Torture chambers for women in the Gestapo. How the Nazis abused children in the Salaspils concentration camp

The Great Patriotic War left an indelible mark on the history and destinies of people. Many have lost loved ones who were killed or tortured. In the article we will consider the concentration camps of the Nazis and the atrocities that took place on their territories.

What is a concentration camp?

Concentration camp or concentration camp - a special place intended for the detention of persons of the following categories:

• political prisoners (opponents of the dictatorial regime);
• prisoners of war (captured soldiers and civilians).

The concentration camps of the Nazis were notorious for their inhuman cruelty to prisoners and impossible conditions of detention. These places of detention began to appear even before Hitler came to power, and even then they were divided into women's, men's and children's. Contained there, mostly Jews and opponents of the Nazi system.

Life in the camp

Humiliation and bullying for the prisoners began already from the moment of transportation. People were transported in freight cars, where there was not even running water and a fenced-off latrine. The natural need of the prisoners had to celebrate publicly, in a tank, standing in the middle of the car.

But this was only the beginning, a lot of bullying and torment was being prepared for the Nazi concentration camps objectionable to the Nazi regime. Torture of women and children, medical experiments, aimless exhausting work - this is not the whole list.

The conditions of detention can be judged from the letters of the prisoners: “they lived in hellish conditions, ragged, barefoot, hungry ... I was constantly and severely beaten, deprived of food and water, tortured ...”, “Shooted, flogged, poisoned with dogs, drowned in water, beaten with sticks, starved. Infected with tuberculosis ... strangled by a cyclone. Poisoned with chlorine. Burned ... ".

The corpses were skinned and hair cut off - all this was later used in the German textile industry. Doctor Mengele became famous for his horrific experiments on prisoners, from whose hand thousands of people died. He investigated the mental and physical exhaustion of the body. He conducted experiments on twins, during which they transplanted organs from each other, transfused blood, sisters were forced to give birth to children from their own brothers. He did sex reassignment surgery.

All fascist concentration camps became famous for such bullying, we will consider the names and conditions of detention in the main ones below.

Camp ration

Usually the daily ration in the camp was as follows:

• bread - 130 gr;
• fat - 20 gr;
• meat - 30 gr;
• cereals - 120 gr;
• sugar - 27 gr.

Bread was handed out, and the rest of the food was used for cooking, which consisted of soup (given out 1 or 2 times a day) and porridge (150-200 gr). It should be noted that such a diet was intended only for workers. Those who for some reason remained unemployed received even less. Usually their portion consisted of only half a serving of bread.

List of concentration camps in different countries

Nazi concentration camps were created in the territories of Germany, allied and occupied countries. The list of them is long, but we will name the main ones:

• On the territory of Germany - Halle, Buchenwald, Cottbus, Dusseldorf, Schlieben, Ravensbrück, Esse, Spremberg;
• Austria - Mauthausen, Amstetten;
• France - Nancy, Reims, Mulhouse;
• Poland - Majdanek, Krasnik, Radom, Auschwitz, Przemysl;
• Lithuania - Dimitravas, Alytus, Kaunas;
• Czechoslovakia - Kunta-gora, Natra, Glinsko;
• Estonia - Pirkul, Parnu, Klooga;
• Belarus - Minsk, Baranovichi;
• Latvia - Salaspils.

And this is not a complete list of all the concentration camps that were built by Nazi Germany in the pre-war and war years.

Salaspils

Salaspils, one might say, is the most terrible concentration camp of the Nazis, because, in addition to prisoners of war and Jews, children were also kept there. It was located on the territory of occupied Latvia and was the central eastern camp. It was located near Riga and functioned from 1941 (September) to 1944 (summer).

Children in this camp were not only kept separately from adults and massacred, but were used as blood donors for German soldiers. Every day, about half a liter of blood was taken from all children, which led to the rapid death of donors.

Salaspils was not like Auschwitz or Majdanek (extermination camps), where people were herded into gas chambers and then their corpses were burned. It was sent to medical research, during which more than 100,000 people died. Salaspils was not like other Nazi concentration camps. The torture of children here was a routine affair that proceeded according to a schedule with meticulous records of the results.

Experiments on children

The testimonies of witnesses and the results of investigations revealed the following methods of extermination of people in the Salaspils camp: beatings, starvation, arsenic poisoning, injection of dangerous substances (most often for children), performing surgical operations without painkillers, pumping out blood (only for children), executions, torture, useless severe labor (carrying stones from place to place), gas chambers, burying alive. In order to save ammunition, the camp charter prescribed that children should be killed only with rifle butts. The atrocities of the Nazis in the concentration camps surpassed everything that humanity has seen in the New Age. Such an attitude towards people cannot be justified, because it violates all conceivable and inconceivable moral commandments.

Children did not stay long with their mothers, usually they were quickly taken away and distributed. So, children under the age of six were in a special barracks, where they were infected with measles. But they did not treat, but aggravated the disease, for example, by bathing, which is why the children died in 3-4 days. In this way, the Germans killed more than 3,000 people in one year. The bodies of the dead were partly burned, and partly buried in the camp.

The following figures were given in the Act of the Nuremberg trials “on the extermination of children”: during the excavation of only a fifth of the territory of the concentration camp, 633 children's bodies aged 5 to 9 years were found, arranged in layers; a platform soaked in an oily substance was also found, where the remains of unburned children's bones (teeth, ribs, joints, etc.) were found.

Salaspils is truly the most terrible concentration camp of the Nazis, because the atrocities described above are far from all the torments to which the prisoners were subjected. So, in winter, the children brought in barefoot and naked were driven to the barracks for half a kilometer, where they had to wash in ice water. After that, the children were driven to the next building in the same way, where they were kept in the cold for 5-6 days. At the same time, the age of the eldest child did not even reach 12 years. All who survived after this procedure were also subjected to arsenic etching.

Infants were kept separately, injections were given to them, from which the child died in agony in a few days. They gave us coffee and poisoned cereals. About 150 children per day died from the experiments. The bodies of the dead were taken out in large baskets and burned, thrown into cesspools or buried near the camp.

Ravensbrück

If we start listing the women's concentration camps of the Nazis, then Ravensbrück will be in the first place. It was the only camp of this type in Germany. It held thirty thousand prisoners, but by the end of the war was overcrowded by fifteen thousand. Mostly Russian and Polish women were kept, Jews accounted for about 15 percent. There were no written instructions regarding torture and torture; the overseers chose the line of conduct themselves.

Arriving women were undressed, shaved, washed, given a robe and assigned a number. Also, the clothes indicated racial affiliation. People turned into impersonal cattle. In small barracks (in the post-war years, 2-3 refugee families lived in them) about three hundred prisoners were kept, who were placed on three-story bunks. When the camp was overcrowded, up to a thousand people were driven into these cells, who had to sleep seven of them on the same bunk. There were several toilets and a washbasin in the barracks, but there were so few of them that the floors were littered with excrement after a few days. Such a picture was presented by almost all Nazi concentration camps (the photos presented here are only a small fraction of all the horrors).

But not all women ended up in the concentration camp; a selection was made beforehand. The strong and hardy, fit for work, were left, and the rest were destroyed. Prisoners worked at construction sites and sewing workshops.

Gradually, Ravensbrück was equipped with a crematorium, like all Nazi concentration camps. Gas chambers (nicknamed gas chambers by prisoners) appeared already at the end of the war. The ashes from the crematoria were sent to nearby fields as fertilizer.

Experiments were also carried out in Ravensbrück. In a special barracks called the "infirmary", German scientists tested new drugs, first infecting or crippling the test subjects. There were few survivors, but even those suffered for the rest of their lives from what they suffered. Experiments were also conducted with the irradiation of women with X-rays, from which hair fell out, skin was pigmented, and death occurred. Genital organs were cut out, after which few survived, and even those quickly grew old, and at 18 they looked like old women. Similar experiments were carried out by all concentration camps of the Nazis, the torture of women and children is the main crime of Nazi Germany against humanity.

At the time of the liberation of the concentration camp by the Allies, five thousand women remained there, the rest were killed or transported to other places of detention. The Soviet troops who arrived in April 1945 adapted the camp barracks for the settlement of refugees. Later, Ravensbrück turned into a stationing point for Soviet military units.

Nazi concentration camps: Buchenwald

The construction of the camp began in 1933, near the town of Weimar. Soon, Soviet prisoners of war began to arrive, who became the first prisoners, and they completed the construction of the "hellish" concentration camp.

The structure of all structures was strictly thought out. Immediately outside the gates began "Appelplat" (parade ground), specially designed for the formation of prisoners. Its capacity was twenty thousand people. Not far from the gate was a punishment cell for interrogations, and opposite the office was located, where the camp leader and the officer on duty lived - the camp authorities. Deeper were the barracks for prisoners. All barracks were numbered, there were 52 of them. At the same time, 43 were intended for housing, and workshops were arranged in the rest.

The Nazi concentration camps left behind a terrible memory, their names still cause fear and shock in many, but the most terrifying of them is Buchenwald. The crematorium was considered the most terrible place. People were invited there under the pretext of a medical examination. When the prisoner undressed, he was shot, and the body was sent to the oven.

Only men were kept in Buchenwald. Upon arrival at the camp, they were assigned a number in German, which they had to learn in the first day. The prisoners worked at the Gustlovsky weapons factory, which was located a few kilometers from the camp.

Continuing to describe the concentration camps of the Nazis, let us turn to the so-called "small camp" of Buchenwald.

Small Camp Buchenwald

The "Small Camp" was the quarantine zone. Living conditions here were, even in comparison with the main camp, simply hellish. In 1944, when the German troops began to retreat, prisoners from Auschwitz and the Compiègne camp were brought to this camp, mostly Soviet citizens, Poles and Czechs, and later Jews. There was not enough space for everyone, so some of the prisoners (six thousand people) were placed in tents. The closer 1945 was, the more prisoners were transported. Meanwhile, the "small camp" included 12 barracks measuring 40 x 50 meters. Torture in the concentration camps of the Nazis was not only specially planned or for scientific purposes, the very life in such a place was torture. 750 people lived in the barracks, their daily ration consisted of a small piece of bread, the unemployed were no longer supposed to.

Relations among the prisoners were tough, cases of cannibalism and murder for someone else's portion of bread were documented. It was a common practice to store the bodies of the dead in barracks in order to receive their rations. The clothes of the deceased were divided among his cellmates, and they often fought over them. Due to such conditions, infectious diseases were common in the camp. Vaccinations only exacerbated the situation, as injection syringes were not changed.

The photo is simply not able to convey all the inhumanity and horror of the Nazi concentration camp. Witness accounts are not for the faint of heart. In each camp, not excluding Buchenwald, there were medical groups of doctors who conducted experiments on prisoners. It should be noted that the data they obtained allowed German medicine to take a step forward - there were not so many experimental people in any country in the world. Another question is whether it was worth the millions of tortured children and women, those inhuman sufferings that these innocent people endured.

Prisoners were irradiated, healthy limbs were amputated and organs were cut out, sterilized, castrated. They tested how long a person is able to withstand extreme cold or heat. Specially infected with diseases, introduced experimental drugs. So, in Buchenwald, an anti-typhoid vaccine was developed. In addition to typhoid, the prisoners were infected with smallpox, yellow fever, diphtheria, and paratyphoid.

Since 1939, the camp was run by Karl Koch. His wife, Ilse, was nicknamed the "Buchenwald witch" for her love of sadism and inhuman abuse of prisoners. She was more feared than her husband (Karl Koch) and the Nazi doctors. She was later nicknamed "Frau Lampshade". The woman owes this nickname to the fact that she made various decorative things from the skin of the killed prisoners, in particular, lampshades, which she was very proud of. Most of all, she liked to use the skin of Russian prisoners with tattoos on their backs and chests, as well as the skin of gypsies. Things made of such material seemed to her the most elegant.

The liberation of Buchenwald took place on April 11, 1945 by the hands of the prisoners themselves. Having learned about the approach of the allied troops, they disarmed the guards, captured the camp leadership and ran the camp for two days until the American soldiers approached.

Auschwitz (Auschwitz-Birkenau)

Listing the concentration camps of the Nazis, Auschwitz cannot be ignored. It was one of the largest concentration camps, in which, according to various sources, from one and a half to four million people died. The exact details of the dead have not yet been clarified. Most of the victims were Jewish prisoners of war, who were destroyed immediately upon arrival in the gas chambers.

The concentration camp complex itself was called Auschwitz-Birkenau and was located on the outskirts of the Polish city of Auschwitz, whose name has become a household name. Above the camp gates were engraved the following words: "Work sets you free."

This huge complex, built in 1940, consisted of three camps:

• Auschwitz I or the main camp - the administration was located here;
• Auschwitz II or "Birkenau" - was called the death camp;
• Auschwitz III or Buna Monowitz.

Initially, the camp was small and intended for political prisoners. But gradually more and more prisoners arrived in the camp, 70% of whom were destroyed immediately. Many tortures in Nazi concentration camps were borrowed from Auschwitz. So, the first gas chamber began to function in 1941. Gas "Cyclone B" was used. For the first time, the terrible invention was tested on Soviet and Polish prisoners with a total number of about nine hundred people.

Auschwitz II began its operation on March 1, 1942. Its territory included four crematoria and two gas chambers. In the same year, medical experiments began on women and men for sterilization and castration.

Small camps gradually formed around Birkenau, where prisoners were kept working in factories and mines. One of these camps gradually grew and became known as Auschwitz III or Buna Monowitz. About ten thousand prisoners were kept here.

Like any Nazi concentration camp, Auschwitz was well guarded. Contacts with the outside world were forbidden, the territory was surrounded by a barbed wire fence, guard posts were set up around the camp at a distance of a kilometer.

On the territory of Auschwitz, five crematoria were continuously operating, which, according to experts, had a monthly output of approximately 270,000 corpses.

On January 27, 1945, the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp was liberated by Soviet troops. By that time, about seven thousand prisoners remained alive. Such a small number of survivors is due to the fact that about a year before that, mass murders in gas chambers (gas chambers) began in the concentration camp.

Since 1947, a museum and a memorial complex dedicated to the memory of all those who died at the hands of Nazi Germany began to function on the territory of the former concentration camp.

Conclusion

For the entire duration of the war, according to statistics, approximately four and a half million Soviet citizens were captured. They were mostly civilians from the occupied territories. It's hard to imagine what these people went through. But not only the bullying of the Nazis in the concentration camps was destined to be demolished by them. Thanks to Stalin, after their release, when they returned home, they received the stigma of "traitors". At home, the Gulag was waiting for them, and their families were subjected to serious repression. One captivity was replaced by another for them. In fear for their lives and the lives of their loved ones, they changed their last names and tried in every possible way to hide their experiences.

Until recently, information about the fate of prisoners after their release was not advertised and hushed up. But the people who survived this simply should not be forgotten.

The most interesting documents were recently published by the blogger http://komandante-07.livejournal.com/, testifying to the atrocities of Ukrainian nationalists from the OUN-UPA against the Poles in the 1940s. Truthful evidence that now European and American politicians and officials who support the Kyiv junta are trying in every possible way to ignore, are in fact the regime of the descendants of those fascist Ukrainian radicals who poured blood over Eastern Europe 70 years ago. Look, and who can, show this to the Europeans and Americans - whom they brought to power in Kyiv and to whom they are ready to provide military assistance! This is madness…

And of course, the most inexplicable absurdity is that Poland, as the country most affected by the OUN-UPA, now openly supports the descendants of Ukrainian radicals, the same ones who tortured and killed thousands of Poles less than a century ago - women, children and the elderly! Is it possible that the historical memory of the Polish people no longer works, or did national wounds heal after a terrible tragedy, in just some 70 years!?

Children in the foreground - Janusz Beławski, 3 years old, Adele's son; Roman Belavsky, 5 years old, son of Cheslava, as well as Jadwiga Belavska, 18 years old and others. These listed Polish victims are the result of a massacre committed by the OUN-UPA.

LIPNIKI, Kostopol county, Lutsk voivodeship. March 26, 1943.
The corpses of the Poles, victims of the massacre committed by the OUN-UPA, were brought for identification and burial. Standing behind the fence is Jerzy Skulski, who saved a life with the firearm he had (seen in the photo).




Two-handed saw - good, but long. An ax is faster. The picture shows a Polish family hacked to death by Bandera in Maciew (Lukov), February 1944. Something lies on a pillow in the far corner. It's hard to see from here.


And lie there - severed human fingers. Before they died, Bandera tortured their victims.

LIPNIKI, Kostopol county, Lutsk voivodeship. March 26, 1943.
The central fragment of the mass grave of the Poles - victims of the Ukrainian massacre committed by the OUN - UPA (OUN - UPA) - before the funeral near the People's House.

KATARZYNÓWKA, Lutsk county, Lutsk voivodship. May 7/8, 1943.
There are three children on the plan: two sons of Piotr Mekal and Aneli from Gvyazdovsky - Janusz (3 years old) with broken limbs and Marek (2 years old), stabbed with bayonets, and in the middle lies the daughter of Stanislav Stefanyak and Maria from Boyarchuk - Stasya (5 years old) with cut and open tummy and insides out, as well as broken limbs.

VLADINOPOL (WŁADYNOPOL), region, Vladimir county, Lutsk voivodeship. 1943.
In the photo, a murdered adult woman named Shayer and two children - Polish victims of the Bandera terror attacked in the house of the OUN - UPA (OUN - UPA).
Demonstration of the photograph marked W - 3326, courtesy of the archive.


One of the two Kleshchinsky families in Podyarkovo was tortured to death by the OUN - UPA on August 16, 1943. The photo shows a family of four - a wife and two children. The victims had their eyes gouged out, they were hit on the head, their palms were burned, they tried to cut off the upper and lower limbs, as well as the hands, stab wounds were inflicted all over the body, etc.

PODYARKOV (PODJARKÓW), Bobrka County, Lviv Voivodeship. August 16, 1943.
Kleshchinska, a member of a Polish family in Podiarkovo, was the victim of an OUN-UPA attack. The result of the attacker's blow with an ax, who tried to cut off the right arm and ear, as well as the torment inflicted, was a round stab wound on the left shoulder, a wide wound on the forearm of the right hand, probably from its cauterization.

PODYARKOV (PODJARKÓW), Bobrka County, Lviv Voivodeship. August 16, 1943.
View inside the house of the Polish Kleshchinsky family in Podyarkovo after the attack of the OUN-UPA terrorists on August 16, 1943. The photograph shows the ropes, called “krepulets” by Bandera, used for sophisticated infliction of torment and strangulation of Polish victims.

January 22, 1944, a woman with 2 children was killed in the village of Bushe (Polish family Popiel)

LIPNIKI (LIPNIKI), Kostopil County, Lutsk Voivodeship. March 26, 1943. View before the funeral. Polish victims of the night massacre committed by the OUN-UPA brought to the People's House.


OSTRÓWKI and WOLA OSTROWIECKA, Luboml powiat, Lutsk voivodeship. August 1992.
The result of the 17-22 August 1992 exhumation of the victims of the massacre of Poles, located in the villages of Ostrówki and Volya Ostrovetska, committed by the terrorists of the OUN - UPA (OUN - UPA). Ukrainian sources from Kyiv from 1988 report the total number of victims in the two villages listed - 2,000 Poles.
Photo: Dziennik Lubelski, Magazyn, nr. 169, Wyd. A., 28 - 30 VIII 1992, s. 9, za: VHS - Produkcja OTV Lublin, 1992.

BŁOŻEW GÓRNA, Dobromil County, Lviv Voivodeship. November 10, 1943.
On the eve of November 11 - the People's Independence Day - the UPA attacked 14 Poles, in particular, the Sukhaya family, using various cruelties. On the plan, the murdered Maria Grabowska (maiden name Suhai), 25 years old, with her daughter Kristina, 3 years old. The mother was stabbed with a bayonet, and the daughter's jaw was broken and her tummy was torn open.
The photo was published thanks to the victim's sister, Helena Kobierzicka.

LATACH (LATACZ), Zalishchyky county, Tarnopol voivodeship. December 14, 1943.
One of the Polish families - Stanislav Karpyak in the village of Latach, was killed by a UPA gang of twelve people. Six people died: Maria Karpyak - wife, 42 years old; Josef Karpyak - son, 23 years old; Vladislav Karpyak - son, 18 years old; Zygmunt or Zbigniew Karpyak - son, 6 years old; Sofia Karpyak - daughter, 8 years old and Genovef Chernitska (nee Karpyak) - 20 years old. Zbigniew Czernicki, a one and a half year old wounded child, was hospitalized in Zalishchyky. Visible in the picture is Stanislav Karpyak, who escaped because he was absent.

POLOVETS (POŁOWCE), region, Chortkiv county, Ternopil voivodeship. January 16 - 17, 1944.
A forest near Yagelnitsa, called Rosokhach. The process of identifying 26 corpses of Polish residents of the village of Polovtse, killed by the UPA. The names and surnames of the victims are known. The occupying German authorities officially established that the victims were stripped naked and brutally tortured and tortured. The faces were bloody as a result of cutting off noses, ears, cutting the neck, gouging out the eyes and strangulation with ropes, the so-called lasso.

BUSCHE (BUSZCZE), Berezhany county, Ternopil voivodeship. January 22, 1944.
On the plan, one of the victims of the massacre is Stanislav Kuzev, 16 years old, tortured by the UPA. We see an open belly, as well as stab wounds - wide and smaller round. On a critical day, Bandera burned several Polish courtyards and brutally killed at least 37 Poles, including 7 women and 3 small children. 13 people were wounded.

CHALUPKI (CHAŁUPKI), settlements of the village of Barshchowice, Lviv county, Lviv voivodeship. February 27 - 28, 1944.
A fragment of the Polish courtyards in Khalupki, burned by UPA terrorists after the murder of 24 residents and the robbery of movable property.

MAGDALOVKA (MAGDALÓWKA), Skalat county, Ternopil voivodeship.
Katarzyna Gorvath from Khably, 55 years old, mother of the Roman Catholic priest Jan Gorvath.
View from 1951 after plastic surgery. UPA terrorists almost completely cut off her nose, as well as her upper lip, knocked out most of her teeth, gouged out her left eye and seriously damaged her right eye. On that tragic March night in 1944, other members of this Polish family died a cruel death, and the attackers stole their property, for example, clothes, bed linen and towels.

BIŁGORAJ, Lubelskie Voivodeship. February - March 1944.
View of the county town of Bilgoraj burned in 1944. The result of the extermination action carried out by the SS-Galicia.
The photographer is unknown. The photograph marked W - 1231 is courtesy of the archives.


We see the open stomach and insides from the outside, as well as a brush hanging on the skin - the result of an attempt to cut it off. OUN-UPA case (OUN-UPA).

BELZEC (BEŁŻEC), region, Rava Ruska county, Lviv voivodeship. June 16, 1944.
An adult woman with a visible, more than ten cm wound on the buttock, as a result of a strong blow with a sharp weapon, as well as small round wounds on the body, indicating torture. Nearby is a small child with visible injuries on his face.


Fragment of the place of execution in the forest. Polish child among adult victims killed by Bandera. The mutilated head of a child is visible.

LUBYCZA KRÓLEWSKA, region, Rava Ruska county, Lviv voivodeship. June 16, 1944.
A fragment of the forest near the railway track near Lyubycha Krolevskaya, where UPA terrorists cunningly detained a passenger train on the Belzec - Rava Ruska - Lvov route and shot at least 47 passengers - Polish men, women and children. Previously, they mocked living people, as later on the dead. Violence was used - punches, beatings with rifle butts, and a pregnant woman was nailed to the ground with bayonets. Desecrated dead bodies. They appropriated personal documents of the victims, watches, money and other valuable items. The names and surnames of most of the victims are known.

LUBYCZA KRÓLEWSKA, forest district, Rava Ruska county, Lviv voivodeship. June 16, 1944.
Fragment of the forest - places of execution. On the ground lie Polish victims killed by Bandera. In the central plan, a naked woman is seen tied to a tree.


A fragment of the forest - the place of execution of Polish passengers killed by Ukrainian chauvinists.

LUBYCZA KRÓLEWSKA, Rava Ruska County, Lviv Voivodeship. June 16, 1944.
Fragment of the forest - places of execution. Polish women killed by Bandera

CHORTKOV (CZORTKÓW), Ternopil Voivodeship.
Two, most likely, Polish victims of the Bandera terror. There are no more detailed data regarding the names and surnames of the victims, nationality, place and circumstances of death.

— Z.D. from Poland: “Those who ran away were shot, chased and killed on horseback. On August 30, 1943, in the village of Gnoino, the headman appointed 8 Poles to work in Germany. and threw them alive into a well, into which a grenade was then thrown."

— Ch.B. from the USA: In Podlesye, that was the name of the village, Bandera tortured four of the miller Petrushevsky's family, and 17-year-old Adolfina was dragged along a rocky rural road until she died.

— E.B. from Poland: "After the murder of the Kozubskys in Belozerka near Kremenets, the Bandera went to the Giuzikhovskys' farm. Seventeen-year-old Regina jumped out the window, the bandits killed her daughter-in-law and her three-year-old son, whom she was holding in her arms. Then they set fire to the hut and left."

— A.L. from Poland: "08.30, 1943. The UPA attacked such villages and killed in them:

1. Kuty. 138 people, including 63 children.

2. Yankovits. 79 people, including 18 children.

3. Island. 439 people, including 141 children.

4. Will Ostrovetska. 529 people, including 220 children.

5. Colony Chmikov - 240 people, among them 50 children.

— M.B. from the USA: "They shot, cut with knives, burned."

— T.M. from Poland: "They hanged Ogashka, and before that they burned his hair on his head."

- M.P. from the USA: "They surrounded the village, set fire to and killed those who were fleeing."

— F.K. from Great Britain: “They took my daughter to a collection point near the church. About 15 people were already standing there - women and children. Centurion Golovachuk and his brother began to tie their hands and feet with barbed wire. The sister began to pray aloud, centurion Golovachuk began to beat her in the face and trample feet."

— F.B. from Canada: "Bandera came to our yard, caught our father and cut off his head with an ax, pierced our sister with a bayonet. Mother, seeing all this, died of a broken heart."

- Yu.V. from the UK: "My brother's wife was Ukrainian, and because she married a Pole, 18 Bandera people raped her. She never recovered from this shock, her brother did not spare her, and she drowned herself in the Dniester."

- V. Ch. from Canada: "In the village of Bushkovitsy, eight Polish families were herded into a stodol, where they killed them all with axes and set fire to the stodol."

- Yu.Kh from Poland: "In March 1944, our village of Guta Shklyana was attacked by Bandera, among them was one named Didukh from the village of Oglyadov. They killed five people. They shot, finished off the wounded. Yu. Khorostetsky was cut in half with an ax. They raped a minor" .

— T.R. from Poland: "The village of Osmigovichi. 11. 07. 43, during the service of God, Bandera attacked, killed the worshipers, a week after that they attacked our village. They threw small children into a well, and those who were larger were closed in the basement and filled up him. One Banderite, holding a baby by the legs, hit his head against the wall. The mother of this child screamed, she was pierced with a bayonet. "

A separate, very important section in the history of evidence of the mass extermination of Poles carried out by the OUN-UPA in Volyn is the book by Y. Turovsky and V. Semashko "Atrocities of Ukrainian nationalists committed against the Polish population of Volyn 1939-1945". This book is distinguished by its objectivity. It is not imbued with hatred, although it describes the martyrdom of thousands of Poles. This book should not be read by people with weak nerves. It lists and describes the methods of mass murder of men, women, and children on 166 pages of small print. Here are just a few excerpts from this book.

- On July 16, 1942, in Klevan, Ukrainian nationalists committed a provocation, prepared an anti-German leaflet in Polish. As a result, the Germans shot several dozen Poles.

November 13, 1942 Obirki, a Polish village near Lutsk. The Ukrainian police, under the command of the nationalist Sachkovsky, a former teacher, attacked the village because of their cooperation with the Soviet partisans. Women, children and the elderly were herded into one valley, where they were killed and then burned. 17 people were taken to Klevan and shot there.

- November 1942, near the village of Virka. Ukrainian nationalists tortured Jan Zelinsky by placing him bound in a fire.

- November 9, 1943, the Polish village of Parosle in the Sarny region. A gang of Ukrainian nationalists, pretending to be Soviet partisans, misled the villagers, who treated the gang during the day. In the evening, the bandits surrounded all the houses and killed the Polish population in them. 173 people were killed. Only two were saved, who were littered with corpses, and a 6-year-old boy who pretended to be killed. A later examination of the dead showed the exceptional cruelty of the executioners. Infants were nailed to tables with kitchen knives, several people were flayed, women were raped, some had their breasts cut off, many had their ears and noses cut off, their eyes gouged out, their heads cut off. After the massacre, they arranged a booze at the local headman. After the executioners left, among the scattered bottles of samogon and leftover food, they found a one-year-old child nailed to the table with a bayonet, and a piece of pickled cucumber, half-eaten by one of the bandits, stuck in his mouth.

- March 11, 1943 the Ukrainian village of Litogoshcha near Kovel. Ukrainian nationalists tortured a Pole teacher, as well as several Ukrainian families who resisted the destruction of the Poles.

- March 22, 1943, the village of Radovichi, Kovelsky district. A gang of Ukrainian nationalists dressed in German uniforms, demanding the issuance of weapons, tortured the father and two Lesnevsky brothers.

- March 1943 Zagortsy, Dubna region. Ukrainian nationalists kidnapped the farm manager, and when he ran away, the executioners stabbed him with bayonets, and then nailed him to the ground, "so that he would not get up."

March 1943. In the outskirts of Guta, Stepanskaya, Kostopol region, Ukrainian nationalists stole 18 Polish girls by deception, who were killed after being raped. The bodies of the girls were put in one row and a ribbon was placed on them with the inscription: "This is how Lyashki (Polish women) should die."

- March 1943, the village of Mosty, Kostopol district Pavel and Stanislav Bednazhi had Ukrainian wives. Both were tortured by Ukrainian nationalists. They also killed the wife of one. The second Natalka, escaped.

March 1943, the village of Banasovka, Lutsk region. A gang of Ukrainian nationalists tortured 24 Poles, their bodies were thrown into a well.

- March 1943, the village of Antonovka, Sarnensky district. Józef Eismont went to the mill. The owner of the mill, a Ukrainian, warned him of the danger. When he was returning from the mill, Ukrainian nationalists attacked him, tied him to a post, gouged out his eyes, and then cut him alive with a saw.

- July 11, 1943, the village of Biskupichi, Vladimir Volynsky district Ukrainian nationalists committed a massacre, driving the residents into the school premises. At the same time, the family of Vladimir Yaskula was brutally murdered. The executioners broke into the house when everyone was asleep. Parents were killed with axes, and five children were placed nearby, covered with straw from mattresses and set on fire.

July 11, 1943, Svoychev settlement near Volodymyr Volynsky. Ukrainian Glembitsky killed his Polish wife, two children and his wife's parents.

July 12, 1943 colony Maria Volya near Volodymyr Volynsky Around 15.00 Ukrainian nationalists surrounded it and began to kill Poles using firearms, axes, pitchforks, knives, dryuchki About 200 people (45 families) died. Some of the people, about 30 people, were thrown into the kopodets and there they were killed with stones. Those who ran away were hunted down and killed. During this massacre, the Ukrainian Vladislav Didukh was ordered to kill his Polish wife and two children. When he did not comply with the order, they killed him and his family. Eighteen children aged 3 to 12, who hid in the field, were caught by the executioners, put on a cart, brought to the village of Chesny Krest and killed everyone there, pierced with pitchforks, chopped with axes. The action was led by Kvasnitsky...

- August 30, 1943, the Polish village of Kuty, Lubomlsky district. In the early morning, the village was surrounded by UPA archers and Ukrainian peasants, mainly from the village of Lesnyaki, and carried out a massacre of the Polish population. Pavel Pronchuk, a Pole who tried to protect his mother, was laid on a bench, his arms and legs were cut off, leaving him to be martyred.

- August 30, 1943, the Polish village of Ostrowki near Luboml. The village was surrounded by a dense ring. Ukrainian emissaries entered the village, offering to lay down their arms. Most of the men gathered at the school where they were locked up. Then five people were taken outside the garden, where they were killed with a blow to the head and thrown into dug pits. The bodies were piled in layers, sprinkled with earth. Women and children were gathered in the church, ordered to lie down on the floor, after which they were shot in the head in turn. 483 people died, including 146 children.

UPA participant Danilo Shumuk cites in his book the story of a Ukrainian: “In the evening we went out again to these very farms, organized ten carts under the mask of red partisans and drove in the direction of Koryt ... We drove, sang “Katyusha” and from time to time cursed at -Russian..."

- 15.03.42, the village of Kosice. The Ukrainian police, together with the Germans, killed 145 Poles, 19 Ukrainians, 7 Jews, 9 Soviet prisoners;

- On the night of March 21, 1943, two Ukrainians were killed in Shumsk - Ishchuk and Kravchuk, who helped the Poles;

- April 1943, Belozerka. These same bandits killed Ukrainian Tatyana Mikolik because she had a child with a Pole;

- 5.05.43, Klepachev. Ukrainian Petro Trokhimchuk and his Polish wife were killed;

- 30.08.43, Kuty. The Ukrainian family of Vladimir Krasovsky with two small children was brutally murdered;

- August 1943, Yanovka. Bandera killed a Polish child and two Ukrainian children, as they were brought up in a Polish family;

- August 1943, Antolin. Ukrainian Mikhail Mishchanyuk, who had a Polish wife, received an order to kill her and a one-year-old child. As a result of his refusal, he and his wife and child were killed by neighbors.

“A member of the leadership of the Provoda (OUN Bandery - V.P.) Maxim Ryban (Nikolay Lebed) demanded from the Main Team of the UPA (that is, from Tapaca Bulba-Borovets - V.P.) ... to understand all the rebellion from the Polish population .. ."

* Oleksandr Gritsenko: “Armiya 6ez depzhavy”, in the image “Tydi, de 6iy for freedom”, London, 1989, p. 405

“Already during the negotiations (between N. Lebed and T. Bulba-Borovets - V.P.), instead of carrying out an action along a jointly drawn line, the military departments of the OUN (Bandera - V.P.) ... began to destroy in a shameful way, the Polish civilian population and other national minorities ... No party has a monopoly on the Ukrainian people ... Is it possible for a true revolutionary-sovereign to obey the line of the party, which begins the construction of the state with the massacre of national minorities or the senseless burning of their homes? Ukraine has more formidable enemies than the Poles... What are you fighting for? For Ukraine or your OUN? For the Ukrainian State or for the dictatorship in that state? For the Ukrainian people or just for your party?”

* “Bidkritiy list (Tapaca Bulbi - V.P.) to the member of the Wire Opranization of Ukrainian Nationalist Stepan Banderi”, view 10 September 1943, p., for: “Ukrainian Historian, vol. 114-119.

“The one who evaded their (OUN Bandery - V.P.) instructions on mobilization was shot with his family and his house was burned down ...”

* Maksim Skoprypsky: “At the offensive and the offensive”, Chicago, 1961, after: “Tudi, debiy for the will”, Kiev, 1992, p. 174.

“The Security Council began a mass purge among the population and in the departments of the UPA. For the least offense, and even at personal expense, the population was punishable by death. In the departments, the skhidnyaks (people from Eastern Ukraine - Ed.per) suffered the most ... In general, the Security Service with its activities - it was the blackest page in the history of those years ... The security service was organized in the German manner. Most of the SB commanders were former cadets of the German police in Zakopane (from 1939-40). They were predominantly Galicians.

* There wc, cc. 144.145

“The order came to destroy the entire unconvinced element, and now the persecution of everyone who seemed suspicious to one or another stanitsa began. The prosecutors were the Bandera stanitsa, and no one else. That is, the liquidation of "enemies" was carried out exclusively on the basis of the party principle ... Stanichny cooked up a list of "suspicious" and passed on to the Security Council ... those marked with crosses should be liquidated ... But the most terrible tragedy broke out with the prisoners of the Red Army, who lived and worked in thousands of the villages of Volyn ... Bandera came up with such a method. They came to the house at night, took a prisoner and declared that they were Soviet partisans and ordered him to go with them ... they destroyed such ... "

* O. Shylyak: “I am true to them”, for: “Come, dey for freedom”, London, 1989, pp. 398,399

An eyewitness to the events of that time in Volyn, a Ukrainian evangelical pastor, assesses the activities of the OUN-UPA-SB as follows: “It got to the point that people (Ukrainian peasants - V.P.) rejoiced that somewhere nearby the Germans ... defeated the rebels (UPA - B.P.). Bandera, in addition, collected tribute from the population ... 3a any resistance of the peasants was punished by the Security Council, which was now the same horror as the NKVD or the Gestapo once were.”

* Mikhaylo Podvornyak: "Biter z Bolini", Binnipeg, 1981, p. 305

In the period after the liberation of Western Ukraine by the Soviet Army, the OUN put the population of that region in a hopeless situation: on the one hand, the legal Soviet authorities conscripted men into the army, on the other hand, the UPA prohibited them from joining the Soviet Army under pain of death. Many cases are known when the UPA-SB brutally destroyed conscripts and their families - parents, brothers, sisters.

* Center. apxi in Min. defend the CPCP, f. 134, op. 172182, n. 12, ll. 70-85

Under the conditions of the OUN-UPA-SB terror, the population of Western Ukraine could not, without risking their lives, help the UPA, at least in the form of a glass of water or milk, and, on the other hand, the reigning Stalinist terror applied cruel repressions for such actions in the form of deprivation freedom, exile to Siberia, deportations.

A woman of Belarusian-Lithuanian origin witnessed how a deserter from the UPA, who “did not know how to kill”, was seized by the Security Council, tortured, broke his arms and legs, cut off his tongue, cut off his ears and nose, and finally killed him. This Ukrainian was 18 years old.

OUN - UPA against Ukrainians:

According to the summary data of the Soviet archives, for 1944-1956, as a result of the actions of the UPA and the armed underground of the OUN, the following died: 2 deputies of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR, 1 head of the regional executive committee, 40 heads of city and district executive committees, 1454 heads of rural and settlement councils, 1235 other Soviet workers , 5 secretaries of city and 30 regional committees of the Communist Party of the Ukrainian SSR, 216 other workers of party bodies, 205 Komsomol workers, 314 heads of collective farms, 676 workers, 1931 intellectuals including 50 priests, 15,355 peasants and collective farmers, children of the elderly, housewives - 860.

During the occupation of the territory of the SRSR, the Nazis constantly resorted to various kinds of torture. All torture was allowed at the state level. The law also constantly increased repression against representatives of a non-Aryan nation - torture had an ideological basis.

Prisoners of war and partisans, as well as women, were subjected to the most cruel torture. An example of the inhuman torture of women by the Nazis is the actions that the Germans used against the captured underground worker Anela Chulitskaya.

The Nazis locked this girl every morning in a cell, where she was subjected to monstrous beatings. The rest of the prisoners heard her screams, which tore apart the soul. Anel was already being taken out when she lost consciousness and thrown like garbage into a common cell. The rest of the captive women tried to alleviate her pain with compresses. Anel told the prisoners that she was hung from the ceiling, pieces of skin and muscles were cut out, beaten, raped, bones were broken and water was injected under the skin.

In the end, Anel Chulitskaya was killed, the last time her body was seen mutilated almost beyond recognition, her hands were cut off. Her body hung on one of the walls of the corridor for a long time, as a reminder and a warning.

The Germans even resorted to torture for singing in their cells. So Tamara Rusova was beaten because she sang songs in Russian.

Quite often, not only the Gestapo and the military resorted to torture. Captured women were also tortured by German women. There is information that refers to Tanya and Olga Karpinsky, who were mutilated beyond recognition by a certain Frau Boss.

Fascist torture was varied, and each of them was more inhumane than the other. Often women were not allowed to sleep for several days, even weeks. They were deprived of water, the women suffered from dehydration, and the Germans forced them to drink very salty water.

Women were very often underground, and the struggle against such actions was severely punished by the Nazis. They always tried to suppress the underground as quickly as possible, and for this they resorted to such cruel measures. Also, women worked in the rear of the Germans, obtained various information.

Basically, torture was carried out by Gestapo soldiers (Third Reich police), as well as SS soldiers (elite fighters personally subordinate to Adolf Hitler). In addition, the so-called "policemen" resorted to torture - collaborators who controlled order in the settlements.

Women suffered more than men, as they succumbed to constant sexual harassment and numerous rapes. Often the rapes were gang rapes. After such bullying, girls were often killed so as not to leave traces. In addition, they were gassed and forced to bury the corpses.

As a conclusion, we can say that fascist torture did not only concern prisoners of war and men in general. The most cruel fascists were precisely to women. Many soldiers of Nazi Germany often raped the female population of the occupied territories. The soldiers were looking for a way to "have fun". Besides, no one could stop the Nazis from doing it.

There is no person in the world today who does not know what a concentration camp is. During the Second World War, these institutions, created to isolate political prisoners, prisoners of war and persons who posed a threat to the state, turned into houses of death and torture. Not many who got there managed to survive in harsh conditions, millions were tortured and died. Years after the end of the most terrible and bloody war in the history of mankind, memories of Nazi concentration camps still cause trembling in the body, horror in the soul and tears in the eyes of people.

What is a concentration camp

Concentration camps are special prisons created during military operations on the territory of the country, according to special legislative documents.

There were few repressed persons in them, the main contingent were representatives of the lower races, according to the Nazis: Slavs, Jews, gypsies and other nations to be exterminated. For this, the concentration camps of the Nazis were equipped with various means, with the help of which people were killed by tens and hundreds.

They were destroyed morally and physically: raped, experimented, burned alive, poisoned in gas chambers. Why and for what was justified by the ideology of the Nazis. Prisoners were considered unworthy to live in the world of the "chosen ones". The chronicle of the Holocaust of those times contains descriptions of thousands of incidents confirming the atrocities.

The truth about them became known from books, documentaries, stories of those who managed to become free, get out of there alive.

The institutions built during the war years were conceived by the Nazis as places of mass extermination, for which they received the true name - death camps. They were equipped with gas chambers, gas chambers, soap factories, crematoria, where hundreds of people could be burned a day, and other similar means for murder and torture.

No less number of people died from exhausting work, hunger, cold, punishment for the slightest disobedience and medical experiments.

living conditions

For many people who passed the "road of death" beyond the walls of the concentration camps, there was no turning back. Upon arrival at the place of detention, they were examined and “sorted”: children, the elderly, the disabled, the wounded, the mentally retarded, and Jews were immediately destroyed. Further, people "fit" for work were divided into male and female barracks.

Most of the buildings were built in haste, often they did not have a foundation or were converted from sheds, stables, warehouses. They put bunks in them, in the middle of a huge room there was one stove for heating in winter, there were no latrines. But there were rats.

The roll call, held at any time of the year, was considered a severe test. People had to stand for hours in the rain, snow, hail, and then return to cold, barely heated rooms. Not surprisingly, many died from infectious and respiratory diseases, inflammation.

Each registered prisoner had a serial number on his chest (in Auschwitz he was beaten out with a tattoo) and a stripe on the camp uniform indicating the “article” under which he was imprisoned in the camp. A similar winkel (colored triangle) was sewn on the left side of the chest and the right knee of the trouser leg.

The colors were distributed like this:

• red - political prisoner;
• green - convicted of a criminal offense;
• black - dangerous, dissident persons;
• pink - persons with non-traditional sexual orientation;
• brown - gypsies.

The Jews, if they were left alive, wore a yellow winkel and a hexagonal "Star of David". If the prisoner was recognized as a "racial defiler", a black border was sewn around the triangle. Runners wore a red and white target on their chest and back. The latter were expected to be shot at just one glance in the direction of the gate or wall.

Executions were carried out daily. Prisoners were shot, hanged, beaten with whips for the slightest disobedience to the guards. Gas chambers, whose principle of operation was the simultaneous destruction of several dozen people, worked around the clock in many concentration camps. The captives who helped remove the corpses of the strangled were also rarely left alive.

Gas chamber

The prisoners were also mocked morally, erasing their human dignity under conditions in which they ceased to feel like members of society and just people.

What fed

In the first years of the existence of concentration camps, the food provided to political prisoners, traitors to the motherland and "dangerous elements" was quite high in calories. The Nazis understood that prisoners should have the strength to work, and at that time many branches of the economy were based on their work.

The situation changed in 1942-43, when the bulk of the prisoners were Slavs. If the diet of the German repressed was 700 kcal per day, the Poles and Russians did not receive even 500 kcal.

The diet consisted of:

• liters per day of an herbal drink called "coffee";
• soup on water without fat, the basis of which was vegetables (mostly rotten) - 1 liter;
• bread (stale, moldy);
• sausages (approximately 30 grams);
• fat (margarine, lard, cheese) - 30 grams.

The Germans could count on sweets: jam or jam, potatoes, cottage cheese and even fresh meat. They received special rations that included cigarettes, sugar, goulash, dry broth, and more.

Beginning in 1943, when a turning point occurred in the Great Patriotic War and Soviet troops liberated the countries of Europe from the German invaders, concentration camp prisoners were massacred in order to hide the traces of crimes. Since that time, in many camps, the already meager rations have been cut, and in some institutions people have stopped being fed altogether.

The most terrible torture and experiments in the history of mankind

Concentration camps will forever remain in the history of mankind as places where the Gestapo carried out the most terrible torture and medical experiments.

The task of the latter was considered to be "assistance to the army": doctors determined the boundaries of human capabilities, created new types of weapons, drugs that could help the soldiers of the Reich.

Almost 70% of the experimental subjects did not survive after such executions, almost all were incapacitated or crippled.

over women

One of the main goals of the SS was to cleanse the world of a non-Aryan nation. To do this, experiments were carried out on women in the camps to find the easiest and cheapest method of sterilization.

Representatives of the weaker sex were injected with special chemical solutions into the uterus and fallopian tubes, designed to block the work of the reproductive system. Most of the test subjects died after such a procedure, the rest were killed in order to examine the state of the genital organs during the autopsy.

Often women were turned into sex slaves, forced to work in brothels and brothels organized at the camps. Most of them left the establishments dead, having not survived not only a huge number of "clients", but also monstrous mockery of themselves.

over the children

The purpose of these experiments was to create a superior race. Thus, children with mental disabilities and genetic diseases were subjected to forcible killing (euthanasia) so that they would not be able to further reproduce “inferior” offspring.

Other children were placed in special "nurseries", where they were brought up at home and in harsh patriotic moods. Periodically, they were exposed to ultraviolet rays so that the hair acquired a light shade.

One of the most famous and monstrous experiments on children are those carried out on twins, representing an inferior race. They tried to change the color of their eyes, making injections of drugs, after which they died of pain or remained blind.

There were attempts to artificially create Siamese twins, that is, to sew children together, to transplant parts of each other's bodies into them. There are records of the introduction of viruses and infections to one of the twins and further study of the condition of both. If one of the couple died, the second was also killed in order to compare the state of internal organs and systems.

Children born in the camp were also subjected to strict selection, almost 90% of them were killed immediately or sent for experiments. Those who managed to survive were brought up and "Germanized".

over men

The representatives of the stronger sex were subjected to the most cruel and terrible tortures and experiments. To create and test drugs that improve blood clotting, which were needed by the military at the front, gunshot wounds were inflicted on men, after which observations were made about the rate at which bleeding stopped.

The tests included the study of the action of sulfonamides - antimicrobial substances designed to prevent the development of blood poisoning in frontline conditions. For this, parts of the body were injured and bacteria, fragments, earth were injected into the incisions, and then the wounds were sewn up. Another type of experiment is the ligation of veins and arteries on both sides of the wound being inflicted.

Means for recovery after chemical burns were created and tested. Men were doused with a composition identical to that found in phosphorus bombs or mustard gas, which at that time was poisoned by enemy "criminals" and the civilian population of cities during the occupation.

An important role in experiments with drugs was played by attempts to create vaccines against malaria and typhus. The test subjects were injected with the infection, and then - trial formulations to neutralize it. Some prisoners were given no immune protection at all, and they died in terrible agony.

To study the ability of the human body to withstand low temperatures and recover from significant hypothermia, men were placed in ice baths or driven naked into the cold outside. If after such torture the prisoner had signs of life, he was subjected to a resuscitation procedure, after which few managed to recover.

The main resurrection measures: irradiation with ultraviolet lamps, having sex, introducing boiling water into the body, placing in a bath with warm water.

In some concentration camps, attempts were made to turn sea water into drinking water. It was processed in various ways, and then given to prisoners, observing the reaction of the body. They also experimented with poisons, adding them to food and drinks.

One of the most terrible experiences are attempts to regenerate bone and nerve tissue. In the process of research, joints and bones were broken, observing their fusion, nerve fibers were removed, and the joints were changed in places.

Almost 80% of the participants in the experiments died during the experiments from unbearable pain or blood loss. The rest were killed in order to study the results of the study "from the inside." Few survived such abuses.

List and description of death camps

Concentration camps existed in many countries of the world, including the USSR, and were intended for a narrow circle of prisoners. However, only the Nazis received the name "death camps" for the atrocities carried out in them after Adolf Hitler came to power and the beginning of the Second World War.

Buchenwald

Located in the vicinity of the German city of Weimar, this camp, founded in 1937, has become one of the most famous and largest such establishments. It consisted of 66 branches, where prisoners worked for the benefit of the Reich.

Over the years of its existence, about 240 thousand people visited its barracks, of which 56 thousand prisoners officially died from murder and torture, among whom were representatives of 18 nations. How many there were in fact is not known for certain.

Buchenwald was liberated on April 10, 1945. A memorial complex in memory of its victims and heroes-liberators was created on the site of the camp.

Auschwitz

In Germany it is better known as Auschwitz or Auschwitz-Birkenau. It was a complex that occupied a vast territory near the Polish Krakow. The concentration camp consisted of 3 main parts: a large administrative complex, the camp itself, where prisoners were tortured and massacred, and a group of 45 small complexes with factories and work areas.

The victims of Auschwitz, according to official figures alone, were more than 4 million people, representatives of the "inferior races", according to the Nazis.

The “death camp” was liberated on January 27, 1945 by the troops of the Soviet Union. Two years later, the State Museum was opened on the territory of the main complex.

It presents expositions of things that belonged to prisoners: toys that they made from wood, pictures, and other handicrafts that are exchanged for food from civilians passing by. Stylized scenes of interrogation and torture by the Gestapo, reflecting the violence of the Nazis.

The drawings and inscriptions on the walls of the barracks, made by prisoners doomed to death, remained unchanged. As the Poles themselves say today, Auschwitz is the bloodiest and most terrible point on the map of their homeland.

Sobibor

Another concentration camp in Poland, established in May 1942. The prisoners were mostly representatives of the Jewish nation, the number of those killed is about 250 thousand people.

One of the few institutions where the uprising of prisoners took place in October 1943, after which it was closed and wiped off the face of the earth.

Majdanek

The camp was founded in 1941, it was built in the suburbs of Lublin, Poland. It had 5 branches in the southeastern part of the country.

Over the years of its existence, about 1.5 million people of different nationalities died in its cells.

The surviving captives were released on July 23, 1944 by Soviet soldiers, and 2 years later a museum and research institutes were opened on its territory.

Salaspils

The camp, known as Kurtengorf, was built in October 1941 on the territory of Latvia, not far from Riga. Had several branches, the most famous - Ponary. The main prisoners were children who were subjected to medical experiments.

In recent years, prisoners have been used as blood donors for wounded German soldiers. The camp was burnt down in August 1944 by the Germans, who were forced to evacuate the remaining prisoners to other institutions under the offensive of the Soviet troops.

Ravensbrück

Built in 1938 near Fürstenberg. Before the start of the war of 1941-1945, it was exclusively female, it consisted mainly of partisans. After 1941, it was completed, after which it received a men's barracks and a children's barracks for underage girls.

Over the years of "work", the number of his captives amounted to more than 132 thousand of the fairer sex of different ages, of which almost 93 thousand died. The liberation of the prisoners took place on April 30, 1945 by the Soviet troops.

Mauthausen

Austrian concentration camp built in July 1938. At first it was one of the major branches of Dachau, the first such institution in Germany, located near Munich. But since 1939 it has been functioning independently.

In 1940, it merged with the Gusen death camp, after which it became one of the largest concentration settlements in Nazi Germany.

During the war years, there were about 335 thousand natives of 15 European countries, 122 thousand of whom were brutally tortured and killed. The prisoners were released by the Americans, who entered the camp on May 5, 1945. A few years later, 12 states created a memorial museum here, erected monuments to the victims of Nazism.

Irma Grese - Nazi warden

The horrors of the concentration camps imprinted in the memory of people and the annals of history the names of individuals who can hardly be called people. One of them is Irma Grese, a young and beautiful German woman whose actions do not fit into the nature of human actions.

Today, many historians and psychiatrists are trying to explain her phenomenon by the suicide of her mother or the propaganda of fascism and Nazism, characteristic of that time, but it is impossible or difficult to find justification for her actions.

Already at the age of 15, the young girl was present in the Hitler Youth movement, a German youth organization whose main principle was racial purity. At the age of 20 in 1942, having changed several professions, Irma became a member of one of the auxiliary units of the SS. Her first place of work was the Ravensbrück concentration camp, which was later replaced by Auschwitz, where she acted as the second person after the commandant.

The bullying of the "Blond Devil", as the prisoners called Grese, was felt by thousands of captive women and men. This "Beautiful Monster" destroyed people not only physically, but also morally. She beat a prisoner to death with a wicker whip that she carried with her, enjoyed shooting prisoners. One of the favorite entertainments of the "Angel of Death" was setting dogs on captives, which were previously starved for several days.

The last place of service of Irma Grese was Bergen-Belsen, where, after his release, she was captured by the British military. The tribunal lasted 2 months, the verdict was unequivocal: "Guilty, subject to execution by hanging."

The iron rod, or maybe ostentatious bravado, was also present in the woman on the last night of her life - she sang songs and laughed out loud until the morning, which, according to psychologists, hid fear and hysteria before the impending death - too easy and simple for her.

Josef Mengele - experiments on people

The name of this man still causes horror among people, since it was he who came up with the most painful and terrible experiments on the human body and psyche.

Only according to official data, tens of thousands of prisoners became its victims. He personally sorted the victims upon arrival at the camp, then they were awaited by a thorough medical examination and terrible experiments.

The “Angel of Death from Auschwitz” managed to avoid a fair trial and imprisonment during the liberation of European countries from the Nazis. For a long time he lived in Latin America, carefully hiding from his pursuers and avoiding capture.

On the conscience of this doctor, anatomical autopsy of live newborns and castration of boys without the use of anesthesia, experiments on twins, dwarfs. There is evidence of how women were tortured by sterilization using x-rays. He assessed the endurance of the human body when exposed to an electric current.

Unfortunately for many prisoners of war, Josef Mengele still managed to avoid a fair punishment. After 35 years of living under false names, constantly escaping from pursuers, he drowned in the ocean, losing control of his body as a result of a stroke. The worst thing is that until the end of his life he was firmly convinced that "in his whole life he did not harm anyone personally."

Concentration camps were present in many countries of the world. The most famous for the Soviet people was the Gulag, created in the early years of the Bolsheviks coming to power. In total there were more than a hundred of them and, according to the NKVD, in 1922 alone there were more than 60 thousand “dissenters” and “dangerous to the authorities” prisoners.

But only the Nazis made it so that the word "concentration camp" went down in history as a place where they massively torture and exterminate the population. A place of bullying and humiliation committed by people against humanity.

1. Irma Grese

Irma Grese - (October 7, 1923 - December 13, 1945) - overseer of the Nazi death camps Ravensbrück, Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen.

Among the nicknames of Irma were "Blond-haired devil", "Angel of death", "Beautiful monster". She used emotional and physical methods to torture prisoners, bludgeoned women to death, and reveled in the arbitrary shooting of prisoners. She starved her dogs to set them on her victims, and personally selected hundreds of people to be sent to the gas chambers. Grese wore heavy boots, and in addition to a pistol, she always had a wicker whip.

In the Western post-war press, the possible sexual deviations of Irma Grese, her numerous connections with the SS guards, with the commandant of Bergen-Belsen, Josef Kramer (“Belsen Beast”) were constantly discussed.

On April 17, 1945, she was taken prisoner by the British. The Belsen trial, initiated by a British military tribunal, lasted from September 17 to November 17, 1945. Together with Irma Grese, the cases of other camp workers were considered at this trial - commandant Josef Kramer, warden Joanna Bormann, nurse Elisabeth Volkenrath. Irma Grese was found guilty and sentenced to hang.

On the last night before her execution, Grese laughed and sang along with her colleague Elisabeth Volkenrath. Even when a noose was thrown around Irma Grese's neck, her face remained calm. Her last word was "Faster", addressed to the English executioner.

2. Ilsa Koch

Ilse Koch - (September 22, 1906 - September 1, 1967) - German NSDAP activist, wife of Karl Koch, commandant of the Buchenwald and Majdanek concentration camps. Best known under a pseudonym as "Frau Lampshade" Received the nickname "Buchenwald Witch" for the brutal torture of camp prisoners. Koch was also accused of making souvenirs from human skin (however, no reliable evidence of this was presented at the post-war trial of Ilse Koch).

On June 30, 1945, Koch was arrested by American troops and in 1947 sentenced to life imprisonment. However, a few years later, the American General Lucius Clay, the military commander of the American occupation zone in Germany, released her, considering the charges of issuing execution orders and making souvenirs from human skin insufficiently proven.

This decision caused a protest from the public, so in 1951 Ilse Koch was arrested in West Germany. A German court again sentenced her to life imprisonment.

On September 1, 1967, Koch committed suicide by hanging herself in a cell in the Bavarian Eibach prison.

3. Louise Dantz

Louise Danz - b. December 11, 1917 - overseer of women's concentration camps. She was sentenced to life imprisonment, but later released.

She began working in the Ravensbrück concentration camp, then she was transferred to Majdanek. Danz later served in Auschwitz and Malchow.

Prisoners later said that they were subjected to ill-treatment by Danz. She beat them, confiscated their winter clothes. In Malchow, where Danz had the position of senior warden, she starved the prisoners without giving food for 3 days. On April 2, 1945, she killed an underage girl.

Danz was arrested on 1 June 1945 in Lützow. At the trial of the Supreme National Tribunal, which lasted from November 24, 1947 to December 22, 1947, she was sentenced to life imprisonment. Released in 1956 for health reasons (!!!). In 1996, she was charged with the aforementioned murder of a child, but it was dropped after doctors said that Danz would be too hard to endure a re-imprisonment. She lives in Germany. Now she is 94 years old.

4. Jenny-Wanda Barkmann

Jenny-Wanda Barkmann - (May 30, 1922 - July 4, 1946) Between 1940 and December 1943 she worked as a fashion model. In January 1944, she became a warden at the small Stutthof concentration camp, where she became famous for brutally beating female prisoners, some of whom she beat to death. She also participated in the selection of women and children for the gas chambers. She was so cruel, but also very beautiful, that the female prisoners called her "Beautiful Ghost".

Jenny fled the camp in 1945 when Soviet troops began to approach the camp. But she was caught and arrested in May 1945 while trying to leave the train station in Gdansk. She is said to have flirted with the policemen guarding her and was not particularly worried about her fate. Jenny-Wanda Barkmann was found guilty, after which she was given the last word. She stated, "Life is indeed a great pleasure, and the pleasure is usually short-lived."

Jenny-Wanda Barkmann was publicly hanged on Biskupska Gorka near Gdansk on July 4, 1946. She was only 24 years old. Her body was burned, and the ashes were publicly washed away in the closet of the house where she was born.

5. Hertha Gertrude Bothe

Hertha Gertrud Bothe - (January 8, 1921 - March 16, 2000) - overseer of women's concentration camps. She was arrested on charges of war crimes, but later released.

In 1942 she received an invitation to work as a warden in the Ravensbrück concentration camp. After four weeks of preliminary training, Bothe was sent to Stutthof, a concentration camp near the city of Gdańsk. In it, Bothe was nicknamed "The Sadist of Stutthof" because of her mistreatment of female prisoners.

In July 1944 she was sent by Gerda Steinhoff to the Bromberg-Ost concentration camp. From January 21, 1945, Bothe was a warden during the death march of prisoners, which took place from central Poland to the Bergen-Belsen camp. The march ended on February 20-26, 1945. In Bergen-Belsen, Bothe led a group of women, consisting of 60 people and engaged in the production of wood.

After the camp was liberated, she was arrested. At the Belzensky court, she was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Released earlier than the specified date on December 22, 1951. She died on March 16, 2000 in Huntsville, USA.

6. Maria Mandel

Maria Mandel (1912-1948) - Nazi war criminal. Occupying the post of head of the women's camps of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in the period 1942-1944, she is directly responsible for the death of about 500 thousand female prisoners.

Colleagues in the service described Mandel as an "extremely intelligent and dedicated" person. The Auschwitz prisoners among themselves called her a monster. Mandel personally selected prisoners, and sent them to the gas chambers by the thousands. There are cases when Mandel personally took several prisoners under her protection for a while, and when they bored her, she put them on the lists for destruction. Also, it was Mandel who came up with the idea and the creation of a women's camp orchestra, which met new prisoners at the gates with cheerful music. According to the recollections of the survivors, Mandel was a music lover and treated the musicians from the orchestra well, she personally came to their barracks with a request to play something.

In 1944, Mandel was transferred to the post of head of the Muldorf concentration camp, one of the parts of the Dachau concentration camp, where she served until the end of the war with Germany. In May 1945, she fled to the mountains near her hometown, Münzkirchen. On August 10, 1945, Mandel was arrested by American troops. In November 1946, as a war criminal, she was handed over to the Polish authorities at their request. Mandel was one of the main defendants in the trial of Auschwitz workers, which took place in November-December 1947. The court sentenced her to death by hanging. The sentence was carried out on January 24, 1948 in a Krakow prison.

7. Hildegard Neumann

Hildegard Neumann (May 4, 1919, Czechoslovakia - ?) - senior warden in the Ravensbrück and Theresienstadt concentration camps, began her service in the Ravensbrück concentration camp in October 1944, immediately becoming chief warder. Due to good work, she was transferred to the Theresienstadt concentration camp as the head of all camp guards. Beauty Hildegard, according to the prisoners, was cruel and merciless towards them.

She supervised between 10 and 30 female police officers and over 20,000 female Jewish prisoners. Neumann also facilitated the deportation of more than 40,000 women and children from Theresienstadt to the death camps of Auschwitz (Auschwitz) and Bergen-Belsen, where most of them were killed. Researchers estimate that more than 100,000 Jews were deported from the Theresienstadt camp and were killed or died in Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, and another 55,000 died in Theresienstadt itself.

Neumann left the camp in May 1945 and was not prosecuted for war crimes. Hildegard Neumann's subsequent fate is unknown.