Consequences and Repercussions of

the Liberation of Nazi Death Camps

Daniel Janzen

 On May 8, 1945 World War II ended in Europe. At

war's end there were about 10 million people in the
Nazi labor and concentration camps, forced labor
units, and prisoner of war camps.
Among the huge number of newly liberated people
who sought to return to their homes, there were
only about 200,000 surviving Jews (from a
population of about 6 1/2 million), who had neither
homes nor countries to return to.

Pre-Context

 In January 1945, as the Soviet army entered Krakow, the

Germans ordered that Auschwitz be abandoned. Before
the end of the month, in what came to be known as the
Auschwitz death marches, an estimated 60,000
detainees, accompanied by Nazi guards, departed the
camp and were forced to march to the Polish towns of
Gliwice or Wodzislaw, some 30 miles away.
Countless prisoners died during this process; those who
made it to the sites were sent on trains to concentration
camps in Germany.

Death Marches

 They found 60,000 prisoners. Many were dying

and thousands of bodies lay unburied. The
liberators were unprepared for the situation, but
tried to help the survivors. Despite this 14,000
people died in the first weeks of liberation. Many
died from disease.

Inside the Camps

 Sanitation was incredibly inadequate, with few

latrines and water faucets for the tens of thousands
of prisoners interned in Bergen-Belsen at this time.
Overcrowding, poor sanitary conditions, and the
lack of adequate food, water, and shelter led to an
outbreak of diseases such as typhus, tuberculosis,
typhoid fever, and dysentery, causing an ever
increasing number of deaths.

Diseases

 It is sobering that, despite all these efforts, 13,000 Belsen

inmates died after liberation. Some inmates had been
starved for so long that they had lost the ability to digest
the rations that well-meaning British soldiers offered
them; within minutes of taking a biscuits.

Tragedies

 Another task was to dispose of the 20,000 diseased

bodies, in order to contain the spread of typhus. The
British forces made the surrendered German and
Hungarian SS camp guards carry the corpses into mass
graves that had been dug by British bulldozer teams.
As punishment for their crimes, the camp guards were
prevented from using protective gloves, and consequently
some of them contracted typhus and died.

Cleaning Up Camps

 This method of burial soon proved too slow, and

subsequently the bulldozers simply shoveled the corpses
into the graves.
This apparent lack of the respect for the dead led to
criticism, but it was a necessary expedient. In addition,
Isaac Levy, a Senior British Army Jewish Chaplain, held
a burial service as each mass grave was filled in.

Cleaning (cont.)

 Finally, after all the inmates had left, the British burned
down the camp to prevent the lice rampant in the
installation from spreading the typhus epidemic further.
As a result, much of Belsen's infrastructure was lost to
the world as a potential memorial of man's inhumanity to
man.

Leaving

 http://www.holocaust-trc.org/the-holocaust-education-pro
gram-resource-guide/oh-no-it-cant-be/
https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/mobile/en/article.php?Mod
uleId=10005129
http://www.sandrawilliams.org/HOLOCAUST/holocaust.
html
http://www.theholocaustexplained.org/ks3/survival-andlegacy/liberation-the-survivors/what-did-the-allies-fi
nd/#.VzAJOSNMHqA
http://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/auschwitz
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/liberati
on_camps_01.shtml