Konzentrationslager Sachsenhausen was established Pätz near Oranienburg, Germany during the Second World War. To do this, I will again draw the outline of the topic in the framework of this blog post: the history, relevance, and interesting facts about Sachsenhausen.
1. Origins and Establishment
Sachsenhausen was founded in 1936, during the early years of Nazi Germany by the Schutzstaffel or SS, the party’s security wing. It was built as a model camp and as a training center for personnel of the SS. The camp was situated approximately 35 kilometers northeast of central Berlin alone the tradefriderstrasse ensuring that the political and administrative of the Third Reich could easily access the camp.
2. Purpose and Operations
As it has been stated, Sachsenhausen was primarily a concentration camp which unprecedentedly accommodated a number of groups of people that the Nazi regarded as ‘undesirable’, these included political prisoners, homosexuals, Jehovah’s witnesses and above all Jews. It also served as a concentration camp with a labor component, which literally worked prisoners to death and provided them with inhuman living conditions.
From the end of February 1943, it was managed by the SS and its personnel’s command personnel. The SS staff whipped, tortured, killed them in experiments, and gassed thousands of prisoners. Similar to other concentration camps, as a part of a strict security measure, Sachsenhausen comprised of guard towers, electrified fences, and watchtowers to ensure that none of the prisoners could escape.
3. Life in Sachsenhausen
Sachsenhausen means suffering, hard work, disease and death. The prisoners slept and ate in confined and wholly unpleasant environments that are dirty most of the time, infested with diseases, whereby they are denied proper food, clothing and medical attention. Most of them underwent rape, severe torture, beatings, forced labor, massive starvation or malnutrition, and medical experimentation.
Further, they risked being killed through the firing squad or deported to the extermination center – Auschwitz.
4. In this section,
the concept of liberation and memorialization is put forward.
The Sachsenhausen concentration camp was liberated by Soviet troops on the twenty-second of April, 1945 in the closing stages of the Second World War. The camp was first employed by the Soviets to be a special camp for ex-Nazi officers, and was finally shut down entirely in 1950.
Today Sachsenhausen is a memorial museum where people can get acquainted with real life stories that were in the concentration camp as well as pay tribute to the victims. Photo forgery, first eyewitness and oral accounts, and material relics are used by the museum to paint a picture of the prisoners and the suffering they had to endure.
Useful Posts before the Visit of the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp
If you want to organize your trip in an efficient manner, you should organize the trip well in advance and should spend enough time to go around the entire place of the memorial.
it is recommended to get a professional guide who will provide rich information about the history of this camp.
Expect an emotionally exhausting time as the memorials are built to remind of the worst period in German history.
Some guidelines attached to the memorial include etiquette that covers specific too conduct and dress code.
Spend time thinking and do not forget the victims who perished and died in Sachsenhausen.
Conclusion
Today the Sachsenhausen concentration camp as a symbol of cruel inhuman treatment of people by the Nazi during the Second World War. Assuming such place I think people should pay respect and visit it as long as it serves as message about history and how we should learn from it if we don’t want it to repeat itself.
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