half-moulded blanket for four men. […] They were removing windows on both sides [...] Winter was severe [...] it was snowing straight on those lying down.

Source: The Concentration Camp Mauthausen 1938–1945, Vienna, 2013, p. 164; excerpt translated by Marek Zając.

The interior of a housing barrack in the Gusen camp (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Teodor Pogoda

[...] I was lying on the bed and looking out the window. The moon was shining nicely. I even got up to walk to the window. I looked at the moon, then at the tower with the soldier standing on it. This mood... I even wanted to get out. Then, in the moonlight, I saw a lot of corpses. I returned to bed quickly.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 261.

Read the texts, look at the

photographs and consider the following questions:

1. What was the day of KL Gusen prisoner like? Present it in the form of a page

from a journal, which will describe not only the events, but also comments

and feelings of other inmates.

A group of KL Gusen prisoners sitting on the stairs in front of one of the barracks after the liberation of the camp in May 1945 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Lois Mullins, public domain)

Look at the photograph and

consider the following question:

1. What was the physical and mental state of the prisoners?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. How would you assess the living conditions of prisoners in KL Gusen?

2. Why were they differentiated according to the kind of work performed by the inmates? Who could count on better treatment and why?

3. What impact did the housing conditions in the camp have on the prisoners’ lives?

Order issued by Oswald Pohl, Head of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office

All matters that can reduce working hours – meals, roll calls and other – should be kept to a bare minimum.

Source: Oswald Pohl’s order, [in:] Stanisław Dobosiewicz Mauthausen-Gusen. Obóz zagłady, Warsaw, 1977, p. 272.

A wooden barrack, which housed the KL Gusen camp kitchen; the kitchen could not provide food for all the inmates, whose numbers were gradually growing (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Czesław Oparcik

[...] I got raw cabbage. The Germans kicked me, but I thought that if I eat this cabbage, even if they kick me, I will survive. Hunger forces people to put everything on one card: you will succeed or not.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 165.

Excerpt from the memoirs of German prisoner Erwin Rinker

Many prisoners had a can attached to their back with a drawstring. During earthworks they collected earthworms or beetles, whatever they could find, and then ate it.

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

12 hours in hall no. 12 Dinner; Gusen 1944

(watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski; from the collections of the Staatliche Bibliothek Regensburg, 999 Gr/4Rat.civ.388, S. 3)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Kazimierz Pieńkos

[…] One day, the Germans decided to get us out to a meadow near the camp during an alarm, we were sitting in the grass, it was April, everything started to bloom. When the inmates left, the field was barren. The grass was gone. They ate everything... I ate it too. I even learned to distinguish the kinds of grass that are sweet and others that stung - each had its own flavour.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 167.

The hunger in KL Gusen

(a still from the In the Abyss of Gusen film; a drawing by Zbigniew Filarski, from the collections

of the Archive of the Stutthof Museum in Sztutowo)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Wiesław Wach

Basically, it was one bread for six prisoners and a bowl of soup. Soup?! There was more water in it, than weeds. The Russians were additionally tearing up the grass and chopping it, taking bones, no matter if they were human or not human, grinding them into flour and adding it to the soup to make it thicker.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 164.

Read the texts, look at the

drawings and consider the following questions:

1. Why did the Germans decide to limit the time for eating to a minimum?

2. How did the prisoners try to cope with hunger and the constant lack of food?

KL Gusen inmates waiting in line for their dinner (watercolour by Stanisław Walczak; Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle

and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Look at the drawing and

consider the following questions:

1. Which categories of prisoners were depicted in the drawing?

2. What is the category of the inmates standing in line?

What about the inmate who is serving the soup?

3. What does this drawing tell us about the system of food distribution in the camp and access to it by different categories of prisoners?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Dobosiewicz

[...] general emaciation was particularly evident on the shoulders and shins – the narrow bones were sharp under the skin; the skull seemed to have contracted or extended backwards; in case of many starving people dropsy changed the appearance of the face, creating sagging skin under the eyes and under the jaws; the skin on face, hands and arms was taking on earthy tint, eye sockets grew larger, eyes seemed to fall into the skull, gaze was cloudy and expressionless.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 49.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Ludwik Kosiarski

I was hungry. If I could get to a human corpse... I approached the crematorium many times, but there was no way.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 168.

KL Gusen inmate (from the collections of the Archive of the Stutthof Museum in Sztutowo)

KL Gusen inmate (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Il giovane marchese di Groppallo, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

Read the texts, look at the

drawings and consider the following questions:

1. How did hunger affect the bodies and minds of the inmates?

2. How did the appearance of starving prisoners change?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and consider the following questions.

1. What can people be capable of because of hunger?

2. What was the impact of malnutrition and hunger on the inmates’ behaviour in the camp?

3. Where did the inmates get the strength not to starve to death?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Wacław Pilarski

You always had to drag yourself out of your bunk in the morning, even on all fours. Something deep inside of you was saying: don't give up, you must survive...

There was an internal struggle for survival. I remember lying on the block with a broken leg, I had a very high temperature and I thought it was probably the end. Colleagues came to visit me in the evening, they stand over me and I hear them talking: “Wacek is dying”. And then I lifted up and shouted: You got to be fucking kidding!

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 256.

Read the texts and consider

the following questions:

1. Where did the prisoners get the strength to fight for survival every day?

The interior of block no. 30, where sick prisoners were held. Opposite was block no. 31, intended for seriously ill prisoners; outside the window are piles of bodies prepared for cremation (drawing by Aldo Carpi, In BL 30, 1946; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

Look at the drawing and interpret

the colours used by the artist:

1. Why do some prisoners have pink skin, while others have yellow skin?

2. Why weren't the characters outside the window coloured at all?

3. What does this drawing tell us about the chances of survival of sick prisoners?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Tadeusz Czech

I dreamed that the war would end and that I could see my family and eat dinner at least once. I didn't need anything else.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 259.

Dream of Easter, Gusen 1944

(watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski; from the collections of the Staatliche Bibliothek Regensburg, 999 Gr/4Rat.civ.388, S. 3)

Read the text, look at the drawing

and consider the following questions:

1. What is depicted in the drawing? Who are the characters and what do they do?

2. What was the purpose of the drawing and what was its message?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Alojzy Waluś

Through the camp gate, prisoners came back in fives, hundreds upon hundreds, no one was wearing their hat, and all of them carried stones on their shoulders, because they had to […] bring the material needed for construction to the camp. Each work commando was followed by a procession of corpses and those on their way out, carried by others. The emaciated, wounded and raggedy bodies were often dragged through the mud, because their camp mates did not always have enough strength to carry them back.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009,

Sick KL Gusen inmate dragged by his camp mate to the camp hospital, 1945 (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Malato trascinato all'ospedale da un compagno, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; Photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

Read the texts, look at the drawings

and consider the following questions:

1. How did the sight of dead camp mates affect the prisoners?

2. What would you say about the attitude of prisoners who helped the exhausted and sick even when their lives were in danger?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Alojzy Waluś

The daily report we heard was: State of the camp 8,251, 425 in hospital, 152 died. Ha! Ha! Ha! Das ist zu wenig! It's not enough! – laughed commander Chmielewski.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 43

Read the text and consider

the following questions:

1. How did the camp authorities want to break the prisoners’ will to fight for survival?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Albert Juszkiewicz

Every day there were fewer and fewer of us […]

I look around, that man’s gone, he's gone as well...

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 127.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Bronisław Kamiński

When they count you at the roll call in the evening, you keep thinking about those who are gone...

Source: Mauthausen-Gusen. Wiersze zza drutów, Warsaw, 1995, p. 19.

Portrait of a dying prisoner, Jerzy Gromkowski, a doctor from Warsaw (charcoal on paper, author unknown; Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Read the texts and consider

the following questions:

1. What influence thinking about deceased colleagues could have

had on one’s will to survive?

Two inmates supporting each other

(drawing by Aldo Carpi, Figure di deportati; 1945-1971; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

A satirical drawing depicting prisoners of KL Gusen during a break; the caption says: “10 minutes of rest when the foreman’s gone... Gusen - 1944”; (watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski; from the collections of the Staatliche Bibliothek Regensburg, 999 Gr/4Rat.civ.388,

S. 3)

Trade between KL Gusen prisoners

(drawing by Bernard Aldebert; from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

Way to Freedom... card (watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski; from the collections of the Seweryn Udziela Regional Museum in Stary Sącz / Association of Lovers of Stary Sącz)

Look at the drawings and

consider the following questions:

1. Which methods used by the inmates to survive were depicted in the drawings?

2. Which one do you think is most important? Justify your answer.

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. What could the prisoners do to survive KL Gusen? Compare their possibilities with other camps.

2. Do you agree with Wacław Pilarski, who said: “If you had thought that they could kill you tomorrow, it would have ended quickly. In the camp, if someone cracked, he was dead in three days. You couldn't give up, no matter what.” Justify your answer. Use accounts of prisoners of various concentration camps.

Excerpt from the memoirs of French prisoner Henri Maître

You could do some sabotage, but only with extreme caution [...] Some were caught and finished hanged - they were cutting off the insulation from cables in the aircraft being built, so that there would be a dangerous short circuit. But the best method of resistance was to preserve your dignity, remain yourself, survive another day – with self-control, strength and hope.

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

Read the text and consider the

following questions:

1. What was the nature of the resistance movement in KL Gusen

and why was it limited?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Zalewski

There was one priest among the prisoners and the German found out that he had a rosary. He beat him very much and told him to eat this rosary bead after bead. And the priest did. Shortly afterwards, the priest died and then we came to the idea to pray the rosary. We agreed that at one specific hour, after the roll call, everyone would say a piece of the rosary. There was also an idea to make a real rosary. We already prepared pieces of granite in which the holes were to be drilled. To preventing Germans from figuring it out, the beads were shaped to look like dices.

Source: Świadkowie Historii. Materiały Warsztatów Dziennikarskich marzec–czerwiec 2009 roku, Warsaw, 2009, p. 48.

Granite cubes, which made up the rosary from Gusen

(from the collections of the Archive of the Stutthof Museum in Sztutowo)

Stations of the Cross written by Mieczysław Cieniak, inmate of KL Gusen, 14 February 1945 (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Wacław Milke

Christmas Eve I will never forget. Representatives of different nationalities gathered secretly in one of the blocks [...] We prepared various carols; a piece of black bread lay on the table. And then it started. First STILLE NACHT, HEILIGE NACHT. Then BOG PREDVICHNY NARODIVSYA. Colleagues made a chorus and began to sing BÓG SIĘ RODZI, MOC TRUCHLEJE... We started sharing bread.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 245.

St. Nicholas of Gusen, 6 December

(from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Krakow-Podhale-style folk nativity scene, by Franciszek Znamirowski.

The interior depicted Warsaw destroyed in 1939, Gusen, 1944-1945.

(from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Nativity scene in the camp. Sketch created by Franciszek Znamirowski, Gusen, 1944-1945 (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Read the texts, look at the illustrations

and consider the following questions:

1. Why were religious practices forbidden in the camp?

2. What significance did the opportunities to practice their religons and celebrate

holidays have for the inmates?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Zbigniew Wlazłowski

Art and culture in Gusen coexisted alongside crime and developed against logic; [...] it saved the prisoners from complete animalisation [...]

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 81

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Grzegorz Timofiejew

In memory and on scraps of paper, exposing themselves to search and inevitable death, the prisoners were keeping the good and not so good [...] camp poems ...

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 81.

Christmas greetings from the Gusen camp, 1945 - a holiday card (watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski; from the collections of the Seweryn Udziela Regional Museum in Stary Sącz / Association of Lovers of Stary Sącz)

Dreaming…, Gusen – 1944 (watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski, from the collections of the Seweryn Udziela Regional Museum in Stary Sącz / Association of Lovers of Stary Sącz)

Prisoners in flames; 1944

(drawing by Zbigniew Filarski; from the collections of the Archive of the Stutthof Museum in Sztutowo)

Is he going to throw…?

(watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski; from the collections of the Staatliche Bibliothek Regensburg, 999 Gr/4Rat.civ.388, S. 3)

Lyrics of the Janeczka camp tango performed by KL Gusen inmate; 1939/1940 (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Read the texts, look at the

illustrations and consider the following questions:

1. What were the themes in concentration camp art? What did they stem from?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. Characterise the conditions for the development of the resistance movement in concentration camps.

2. How do you understand the words of Wacław Pilarski, who said that the conspiracy in KL Gusen “was to help one another, save one another's life?”

3. Expand upon Zbigniew Wlazłowski’s statement that art and culture in Gusen coexisted alongside crime and developed against logic; it saved the prisoners from complete animalisation.

Extract from statement by Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer-SS and one of the main leaders of the Third Reich

No matter if other nations live in prosperity or die of hunger, I’m only interested in it as far as we need them as slaves.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 37

Excerpt from the testimony of Franz Ziereis, commandant of the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp

Himmler picked up a 45-kilogram stone himself, put it on the shoulders of the prisoner, and ordered to finish off the people quickly this way.

Source: Jerzy Osuchowski, Gusen – przedsionek piekła, Warsaw, 1961, p. 187.

Heinrich Himmler during an inspection of KL Mauthausen in 1941

(from the collections of the Archive of the Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-250 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

High-ranking SS officers during an inspection of Mauthausen concentration camp in 1941; Himmler is third from the left

(from the collections of the Archive of the Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-45534-0005 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Read the texts and consider

the following questions:

1. What were Himmler’s plans for the conquered nations?

Excerpt from the book by Polish prisoner Stanisław Dobosiewicz

The SS simultaneously carried out two tasks: extermination and exploitation. They collected payment for the work of prisoners, part of which was deducted as the costs of maintaining the prisoner, and another part they kept for themselves [...] The concentration camp was a large profit-making enterprise based on slave labour [...]

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 58

Mauthausen camp inmates working in the quarry; 1944-1945 (drawing by Ludwik Smrokowski; from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

Spanish inmates of the KL Mauthausen carrying out earthworks; 1942 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, public domain)

Excerpt from the document on estimation of the profitability of using the work of prisoners in concentration camps

Assuming that the average life expectancy of a prisoner was 9 months, and the daily rent for him was 6 RM [REICHSMARK] and after deducting the cost of food (60 pfennigs) and depreciation of the cost of clothing (10 pfennigs) and the cost of incineration in the crematorium (2 RM), it is determined, that the net income from the prisoner's work is 1,431 RM, to which should be added 200 RM for the dental gold, clothing, valuables and money left by the deceased. This gives in total 1,631 RM for each prisoner.

Source: Estimation of the profitability of using prisoners in concentration camps, an SS document, [in:] Stanisław Dobosiewicz, Mauthausen-Gusen. Obóz zagłady, Warsaw, 1977, p. 245.

KL Mauthausen inmates working in the Wiener Graben quarry; 1942

(from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen, public domain)

KL Mauthausen inmates on the so-called Stairs of Death (Todesstiege), which led to the main camp from the Wiener Graben quarry. On the stairs, inmates often collapsed under the weight of the stones they carried. After a fall, they would roll down, pulling other inmates with them, which is why the stairs quickly became infamous in the camp (from the collections of Bundesarchiv, Bild 192-269

/ CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Read the texts, look at the photographs

and consider the following questions:

1. How did the SS benefit from the slave labour of concentration camp prisoners?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. Justify the statement that the concentration camp was a large enterprise based on the slave labour of inmates.

2. How would you explain Stanisław Dobosiewicz's statement that in concentration camps, the SS carried out two tasks: extermination and exploitation of prisoners in a simultaneous manner?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Italian prisoner Gianfranco Maris

We were supposed to unload cement sacks from the wagons [...] One bag weighed 50 kilograms. The commando consisted of six, seven Jews and me. […] They couldn't even lift the bag up [...] The terrible massacre began... Horrible… Unimaginable… One was a surgeon, another a professor of history, yet another a painter ...

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

View of the Gusen camp after its liberation; the quarry where the prisoners worked visible to the right

(from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives

and Records Administration, College Park, public domain)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Władysław Gębik

A mill for grinding stones called Schottersilo, in which prisoners worked without protective masks. The very sharp quartz dust settling in the respiratory tract first caused bleeding and then the death of the prisoner [...]

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 55

Schottersilo, a stone grinding mill in KL Gusen; post-war photograph

(from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Read the text and consider

the following questions:

1. What were the professions of the prisoners forced to do heavy physical labour?

2. What impact did this have on their chances of survival?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Albert Juszkiewicz

We left the camp in fives through the main gate. Then we were made to stand in line and the kapos began to scream [...] Im Laufschritt! – quick march! Capos, tall and strong, used to run on both sides and rush the prisoners, beating them with sticks on backs and heads. Finally, we were reaching the quarry site.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 127.

The road leading from KL Gusen to the nearby Kastenhofen quarry (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Telesfor Matuszak

We walked quickly with the stone one way, and returned – without stone – running. On this day, I walked or ran the route from the quarry to the camp about sixteen times.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 127.

Prisoners of KL Gusen II camp working in the quarry (drawing by French prisoner Bernard Aldebert, [1945/1946]; from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

The Stairs of Death in Gusen, about 200 steps, which the prisoners had to climb to work in the quarry; post-war photograph (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Jan Wojciech Topolewski

We take these stones and my father says: “Take a little one, because you won't make it; I will take a bigger one and I will walk in such a way as to cover you.”

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 235.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Albert Juszkiewicz

The SS-man stopped one Jew, told him to come forward and shouted: You stupid dog, you damned Jew, why do you have such a small stone?

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 131.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Zbigniew Wlazłowski

Sweat was pouring down the tired faces, and lungs were wheezing due to dust. I had aching bloody bruises on my shoulders, as well as burning abrasions and blisters on my hands caused by handling stones. I felt that I could collapse in any moment.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 55.

Stone Carriers (watercolour by Maksymilian Chmielewski; 1939–1945; Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Prisoners working in a quarry (watercolour by Adam Grochowski, Bohrer [stone driller], 1944; from the collections of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim)

Prisoners of KL Gusen II camp on a break while working in the quarry (drawing by French prisoner Bernard Aldebert, [1945/1946]; from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Zbigniew Wlazłowski

I ran after an older man who stumbled and fell [...] then a kapo kicked him to throw his body down from the embankment. I thought: This is hell!

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 55.

The abuse of prisoners working in the quarry (drawing by Adam Grochowski, Prisoners pushing a cart with stones; Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Alojzy Waluś

Some had [...] their heads and faces completely massacred. [...] whoever was unable to walk on his own, was dragged down the stairs, held by legs, so that [...] his head was smashing against the stone stairs.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 43.

Commando returning from work (drawing by Adam Grochowski; 1939–1945; Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Read the texts, look at the drawings

and consider the following questions:

1. What did a prisoner’s day in the quarry look like? Describe it in the form

of a page from a journal.

2. What could be the hardest to bear for the prisoners working in the quarry?

3. How did the prisoners cope with difficult situations? Could they count on any help?

4. Why did SS men and prisoner functionaries abuse the prisoners working in quarries?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. Using the example of slave labour of KL Gusen prisoners working in the quarry, explain the assumptions of the policy of extermination by labour.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Dobosiewicz

During the battle of Stalingrad, Albert Speer, Minister of Armaments, came to Gusen and was surprised that the labour force in the camp was being wasted so much. And he decided that the camp would be transformed into a large armament factory. Soon [...] drilling of large adits in the rock began, where branches of Steyr, a large Austrian arms manufacturer, producing machine gun parts, as well as parts for various armoured vehicles, were set up there. […] then new adits were excavated and the Messerschmitt plant, which produced fuselages for airplanes, was set up there.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw 2010, p. 141.

View of the the barracks of the Steyr-Daimler-Puch AG armaments plant from the Kastenhofen quarry. The plant was located on the grounds of KL Gusen (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Messerschmitt Me 262 jet plane fuselages manufactured by KL Gusen inmates for the Messerschmitt GmbH factory. The production process involved harmful chemicals, paints, gases and acids, often leading to poisoning and death of the inmates (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Crucifix !!!, a watercolour depicting prisoners cleaning the Me 262 jet plane fuselages before they were painted. It was painted by Feliks Julian Znamirowski, an inmate of KL Gusen, who painted it for the obermeister Karol Seider (on the right in the picture). Seider was considered a lenient and forgiving man; sometimes he cursed, yelling “Crucifix!!!” (watercolour by Franciszek Znamirowski; from the collections of the Staatliche Bibliothek Regensburg, 999 Gr/4Rat.civ.388, S. 3)

Read the text, look at the illustrations

and consider the following questions:

1. What was the reason for transforming KL Gusen into a large armaments plant?

2. Which arms factories have moved their production to the camp?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Slovenian prisoner Dušan Stefančic

[…] I was transferred to the Gusen II camp, located a few hundred metres away from Gusen I. We've heard terrible things about Gusen II, what we did not know was that any prisoner could survive for a maximum of three or four months there. We had to work in the neighbouring village of St. Georgen, where the big, underground plants producing Messerschmitt Me 262 planes were located. The hygienic conditions in Gusen II were disastrous. There was one latrine and one washroom for 12,000 inmates in the camp.

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Alojzy Frelich

[…] there wasn't any bath where one could wash their body, only a trough with cold water. There was no change of underwear, the striped camp clothes stayed on our bodies until the day we died.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 145.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Tadeusz Hanuszek

There were cases that prisoners working on the extension of corridors and the factory were buried by stones and sand [...] These prisoners were not extracted from under the debris at all.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 55.

One of the underground tunnels built by prisoners of KL Gusen in the vicinity of Sankt Georgen, where Germans relocated their arms production; post-war photograph (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Gusen II: The Tunnel

prisoners during the construction of the underground tunnel (drawing by French prisoner Bernard Aldebert, [1945/1946]; from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

Read the text, look at the illustrations

and consider the following questions:

1. What were the living conditions of inmates of KL Gusen II?

2. Why did the Germans decide to move their arms production to underground tunnels and adits?

3. What dangers were prisoners working in armaments factories and underground tunnels exposed to?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. What was the significance of slave labour of concentration camp inmates for the German arms industry?

2. Write a short essay on living and working conditions in Gusen I and II concentration camps. You can draw inspiration from an excerpt from Jerzy Osuchowski’s memoirs, who stated that “If Gusen I was the antechamber of hell, then Gusen II was its very bottom.”

Excerpt from the memoirs of French prisoner Henri Maître

Everything they did, they wanted to break us, to make us lose control over our bodies. They did everything just to humiliate us. Everything was organised to murder us.

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

Beating the Prisoner

(watercolour by Maksymilian Chmielewski; Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Read the text and consider the

following questions:

1. What was the purpose of the extensive terror system in the camp?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Janusz Bąkowski

[The SS-man] took one or two puffs from a beautiful, big cigarette and threw it at my feet. I didn't pick up this cigarette and went on. And then I hear: Halt!* I look back and see that the SS-man, instead of shooting me, points at the cigarette – I'm supposed to come back and pick it up. […] The SS-man gave the prisoner a cigarette and he ignored him. As if I disregarded God.

* Halt! (German) - Stop!

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 198.

Killing the Prisoner

(watercolour by Maksymilian Chmielewski; Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

After the liberation of the camp, one of the former prisoners of KL Mauthausen-Gusen complex shows how they were punished for trying to pick up cigarette butts. For this offence, the prisoners were punished by getting chained to the wall and left for three days without food or anything to drink (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Arnold Bauer Barach, public domain)

Excerpt from the testimony of Franz Ziereis, commandant of the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp

Chmielewski and Seidler - the Gusen's Lagerführers* – ordered to have parts of human skin with original tattoos tanned especially for them. They furtherly ordered book bindings, various bags and lamp shades made of these pieces.

* Lagerführer (German) - the camp commandant.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 75

Karl Chmielewski, commandant of the Gusen camp (first from the right) in a group of high-ranking SS officers during an inspection of KL Mauthausen-Gusen by Heinrich Himmler in April 1941 (from the collections of Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-45534-0005 / CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Wacław Pilarski

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2011, p. 131.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 131.

The kapo beats a boy, pushing him towards the electrified fence (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Un kapo picchia un ragazzo spingendolo verso il reticolato elettrificato, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; Photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

A group of KL Gusen prisoners rushed up the stairs by the kapo (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Primo incontro con i Muselmann, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

Read the text and consider the following questions:

1. Who were the camp executioners and how did they treat the prisoners?

2. What could be the reasons and motives for their behaviour towards prisoners?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Leon Ceglarz

Each activity - regardless of whether we were carrying stones, assembling or forming camp groups - was a stream of constant screams, beatings and murders.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 133.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Leon Ceglarz

If it happened that you were not hit with a stick, it was a happy day, regardless of hunger.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 133.

The arrival of a transport to the camp; (watercolour by Maksymilian Chmielewski, 1939-1945; Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

The kapo rushes prisoners carrying a rock boulder (drawing by Marian Sławiński, W karnej kompanii [In the Penal Company],

Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the

Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Soviet prisoner Leonid Kuzmin

The Spaniards gave lots of potatoes. I'm walking along the camp wall and I see that – oh my God – an SS-man, the assistant of the commander himself, is coming across. He shouts at me: “Komm her, Mensch, komm her, komm her! Was ist los?”*. I played dumb. “Ich weiss nicht!” ** He took me to the camp. “Los! Aus!”** I dropped the potatoes. “Now eat it, you dog!”. I ate four or five dirty potatoes; I couldn't eat any more. “Now lie on the trestle” – I got 25 lashes.

* Komm her, Mensch, komm her, komm her! Was ist los? (German) - Come here, man. Come here, come here! What’s going on?

** Ich weiss nicht (German) – I don’t know!

*** Los! Aus! (German) – Come! Drop it!

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

Flogging. Prisoners of KL Gusen were flogged for any reason. The punishment often ended with a heavy beating of the prisoner, which in many cases led to their deaths (drawing by Piotr Abraszewski, 1939–1945, Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Grzesiuk

There was no peace at night either. They beat those who went out to the outhouse, or those who peed on their way to the outhouse, sometimes they executed those who mistakenly went through the door of the kapo's chamber in the dark[...]

Source: Stanisław Grzesiuk, Pięć lat kacetu, Warsaw, 2018, p. 297.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Nogaj

The moon was bright. The prisoner walked towards the outhouse, his wooden boots made banging noises on the scattered stones [...] Out of a sudden, a well-known murderer, an Austrian named Krakower, jumped out of the same block and [...] started hitting the unlucky man with a thick baton.

“That’s what you get for making noise at night!”, he kept yelling [...], while beating his victim without a moment of respite. [...] Upon noticing that the man was dead, he laughed with satisfaction. He then declared [...] to the onlookers, who gathered around:

“That's what happens to anybody who wakes me up at night.”

Source: Stanisław Nogaj, Gusen. Pamiętnik dziennikarza, Katowice–Chorzów, 1945, p. 25.

Read the texts, look at the drawings and

consider the following questions:

1. What dangers the prisoners were exposed to during the day and night from

the kapos and the SS men?

2. Could they avoid them in any way?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Bolesław Gajewski

The first strike feels as if somebody ran a knife over your ass and cut your skin. Every subsequent strike hits the wound. A man can power through everything, but the unbearable pain is impossible to describe.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 198.

The post (drawing by Stanisław Walczak, Seidler and Gross at “work”, from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

The post (drawing by Maksymilian Chmielewski, Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Soviet prisoner Leonid Kuzmin

There was a barrel in the washroom, 500 litres, with ice-cold water. They used to immerse the prisoners in it again and again until they were drowned. This is how the life looked like...

Source: Erinnerungen an Gusen. Das Konzentrationslager in den Erzählungen von Überlebenden, directed by: Christian Dürr, produced by: The Republic of Austria / Ministry of the Interior, 2005; translation of the excerpt by Marek Zając.

Drowning the Prisoners

(watercolour by Maksymilian Chmielewski, Człowiek człowiekowi…, Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939-1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Soviet prisoner Jerzy Osuchowski

To avoid underwater torment, many chose suicide. The simplest, because the fastest and painless, was death on [electric] wires surrounding the camp.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 66.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Italian prisoner Aldo Carpi

I heard them throwing themselves on the wires several times, but I never saw any of them. The impact of the body against the wires caused such a violent discharge, such a bang that you could hear it everywhere. They went on the wires out of desperation. Mostly after torture.

Source: Aldo Carpi, Dziennik z Gusen, Warsaw, 2009, p. 67.

Corpses of prisoners lying along an electrified wire fence, photograph taken in May 1945 after the liberation of the camp (from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

Prisoner’s corpse hanging on a live wire in KL Mauthausen (from the collections of the Archive of the Stutthof Museum in Sztutowo)

Read the texts, look at the illustrations

and consider the following questions:

1. How did the prisoners cope with the punishment and torture system?

2. What helped them endure the daily humiliation and suffering?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. Do you agree with the statement that terror was a planned and regular element of the KL Gusen camp life?

2. What did Leon Ceglarz mean, when he said: “If it happened that you were not hit with a stick, it was a happy day, regardless of hunger?”

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Nogaj

One day Malinowski fell ill and had diarrhoea [...] he lay numb in a fever on a dirty straw mattress. This fact was reported to the block senior. He ran with a piece of board in his hand [...] to Malinowski:

“What have you done here, you pig!”, he shouted, banging on the poor man's head with the piece of board [...] I couldn't stand it: [...] I grabbed the block senior by the hand when he was about to hit the ill for the second time:

– Don't you really have no conscience? How can you beat someone seriously ill? You can kill him this way!

He looked at me for a moment and then, as if he came to his senses, he smiled [...] with pity:

– [...] you still don't understand what a concentration camp is. What do you think I can do with this man? He has to die anyway.

Source: Stanisław Nogaj, Gusen. Pamiętnik dziennikarza, Katowice–Chorzów, 1945, p. 32.

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Zbigniew Wlazłowski

During one of the calls it was announced that the weakest would be sent to the Hartheim sanatorium [...] Many reported to the camp administrators their desire to leave [...] After a few days, the clothes of the deported were sent to the camp. It turned out that the they didn't reach [...] the sanatorium, they were strangled with exhaust pipes directed to the inside of sealed trucks [...]

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 65.

The Hartheim castle, one of the centres of euthanasia, where concentration camp prisoners - mainly from the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp -- were murdered as part of the action codenamed "14f13" (photograph from the collections of KZ-Gedenkstätte Mauthausen)

A damaged Magirus-Deutz van found in 1945 in Kolno, near the Kulmhof extermination camp (Chełmno nad Nerem); a similar vans were used by the Nazis as mobile gas chambers for murdering the prisoners of KL Mauthausen-Gusen using engine exhaust fumes (Wikimedia Commons, public domain - photograph published in the Polish public domain, 01.01.1996)

Excerpt from the book of Polish prisoner Stanisław Dobosiewicz

[...] selected ill prisoners were all the time consequently being killed by cardiac injections with gasoline, phenol or hydrogen peroxide.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 72.

Injection

Sick KL Gusen inmates were murdered by injections of gasoline, phenol, or hydrogen peroxide to the heart (drawing by Maksymilian Chmielewski; Człowiek człowiekowi... Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Zbigniew Wlazłowski

Passing [...] near the infirmary, I heard a scream and some struggling. After a while I heard the Polish national anthem. I opened the door. A young emaciated boy sang [...] tied to the surgical table. Köfferbeck tried to plug his mouth, and next to him, with a large syringe filled with liquid, stood a non-commissioning officer SS Heschel, getting ready to insert the needle into the heart of the lying boy.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 72.

Dr. Feliks Kamiński (left) and Piotr Pawłowski during an autopsy in KL Gusen, drawing by Aldo Carpi, Il dottore Felix Kaminski (a sinistra) e Peter Pawlowski durante un'autopsia nel prosectorio del crematorio, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; Photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Nogaj

Our Polish doctors, working in the infirmary […] found out about as many as 80 different kinds of violent deaths among Gusen inmates […] they were killed with bullets, batons, rope, gas, poison, electricity, hunger, they were buried alive, burned alive, stoned, died hit by trains, thrown off rocks, and so on, and so forth.

Source: Człowiek człowiekowi… Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw, 2009, p. 63.

A drawing showing prisoners awaiting their death inside a makeshift gas chamber in KL Gusen (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Deportati nelle camere a gas, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

You won’t have lice no more! One of the forms of mass murder of KL Gusen inmates were the so-called "death baths", during which icy water was poured over them, after which they were kept naked outside in winter; this is how many prisoners met their demise (drawing by Adam Grochowski, 1939/1945; Człowiek człowiekowi... Niszczenie polskiej inteligencji w latach 1939–1945. KL Mauthausen/Gusen, The Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, Warsaw 2009)

The view of Gusen camp. On the left, a fence line with a watchtower, with a road running along it, with the execution wall at its end, where inmates were executed. To the right of the wall there is a crematorium building with a smoking chimney; (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Veduta del komando di Gusen, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

Read the texts, look at the

illustrations and consider the following questions:

1. Why were sick prisoners murdered on such a large scale in KL Gusen?

2. What were the kinds of violent demise met by KL Gusen inmates?

3. What do various forms of killing prisoners tell us about the character of the camp?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Telesfor Matuszak

One crematorium oven could fit five people at one time [...] Burning the corpse was taking about two hours, except that after an hour the German capo was splitting the corpse into smaller pieces with a three-meter hook so that everything burns better [...]

On the first day of work in the crematorium, I had to burn a colleague of mine – I remember this first one. I know I burned more of them, but I can't remember the circumstances I got already desensitised. It was simply an object.

Source: Ocaleni z Mauthausen. Relacje polskich więźniów obozów nazistowskich systemu Mauthausen-Gusen, ed. Katarzyna Madoń-Mitzner, Warsaw, 2010, p. 139.

Former prisoners pose for the photo, showing how the corpses were put into the crematorium furnace. The photograph was taken after the liberation in 1945 (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

The bodies of KL Mauthausen inmates lying in the crematorium, ready to be cremated. The photograph was taken after the liberation of the camp in May 1945 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, public domain)

A pile of corpses lying in front of the crematorium building in KL Gusen (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Mucchio di cadaveri, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

The courtyard of barracks no. 31 in KL Gusen, where sick prisoners were murdered with Zyklon B in April 1945; the first case of gassing of prisoners in the camp occurred in the autumn of 1941, the killed inmates were Soviet POWs (drawing by Aldo Carpi, Banohf BL 31, 1945; original works by Aldo Carpi belong to the collections of Museo Monumento al Deportato di Carpi - Fondazione Fossoli, Carpi, Modena, Italy; photo by: Istituto per i Beni Culturali della Regione Emilia-Romagna)

Excerpt from the book of Polish prisoner Stanisław Dobosiewicz

The amount of ash was significant. The headquarters began to transfer them – probably for a fee – to nearby farms for fertilizing the gardens and fields, and when there were not enough of eager buyers, they dumped it on the nearby roads leading to the Danube.

Source: Stanisław Dobosiewicz, Mauthausen-Gusen. Obóz zagłady, Warsaw, 1977, p. 190.

Combustion chambers of the crematorium furnace in KL Gusen. The photograph was taken in May 1945 after the liberation of the camp (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

The room of the Anatomical Ward at the KL Gusen camp hospital, where SS doctors conducted pseudo-medical experiments (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

A collection of “peculiarities” featuring prepared parts of inmates’ bodies, found in the Anatomical Ward of the KL Gusen camp hospital (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of

Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Read the text, look at the

illustrations and consider

the following questions:

1. How did the prisoners’ work in the crematorium affect their minds? In what

ways did the prisoners try to cope with this difficult situation?

2. What were the bodies of the prisoners after their death used for?

3. What is your opinion about the attitude of the local residents of Gusen, who used the ashes of dead inmates as a fertiliser for their gardens and crops?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. Explain what the “Action 14f13” was. Present its assumptions and course.

2. Find biographical information on Aldo Carpi, the author of most of the drawings in this work sheet. How do you feel about his works? What do these drawings tell us about the author and in what way do they present the reality of life in the concentration camp?

After the liberation, American soldiers found corpses of prisoners on the grounds of the Gusen camp, lying in dirty beds, in landfills, on the roads, in carts, in warehouses and in cold stores, where they awaited cremation; May 1945 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, public domain)

Former KL Gusen inmates among the corpses lying on the ground; May 1945 (still from the Mauthausen Concentration Camp film, 1945, dir. E.R. Kellogg, George C. Stevens, James B. Donovan, produced by: United States Army Signal Corps; accessed at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives & Records Administration)

An American soldier standing in front of the gallows on the Gusen camp grounds; May 1945 (still from the Mauthausen Concentration Camp film, 1945, dir. E.R. Kellogg, George C. Stevens, James B. Donovan, produced by: United States Army Signal Corps; accessed at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives & Records Administration)

A cart filled with the corpses of the deceased inmates in front of the entrance gate to the camp. After the liberation, American soldiers forced the local Austrians to pick up and bury the dead bodies of the inmates; May 1945 (still from the Mauthausen Concentration Camp film, 1945, dir. E.R. Kellogg, George C. Stevens, James B. Donovan, produced by: United States Army Signal Corps; accessed at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives & Records Administration)

The hospital room of the Gusen camp; Polish prisoners sitting by the bed of an Italian inmate, who tried to commit suicide on the day of the camp’s liberation; May 1945 (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

A group of former KL Gusen inmates posing for a photo in front of the quary where they worked while held at the camp;

May 1945 (from the collections of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Lois Mullins, public domain)

Look at the photographs and

consider the following questions:

1. What do the photographs tell us about

the situation in the Gusen camp at the time of its liberation?

2. What was the physical and mental state of the liberated prisoners?

3. How did the Americans and former prisoners try to improve the sanitary conditions in the camp?

4. Why did the Americans decide to force the local populace to clean up the camp grounds and bury the bodies of the dead inmates?

A satirical drawing depicting SS men fleeing Gusen (drawing by Zbigniew Filarski, Before Freedom, Gusen, 1945; from the collections of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim)

A satirical drawing depicting a former prisoner functionary forced to work, mocked by other inmates. After the liberation of the camp, acts of vengeance took place in Gusen (drawing by Zbigniew Filarski, After Regaining Freedom, Gusen 1945; from the collections of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim)

Take a closer look at the satirical

drawings and consider

the following questions:

1. How are the SS men and prisoner functionaries depicted?

2. What did the author of the drawings want to tell the viewers?

3. Explain the caption on one of the drawings: “First prisoner-kapo of the Free Gusen.”

4. What would you say about the behaviour of former inmates who took revenge on their tormentors for the harm they suffered in the camp?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Polish prisoner Stanisław Nogaj

After regaining my freedom, I walked towards Vienna. My first stop was in Schwertberg, located only 11 kilometres from [...] Gusen. I asked for water at the local blacksmith. The frightened Austrian offered me a dinner:

– I see that you are from a concentration camp, probably from Mauthausen, this slaughterhouse [...]

– No, I'm not going from Mauthausen, but from the most terrible slaughterhouse in the world ... from Gusen, where I was kept for 5 years. I'm one of the few who survived.

– From Gusen? – the kind host was surprised. – Where is it, actually? […]

It was hard for me to comprehend that there were people living only 11 kilometres from the Gusen camp who knew nothing about it [...] And what do my dear comrades say to this? What will say those who spread the news saying that Gusen is known all around the world?

That the governments of all countries are informed about the crimes in Gusen? Gusen – is just a hole, not marked on any map, not inscribed in any list. While to us, during those five years of imprisonment, it seemed that Gusen was at least as well-known as Dachau! What is Gusen?

Source: Stanisław Nogaj, Gusen. Pamiętnik dziennikarza, Katowice–Chorzów, 1945, p. 18.

Read the text and consider

the following questions:

1. How was Stanisław Nogaj welcomed by

the Austrian host?

2. Why was he surprised that the residents of the nearby Schwertberg did not

have a clue about the concentration camp in Gusen?

3. What could be the source of such a difference in knowledge about the main concentration camp in Mauthausen and the auxiliary camp in Gusen?

4. What did the prisoners of the Gusen concentration camp think about the knowledge of the world about what happened in the camp during the war? Where did these thoughts come from?

Wreaths and flowers placed by former prisoners on the ruins of the former crematorium furnace as part of the 1965 commemoration of the victims of the Gusen camp (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

The Gusen Concentration Camp Memorial, surrounded by a row of single-family houses that were built on the site of the former camp; 2019 (still from the In the Abyss of Gusen film)

Former Polish inmates of KL Gusen standing in front of the former camp administration building (Jourhaus), sold in 1965 to the Langenstein municipality, which was to be used to establish a new kindergarten (from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz)

Current appearance of the camp administration building - the Jourhaushas been turned into a private villa

(2002 - from the collections of the Foundation for Polish-German Reconciliation - Archive of Stanisław Dobosiewicz;

2019 - still from the In the Abyss of Gusen film)

Contemporary view of the stone crushing mill; 2019 (still from the In the Abyss of Gusen film)

Contemporary view of the former roll call square with a wall surrounding the camp; 2019 (still from the In the Abyss of Gusen film)

Look at the photographs and

consider the following questions:

1. Which parts of the infrastructure of the former KL Gusen concentration

camp have survived to this day? What is their condition and what are their current functions?

2. Thanks to whom and when was the Gusen Memorial established? What form does it have now?

Summary

Analyse the sources, read more and answer the following questions.

1. What is your opinion about the decision of the American soldiers to force the local Austrian populace to clean up the area of the former Gusen camp and bury the dead? What was the purpose of this action and what impact did it have?

2. Talk about the issue of caring for the site of the former Gusen concentration camp. Who should be responsible for this and why? What shape should the memorial site in this area take?

3. Expand upon the thought of former KL Gusen inmate Alojzy Waluś, who said: “The world and its history can go on, but there are things we should learn from. Wounds cannot heal too quickly, because they can easily be opened again.”