Buchenwald

SS IDENTIFIES SITE FOR BUCHENWALD CAMP May 5, 1937 SS Colonel Theodor Eicke, Inspector of Concentration Camps, notifies state officials in Thuringia, Germany that the land the SS has acquired on the Ettersberg, a mountain near Weimar in central Germany, will be used for the construction of a concentration camp, later called Buchenwald, accommodating 8,000 prisoners. CONSTRUCTION OF BUCHENWALD BEGINS July 16, 1937 The SS begins the construction of Buchenwald. The first prisoners, about 150 prisoners transferred from other camps, arrive on the Ettersberg, northwest of Weimar, Germany, and begin clearing trees and building barracks for the new concentration camp. SS INTERNS FIRST JEWISH PRISONERS November 9, 1938 The first of over 10,000 Jewish men arrive at Buchenwald. Gestapo authorities ordered the mass arrest of Jews in the aftermath of Kristallnacht, the nationwide pogrom against Jews in Germany. The SS holds them in five barn-like barracks in the camp for Jews, a special enclosed segment of the camp at Buchenwald. In the first weeks, more than 200 die from beatings and the primitive conditions in the camp. The SS releases only those Jews who can document their imminent emigration from Germany. The SS will close the special camp for Jews at Buchenwald in mid-February 1939 because of an outbreak of typhus. POLISH PRISONERS SENT TO BUCHENWALD October 15, 1939 Shortly after the surrender of Poland, the first group of prisoners from German-occupied Poland arrives in Buchenwald. More than 2,000 Poles arrive in this transport over the next two days. In the aftermath of the invasion of Poland, German authorities deport almost 5,000 Poles to Buchenwald. SOVIET POWS SHOT IN CAMP September 16, 1941 The SS shoots 300 Soviet officers on the SS rifle range outside the Buchenwald concentration camp. By the end of 1942, SS forces shoot more than 8,000 Soviet prisoners of war in Buchenwald, most of them in a stable outside the prisoner compound. Hitler authorized the summary killing of captured Soviet political and military officers even before the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, in violation of all conventions regarding the proper treatment of prisoners of war. MEDICAL EXPERIMENTS CONDUCTED ON PRISONERS January 5, 1942 On behalf of the Health Institute of the Waffen-SS, SS doctor Erwin Ding-Schuler begins using prisoners at Buchenwald to test vaccines for the treatment of typhus. The experiments will continue until early 1945, taking the lives of hundreds of prisoners. SS doctors at Buchenwald initiated a broad program of involuntary medical experiments on prisoners in barracks 46 in the northern part of the main camp. CONSTRUCTION OF RAIL LINE March 18, 1943 Heinrich Himmler, SS leader and chief of German police, orders the construction of a rail line from Buchenwald to the city of Weimar. Prisoners labor 12 hours a day seven days a week for three months to complete the 10-mile segment. Trains first use the new rail line in late June 1943. The rail line to Weimar will facilitate the transfer of prisoners as well as their use as forced laborers in German armaments production at Buchenwald. FRENCH PRISONERS SENT TO CAMP May 21, 1943 Fifty French prisoners from the concentration camp at Compiegne, France, arrive at Buchenwald. German authorities in France retaliated against increasing French resistance to German occupation with the arrest and deportation of French workers to camps in Germany. More than 20,000 French workers will be deported to Buchenwald by early February 1945. WARSAW POLES SENT TO BUCHENWALD August 13, 1944 In the wake of the Polish uprising in Warsaw, Poland, more than 2,500 Poles arrive in Buchenwald. German forces defeat the uprising in early October. In retaliation for the uprising, the Germans expel most of the Polish population from Warsaw. They will deport about 65,000 Poles to concentration camps in Germany, nearly 5,000 of them to Buchenwald. GERMAN COMMUNIST LEADER EXECUTED August 18, 1944 Gestapo officers transfer Ernst Thaelmann from a jail in Bautzen, Germany, to the crematorium building at Buchenwald and shoot him. Hitler personally ordered the execution four days earlier. Thaelmann, the head of the German Communist Party before the Nazi rise to power in 1933, had spent almost 12 years in confinement. ALLIED AIR RAIDS OVER BUCHENWALD August 24, 1944 Allied air forces bomb Buchenwald, destroying the rail station, the Gustloff II Armament Factory, and the German Armament Works at Buchenwald. The SS holds many prisoners at their forced-labor assignments during the bombing. More than 300 prisoners die and almost 1,500 are wounded in the attack. Allied planes destroy all arms production facilities in Buchenwald. SS REPORTS ON CAMP PRISONER POPULATION January 15, 1945 SS camp officials report that there are 110,556 prisoners in the Buchenwald concentration camp, including 26,650 women. The Buchenwald camp system included more than 100 subcamps located across central Germany. Prisoners worked mostly in armaments factories, stone quarries, and construction projects. SS FORCES PRISONERS ON DEATH MARCH April 7, 1945 The SS forces almost 5,000 prisoners on a death march toward the Flossenbürg camp in eastern Germany and 4,500 prisoners on a death march toward the Dachau camp in southern Germany. Members of the SS kill any prisoner who cannot keep up. The International Camp Committee, leading the prisoner resistance organization in Buchenwald, determines to hinder SS plans to evacuate the camp. PRISONERS COMMUNICATE WITH ALLIED FORCES April 8, 1945 A transmitter built secretly by prisoners in Buchenwald begins broadcasting to approaching American forces. In both English and German, the prisoners plead for immediate aid in the face of SS plans to liquidate the camp. American forces acknowledge the message and continue their advance toward Buchenwald. Later in the day heavily armed SS forces enter Buchenwald. They seize almost 10,000 prisoners, half of whom they send immediately on a death march toward Weimar. They hold the other half on the grounds of the German Armament Works in preparation for the next death march. DEATH MARCH TOWARD DACHAU April 9, 1945 The SS forces almost 5,000 prisoners held on the grounds of the German Armament Works at Buchenwald on a death march towards the Dachau concentration camp in southern Germany. Members of the SS kill any prisoner who cannot keep up. On April 27 the survivors, about half of the original column, arrive at Dachau. In all the SS evacuated almost 30,000 prisoners as American forces approached the Buchenwald concentration camp. LIBERATION OF BUCHENWALD April 11, 1945 Prisoners in Buchenwald revolt to prevent the final evacuation of the camp. They storm the watchtowers, seize control of the camp, and take 150 Germans prisoner. Later that afternoon, American forces reach the camp. More than 20,000 prisoners remained in the camp at liberation. More than 250,000 prisoners had passed through the camp since its establishment in 1937; of these, more than 50,000 died.