Page 28 - Jewish News_January 2020

28A January 2020 JEWISH INTEREST

A tale of two Januaries

By Paul R. Bartrop, PhD
his month marks 80 years since ment. The town of Auschwitz seemed ability of a railroad junction and raw oversee the camp’s liquidation. On No-
the establishment of the Nazi the ideal location, though it had its ob- material, along with the chance to ex- vember 26, 1944, when delay threatened
Tconcentration (later, extermina- jectionable side. Surrounded by open ploit slave labor, added to its allure. An and the Soviets drew nearer, Himmler
tion) camp at Auschwitz in 1940. It is swampy moorland, it remained muddy arrangement was made between I.G. issued another order concerning the
also the 75 anniversary of the camp’s for most of the year, it was unhealthy Farben and the SS, whereby the lat- destruction of Auschwitz.
th
liberation in 1945. and malaria-infested, and in winter it ter would provide the slave labor and After considerable administrative
In 1939, with the outbreak of war, turned bitterly cold. Severe winds swept I.G. Farben would pay for the use of difficulties, the complete evacuation of
the German Inspectorate of Concentra- down from the north, unimpeded by any the workers. At the same time, SS chief the complex was ordered for January
tion Camps was authorized to examine natural obstacles on the Polish plain. It Heinrich Himmler ordered the camp 17, 1945. The next day, some 22,000
the possibility of set- was flat, cold, wet, muddy, cheerless system expanded to accommodate over men and women left the camp, and
ting up new camps. and colorless. There seemed little to rec- 100,000 additional inmates. the day after that, a further 3,500 were
One of the first of ommend the area surrounding the little The camp would eventually be- evacuated. They were about all that was
these, located in Silesian town. come a vast complex covering 15 left of a camp complex which at one
southwestern Poland Despite this, on May 4, 1940, the square miles, in which the SS, capital- time could boast a population of pos-
near the confluence first commandant, Rudolf Franz Hoess, izing on the use of slave labor, made a sibly 200,000. The earliest date of free
of the Vistula and began his task of constructing the new fortune as a result. contact with Soviet forces was January
Soła Rivers, was to camp. Employing prisoners from other Auschwitz, together with five oth- 22, 1945. When the camp was formally
Dr. Paul Bartrop be built just outside camps as slave labor, the compound was er camps located by the Germans in occupied two days later, there were only
the town of Oświęcim. In German the soon built. It received its initial batch of Poland (Bełzec, Chełmno, Majdanek, 2,819 survivors left at Auschwitz.
name was Auschwitz. This was initially permanent inmates on July 14, 1940. Sobibór and Treblinka) altered the na- The prisoners had been evacuated
to be a camp for Polish POWs. Understanding the history of Aus- ture and course of concentration camp in the face of Soviet progress. The Rus-
Auschwitz would ultimately serve chwitz is a complex challenge. Initially development. These were the Vernich- sians were so close while the prisoners
as one of the epicenters of the Holo- it was established as a camp for Polish tungslager, the death (or extermina- were marching away that the sounds of
caust, with more Jews murdered there soldiers and political prisoners. Later, tion) camps. battle could be clearly distinguished.
during the war than in any other loca- Soviet POWs were included, while Because of their existence, the im- The survivors suffered terribly during
tion. Since the victims came from every Jews were added increasingly from age of the Nazi concentration camps the forced marches that took them to-
part of Europe, and because Auschwitz mid-1941 onwards. was irrevocably transformed, such that ward the west, and countless numbers
operated longer than any other exter- Further, there was not a single Aus- all camps are now viewed as elaborate perished. Discussion of these Death
mination camp, it has come to symbol- chwitz, but rather three main camps – and gigantic factories created for the Marches opens a new dimension relat-
ize the horror of the Holocaust overall. Auschwitz I, Auschwitz II (Birkenau) purpose of destroying human lives. ing to the story, however, and will await
It was on January 25, 1940, that the and Auschwitz III (Monowitz) – along The extermination camps were in- another column at a different time.
SS decided to construct a camp near with approximately 50 satellite camps stitutions designed to methodically and The name Auschwitz evokes many
Oświęcim. Then, on February 21, 1940, located over a wide geographical re- efficiently murder millions of people, things. What is often overlooked, how-
the Inspector of Concentration Camps, gion. specifically Jews. These mass murders ever, are the bookend dates – January
Richard Glücks, reported to Heinrich In the winter of 1940-1941, Ger- took place in specially designed gas 1940 and January 1945 – that separate
Himmler that a group of “former Pol- man industrial conglomerate I.G. Far- chambers. At Auschwitz, they employed what happened in the middle. Simulta-
ish artillery barracks” had been found ben chose Auschwitz as the site for the crystallized hydrogen cyanide, which on neously the world’s largest murder site
that were suitable for further develop- construction of a new plant. The avail- contact with air, oxidized to become hy- and cemetery, the phenomenon of Aus-
drocyanic (or prussic) acid gas, manu- chwitz had to begin somewhere. Fortu-
DIANE LAWSON, CCIM factured under the trade name Zyklon B. nately, after a herculean effort, it also
ended, 75 years ago this month.
January 1940 therefore had a lot to
COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE SERVICES answer for. But as the war progressed, Dr. Paul Bartrop is Professor of His-
tory and the Dir. of the Center for Ju-
and Soviet armies advanced toward
 Part of only 6% of brokers who Germany throughout the latter half of daic, Holocaust, and Genocide Studies
have earned their CCIM 1944, the position of Auschwitz seemed at Florida Gulf Coast University. He
uncertain. In September 1944, Hein-
can be reached at pbartrop@fgcu.edu.
designation rich Himmler ordered Rudolf Hoess to

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