Did you know...

• As Allied troops moved across Europe, they encountered concentration camps, mass graves, and numerous other sites of Nazi crimes. However, the liberation of Nazi camps was not a primary objective of the Allied military campaign.
  
  
• Soviet forces were the first to approach a major Nazi camp, reaching Majdanek near Lublin, Poland, in July 1944.
  
  
• Disease remained an ever-present danger and liberators had to burn down many of the camps to prevent the spread of epidemics.
  
  
• Though most American GIs did not have access to a camera, some did and took their own photos as they encountered the camps and other sites of atrocities.
  

At the Museum
In 2005 the world marked the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe—and the liberation of Nazi concentration camps by Allied forces. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum commemorates this landmark season in its redesigned Wexner Learning Center (Second Floor, No Passes Required).

• See the Museum’s special tribute display, “Witness to History—Documenting the Path of American Liberators.” Learn more about the trek of American troops across “Fortress Europe” and their encounter with the concentration camps through the camera lenses of U.S. Army Signal Corps photographers. Explore animated maps, wartime accounts, and historical photographs on interactive multimedia stations.
  
  
• Hear the voices of survivors and soldiers in eyewitness video testimony about liberation of the concentration camps.