Germany. Touring the Nazi’s First Concentration Camp
Opening in 1933, Dachau was the first konzentrationslager (concentration camp) created in Nazi Germany. Its purpose was to imprison Hitler’s political opponents including Social Democrats, communists, and others opposed to the fascist regime. Located in southern Germany’s Bavaria Region and about 16 kilometers northwest of Munich, Dachau was constructed on the site of a former munitions factory. Shortly after opening, the camp was expanded to accommodate Jews, Romani (aka gypsies), Catholic priests, Jehovah’s witnesses, emigrants, and criminals from Germany, Austria, and countries occupied by German forces. Within the Nazi Regime, Dachau served as a model for other concentration camps.
The 300 by 600-meter prison compound was surrounded by an electrically charged barbed-wire fence. Prisoners who entered a three meter-wide “no-man’s-land” inside this perimeter were summarily shot. Adjacent to the prisoner compound was the SS training school barracks and factories staffed by forced labor from the camp. The main compound was separated into two sections, the prisoner area and the crematorium. The prisoner area had 32 barracks buildings including one for clergy and one for medical experiments. The barracks were extremely crowded with up to a thousand persons packed into buildings designed for 250. Built in 1942 and located on the north side of the prisoner compound, the crematorium was used to dispose of the dead.
The camp’s commandant, Theodor Eike, implemented a policy to dehumanize internees that was based on corporal punishment. Prisoners were subject to brutal treatment including the withholding of food, tree or pole hanging, standing at attention for extended periods, and flogging. Prisoners who attempted escape were executed. Estimates suggest that as many as 200,000 were interned at Dachau during the camp’s period of operation from March 1933 to April 1945. The camp had 32,000 recorded deaths, including thousands who were murdered and 15,000 who died during a typhus epidemic in 1944. Thousands also perished in the last few months of the war during forced marches to other concentration camps. Many deaths went unrecorded. The camp was liberated on April 29, 1945 by the U.S. 42nd Rainbow Division. When they arrived, American troops found many prisoners weak beyond the point of recovery. Among the first American journalist to see the camp, Martha Gellhorn wrote, “We are not entirely guiltless, we the Allies, because it took us twelve years to open the gates of Dachau. We were blind and unbelieving and slow, and that we can never be again. We must know now that there can never be peace if there is cruelty like this in the world.” After the war the camp was used to hold SS soldiers awaiting trial and Germans who had been expelled from Eastern European countries. The U.S. tried 42 SS officers in November and December 1945. All were found guilty and 23 were hanged.
We parked our rental car on a street near Dachau’s main entrance. After buying tickets, we passed through the SS guardhouse and political department where new prisoners were photographed and assigned numbers. The political department building was also used to torture prisoners. Above the camp’s main gate are wrought iron letters spelling out the words Arbeit macht frei, meaning “work makes you free.”
On the south side of the compound was the roll call area where assembled prisoners were counted. Nearby were the prisoner baths and the maintenance building where harsh punishments were delivered by SS guards. The camp is well interpreted. Most buildings contained detailed displays in German, English, and other languages. Only two of the original barracks buildings are still standing. One is “sickbay” which was sometimes shown to visitors as evidence of the humane treatment of prisoners. Inside the compound we passed the statue of an extremely thin man atop a marble platform. Created after the war by artist Fritz Koelle, it is dedicated to the unknown concentration camp inmate.
Several buildings have been added to the north part of the compound since the end of World War II including the Catholic Mortal Agony of Christ Chapel, the Protestant Church of Reconciliation, and a Jewish memorial. Just outside the compound is a Russian Orthodox chapel and the Catholic Carmelite Convent of the Precious Blood. We crossed over a bridge to the crematorium, called “Barracks X” during the camp’s period of operation. The crematorium has four furnaces and a morgue. Although there was a gas chamber disguised as a shower, systematic mass killings never took place at Dachau. The crematorium site was used to execute resistance members who were shot or hung. Today, the crematorium is a memorial to the camp’s dead.
