My own surrender to the 3rd US Army 9th May 1945

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Interesting site by a New Zealander . Has several source photos and comments on Dachau and other camps.  While it has a Pro-Holocaust narrative, certain parts of it lend credence to other finds.  

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Monday, March 21, 2011

Military Training and Punishments

There seems to be still some misunderstanding when it comes to methods of our SS Instructors to basic training and punishments. In my case I did not brake any violation of the Wehrmacht code, I had distributed leaflets which came close to pornography.My punishment was supervised by an officer,yet we received explicit instruction in sex education which again were held by officers,professionals on the subject.One of our men was engaged (he was 19) to be married and Hess would never give up to degrade him in any way possible.Most of us were Theology Students and looking back it was simply a matter of breaking our spirit.He did break the rules by hitting and punching boys that could not and would not accept his teachings of the NS doctrine.The training was harsh and brutal.Two boys committed suicide, one by holding the barrel(pipe) of a Panzerfaust against his chest and fired himself to pieces.The other one simple hanged himself over trumped up charges, he allegedly had urinated inside a corridor wall which had frozen in the cold.In fact an NCO had used his canteen and had poured water along the wall.This was a method of getting rid of those that "did not fit in".It was common practice by both Wehrmacht and SS not to send Instructors with recruits into combat,you would simple shoot them in the back at the first opportunity.Some of the boys were deeply religious and when it came to practicing Genick-Schuss shooting on dummies, I too was thinking of the commandment:"You shall not kill".I will come back to this subject of de-programming later on.

Executions by US Forces

When it comes to the execution of Jungvolk members by US forces, you have to realize that these were forced into our depleting ranks sometimes at gunpoint still in their Jungvolk or older ones in HJ uniforms and thus not legally members of the Wehrmacht. US armored columns spearheaded way ahead of the main bunch and we were caught "behind"enemy lines. I do not know what treatment was dished out when taken prisoner in HJ uniform, I never seen any one in a POW camp.
The execution I referred to took place in the Harz region (Thueringen) by an American Advance column that had to retreat later on.I have no pictures of the execution,but they were published and are still available through the archives of the German Bildzeitung Der Stern.I will later on show a typical method of shooting in my blog.
Only briefly, I had no rank but was addressed as Hilfsausbilder, was billeted with a nice family for a couple days in the vicinity south of Limburg an der Lahn.One thing they always did, shut the doors tightly behind them, as if to hide something. They had two sons. During assembly I was told to search that house. The mother cried and told me "We made you welcome and now you come with a gun".I took her sons!

Ones own Faith

Most of the intake were High School Students,some of us in mid-term studying Theology thus taught by the commandment not to kill, although Nietzsche said "Gott ist tot,es gibt nur einen Uebermenschen" also sprach Zarathustra, some strongly believed in God. So it was one of the functions to de-program us of what was a necessity in war time to shoot and kill your fellow man. With an exception of one boy,these expert were successful, but only down to the age of three to four. It was impossible to break you of the first little prayer that a mother or grandmother had taught you, and I am now more or less agnostic.Yet I still remember my little prayer:"Ich bin klein mein Herz ist rein darf niemand drin wohnen als Jesus allein".

PS>I failed after the war to get back to full study as a Missionary, the panel of three Pastors told me that I failed on one point only:"You do not believe in God".

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Tuesday, March 15, 2011
My own surrender to the 3rd US Army 9th May 1945

and lasted to January 1946: Eisenhower made us DEF's "Disarmed Enemy Forces",thus had no rights under the Geneva Convention

An American solders guards members recruted from the Hitler Jugend,although they are in Wehrmacht Uniform, the Western Allies tended to treat HJ as children fighting because they had no choice, the Soviets made no such distinction, and treated Hitler Youth members as ruthlessly as adult soldiers. This picture seems to be staged, if you look into their faces of the "captured" youth there are no expression of fear or apprehension, and were perhaps members of a Labor Service Company. Their trousers are "work pants".

 It was an entirely different position the Allies took when HJ members were captured or surrendered in their original uniform, with their swastica armband on their sleeves. On April 20th 1945 Hitler decorated some of them who had seen action in Berlin. These boys had no rights under any rules to be treated as POW's when captured and were faced with summary execution. One boy in this picture survived and is mentioned in the memoirs of one of Hitler's secretary. I might be able to come back to this later.

Execution of 16 Year Old Heinz Petry by the US Fire Squad


Not only was Heinz Petry mere 16 year old when executed, his execution took place on June 11, 1945 -long after World War II hostilities in Europe ended.

There were actually three boys, two of them students of AHS.(Adolf Hitler School) Of the latter one who was arrested by the Americans, could escape. The other two were convicted and executed on 01.06.1945. That was the Adolf Hitler students Heinz Petry and the Hitler Youth Josef Schöner (not Schener). In the court's opinion of the U.S. military the accusation of spying served only as a pretext for the Chairman of the Military Court who emphasized in the court's opinion "that the responsibility for the fate of the two boys lies with the Nazi leaders, and they only, will send send them  to their deaths. The German military and political leaders force us", said the chairman,"to fight fire with fire and blood with blood. We will not tolerate those responsible to hide behind women and children". Unless the presiding judge considered this a "deterrent sentence", he unjustly sentenced the sixteen and seventeen year-old boys whose guilt as so called spies did not justify the death penalty. Read the text quoted in the "Aachen News" of 6 June 1945.


A typical method the American Army applied during execution by firing squad, a stake in the ground, rope around the prisoner and blindfolded, usually hands tied behing the stake. This photograph shows the victim's body falling as bullets sever the rope which had tied him to the stake. Wooden splinters are cascading through the air. The victim in this case was French.

Meeting Henry Ford in Wellington NZ in January 1970. I am standing at the right in this picture

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Saturday, March 26, 2011

A new and different start

I had acquired another job in Allach in a Supply Depot after WOJG Milton F.Plier had fired some else and hired me. What he saw in me I don't know I can only guess, "a lonely boy who needed parental help".I was 18 years old and in many ways still naive. He took very little interest in me during my stay, but obviously had not forgotten our original discussion that I rather be working in a mess hall or a kitchen where I could get at least a meal as I did not want to get hungry again, but he saw it only from the American point of view and had only a smile on his face. I will come back to this back later on.

General Lucius Clay, the Deputy to General Eisenhower,stated: (who's myopic political vision regarding the threat of communism was just as bad as Eisenhower's)"I feel that the Germans should suffer from hunger and from cold as I believe such suffering is necessary to make them realize the consequences of war which they caused[1].
US occupation forces were under strict orders not to share their food with the German population, and this also applied to their wives when they arrived later in the occupation. The women were under strict orders not to allow their German maids to get hold of any leftovers," the food was to be destroyed or made inedible", although in view of the starving German population facing them many housewives chose to ignore these official orders[2]In August 1944 a Handbook for the Military Government in Germany was ready, after reading it President Roosevelt rejected it, a new document was drafted (JCS1067) on March 20 1945 Roosevelt was warned that this order was not workable it would stew the Germans in their own juice "Let them have soup kitchens! Let their economy sink!" Asked if he wanted the German people starve, he replied,"Why not?"[4]

My main function in Allach was to keep incoming material  stored and issued when required, this also included receiving the EM's  uniforms as well as bed sheets pillow slips etc taken to the QM Laundry in Dachau for dry cleaning and washing. On one of these trips, our driver James Walters wanted to show me what those God damn Germans did during the war just around the corner in a crematorium, this was mid 1946. I was fully aware of the activities of the SD and Einsatzgruppen in Russia as a youngster when my uncle told my parents(I pricked my ears to listen)  that Germans committed mass murder of people that were racially not pure. As the older generation never believed that Hitler could ever win this war, they always felt and said when no one else was there:"Die Rache der Sieger an das deutsche Volk wird unbeschreibar".(The retaliation of the victors towards the German people will be indescribably).

The Crematorium

Well my first impression to walk a tree lined gravel path towards the crematorium was almost serene, it was tree lined and curved slightly, and on that day no one was present, yet what I noticed first were dog kennel type of boxes, three on each side, stacked with flower pots which puzzled me and only very much later I was told these were used to hold the ashes of the cremated victims.

James and I entered the few steps towards the delousing chambers which had sculls and cross bones "Achtung" markings on steel doors with chalk markings indicating time durations"zu"=shut and "offen"=open written on them. One of the chambers still had a padded Jacket hanging on  a rail with a coat hanger still inside it. We wandered around into various rooms which showed nothing of interest to me.

Then he got excited and furious to show me the gas chamber with the description BRAUSEBAD written above it. First of all I had a good look at the steel door, why a steel door? It was of the type that is used on battleships to create watertight compartments, it had rubber type seals around it very similar you have on fridges and two large handle bars for locking, you could not unlock this door from the inside. I went inside but not very far as I had the feeling of claustrophobia when James locked the door from the outside and it was completely dark no light of any kind and momentarily I was scared.At that time I did not think much about its purpose and the expression Holocaust was not in use. My own opinion now is:That the chamber was intended to be used for homicidal purposes but the installation was never completed or considered impractical and some internal changes were made to be altered at a later stage.Perhaps as a shower. I was not horrified when I saw the ovens as such, for me it was and still is a matter of cremating the dead as quickly as possible to avoid spreading of diseases. How they died in the Camp is another matter. The last to use these facilities were the American Military to dispose of the 12 Nazi war criminals sentenced to death by hanging at Nuernberg. In fact a total of 14 boxes had been trucked to Dachau. As this was the last indignity in some way a symbolic act of the Americans, only Goering had been shown were he would eventually finish up, yet he cheated the hangman.[3]I doubt that any guide will tell you this.

We had a good look around the building but I can not remember anything like the controversial chutes or modification that are shown now in various publications. There was a sort of rack with mannequin inmates bent over it and a fierce looking SS-man beating them. Also a sign underneath an oak tree which was described as a Hanging Tree. At one place there was a covered ditch, which was described a "Drain for blood" after the shooting and executions of Russian political Commissars their blood would flow there. I have seen blood during my short fights during the war,but the blood of the dead never ran that much. What a story!

Controversies

When I first saw the crematorium building in 1946 I can not recall seeing the so called chutes that would take Zyklon pellets into the chamber. There were always rumors that they had been added on at a later stage to make the function of a gas-chamber more plausible to visitors. As the building was constructed under SS supervision and their standards from my own experience were extremely high, they would never have accepted the shoddy workmanship that was performed on it. The whole thing does not fit in. During my stay in Dachau I met a number of ex-inmates as well as SS-POW's in 1948 and sometimes it came to heated debates as both parties knew more about the activities than any others but were even to this date reluctant to talk. What was almost a laughing matter to them(the SS-men) was the BRAUSEBAD wording above the chamber door. I was bluntly told:"If you don't believe it that it was put on when the Amis were there, just touch the letters and you will find they are almost fresh in comparison to the rest of the painted wall'. So I did. The impression I had that it was stenciled on and not done by a sign painter. These types of stencils are used during spray painting of US Army vehicles. One thing that strikes me odd is the letter E which has been done in revers i.e. the middle bar is normally in the center or in the upper part of the letter, not in the lower, but it can be used in both ways.

 During my stay at Allach,here again at the Supply Depot quite a lot of thieving was going on. The most desirable items were kept in three rooms and only myself and another elderly gent who had always been there as Germans had excess to them apart from the American personal plus two young women who did the cleaning, who were checked when they left the building, yet nothing was ever found how the missing items like shoes, soap and clothing, blankets etc went missing. What the Americans never looked at was the dirty water buckets of the two women. And I had been asked to look the other way!

Slowly but persistently the Cold War was heating up and attitudes as well as condition improved by 1948, the D-Mark was introduced and thanks to the Marshal-Plan  with the aim of cranking the German economy up, not only in Germany but war torn Europe as a whole except East Germany. This effected the Ordnance Field Maintenance Shop as well, as it was originally the property of the Dornier Werke who had manufactured compressors there during the war for their fighter planes. Non essential Units were I worked were the first to be closed or transferred to Dachau, the entire process took a number of months and I was made jobless. Mr.Plier had not forgotten my plea when I first met him that I did not want to get hungry again and I was employed for some time in the Mess Hall as waiter for the remaining officers until the shift to Dachau was completed. Here again he had been instrumental that I was employed in the Dachau Garrison Mess later on for a short period until I found other work in the Camp. At that time I was not aware that he had spoken for me, nor was I ever able to thank him.
I would like to relay here a typical example of how the attitude of Americans towards came to the surface:I was wearing GI fatigues (HBT's) had a crew cut,GI glasses (which a kind soldier had given me,his spare pair) and perhaps looked like a GI. I was sweeping my place in the mess hall,when the Provost  Sgt. approached me, and said:"Look soldier,you don't have to do that let those Krauts do the dirty work!" One of the cooks told him:"He is one".

Camp Dachau

It was here that I came in contact with American GI's that were kept in the original Jail Proper,which shows the sign "Arbeit macht frei".This was an Army stockade. These were short time Army Prisoners, accompanied by guards with shotguns when they arrived at the mess hall. I don't think this appears in any guide books. I knew one of them a Sgt.Bachman from way back who was caught taking food for his German girl friend and family, he had meant well for his adopted family but it was an offense  nether-the-less.

I finally found a more secure job to my liking as a clerk in a Ordnance Supply Depot at the end of 1948, where I worked with a young widow aged 23 by the name of Anita Haug. Only later on did I found out that her father had been a high ranking SS-Officer since 1933 in the Administration of the Concentration Camp, but was killed in action during the fighting in Hungary 1945. To avoid repercussion from inmates or the "Liberators" together with other families had been evacuated to Tyrol and returned to Dachau living in rather spartan condition at the Wuermuehle. She was a very attractive looking young women, men like to be seen with. I would have called her a "Good Time Girl". To come to the more serious matter that haunts me to this day, are her statements and that of her mother, that the  beloved heroic "Liberators" not only committed murder of 500 so called SS-Guards, but also dragged other SS-Personnel out of their villas that had been maintenance people mechanics and the like, put them against the wall opposite the main Louisiana Drive and shot them.
Mothers had given their small children cyanide capsules and told them to take them into their mouths and bite onto them like a lolly as soon as their Daddy is shot. Both, her mother and her, claimed that about twenty young children died this way before the Americans realized what was happening and the shooting was stopped.
I have searched in the vicinity close to the perimeter of the fenced off golf course for the graves, where a former inmate apparently have buried them, there was also a web page which  describes his own feelings. I did find three mounds close to the fence but did not take it any further. I did raise this question again if it took place and how, but was ignored.

Mrs. Anita Haug married an American Sargent lives in the States under a different name and I feel strongly about the incidence for some scholar to have her statement for historical purposes investigated. I am able to give more details of her life (but not on this blog) by contacting me via e-mail>herbstolpmann@gmail.com<

Living Conditions

For the first time I was happy with my accommodation in the old SS-Hospital located behind the infamous coal bunker with all the comforts of home. It was a close knit community of about 500 employees that worked for the various American Army Units, but there was a vast gulf despite the fact that fraternization had taken place, between those(The Germans)and us (The Americans). I worked as an Editor for the Ordnance Supply Office responsible for most Military Equipment for the Munich Sub Area. Our office was located in the abandoned War Crimes Tribunal Buildings, however we were still treated as second class citizens we were not allowed to use the toilet facilities next to my office but had to walk about 100meters to the main building to relieve ourselves. This and other little quirks the Americans insisted on, made us think of the segregation in States between Whites and Blacks, which we felt was applied to us as well. Admittedly conditions improved once the Koren War had started.
I met my future wife here, who was emigrating to New Zealand  and I followed her at the end of 1956, got married had a family and was trying to forget the past! Still, memories linger on.
PS<The Hospital site which was a Home from Home for a number of years was destroyed later on

Source[1] Richard Dominic Wiggers pg.278
             [2]Eugine Davidson"The Death and Life
                   of Germany"University Press Missouri
             [3]Kollektives Gedaechtnis:Willi Witte
             [4]M.R.Beschloss"The Conquerors pg196

Krefeld Hungerwinter Demonstration, sign reads: We want COAL we want BREAD
The average German civilian received 1,200 calories per day[1]
Displaced Persons were receiving       2,300 calories
Adult calorie in USA was 3,200-3,300, UK 2,900 and US Army 4,000[2]
source[1][2]R.D.Wiggers pgs 280,285

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[CrackSmokeRepublican]

DACHAU KZ: SUFFERING AND DEATH
DACHAU KZ: SUFFERING AND DEATH

Prologue:
Dachau was the only early concentration camp, which lasted until the liberation in 1945 from its inception in 1933. This so-called main camp (Stammlager) with a number of satellite camps (Aussenlager) was controlled from Munich. I visited two of these places in 1950, the Pollnhof which was an Estate of the SS and the Meat factory Wülfert a private enterprise,  within the city limits that held inmates as slave labor but nothing was there as a reminder of the past, yet records do exist how prisoners were treated and I might be able to comment at a later stage.
The first indication the public received that a camp would be established was a Press-cutting from the Völkischer Beobachter, the mouth piece of the NSDAP of 21st March 1933 in which it stated that "a concentration camp for political prisoners will be opened on Wednesday 22nd March 1933 near Dachau." The camp in fact was built on land in the parish of Prittlbach which was later to become part of the town of Dachau. In its structure it was the model for many other concentration camps to be built right through German occupied Europe during WW II. The essence of the National Socialist rule was a system of terror that spread right through the net-work of 24 main camps with about 1000 sub-camps where opponents to the regime were exploited, tortured at the mercy of SA, SS, and police auxiliary which often resulted in death.
My narrative is based mainly on documents as well as books, in addition to statements from a number of inmates including SS guards that left Dachau prior to the liberation and have never been brought to trial.
As for myself I had a cosmopolitan upbringing during the third Reich, we had French and Russian POW's on the Estate, never considered Russians as (Untermenschen) sub-humans, in both cases they taught me their languages, something that was not condoned by the regime.
The translations are my own and I apologize if it sounds somewhat "stilted" as I have not done this type of work for over fifty years. Last but not least I dedicate my narrative to two young Indian brothers, Arjun and Varun who will tour Germany as part of their School Curriculum.
HKW Stolpmann-Auckland NZ -August 2011

STAMMLAGER DACHAU

The local newspapers reported extensively on the new camp. On 11 April, a new Häftlingstransprt(Transport of Arrested) arrived from Nuremberg, another hut was completed. Cooking was done initially in field kitchens, the food was taken into a large hall outside the fenced part of the camp and consumed there. The allocation of numbers indicates the growth of inmates assigned to the camp population: In March 1933, number 170 was reached, in April 1137 and at the month of May number 2033. Due to some releases from the camp in June 1933 with a slight drop in the total, the number 2375 was assigned. 1953 people had been detained. By the year 1938 the number of prisoners moved constantly between 2000 and 2500. The total capacity intended originally was for 5000 internees, which was meant to be held in "protected custody".





The first detainees were German communists, Social Democrats later came increasingly civic politicians and monarchists. The political police in June1933 conducted a raid on the Bavarian People's Party which led to the detention of their Functionaries. The police behaved properly in this first phase towards the detainees in general. The initially tolerable condition within the the camp were not of a long duration. On 1 April 1933 Himmler rose to the command of the political police in Bavaria and assumed all rights in this area of responsibility as leader of the SS. On April 10th an SS unit took control of the camp and murdered few days later four Jewish inmates, under the pretext of an alleged attempted escape.Camp commander was SS Captain(Hauptsturmbannführer) Hilmar Wäckerle.
To run the Camp on a legal basis, rules and regulations as used in civil prisons was applied. Dachau was established as a State-owned concentration camp, although Himmler did everything to have it entirely under the domain of the SS, a comprehensive 18 point Sonderbefehl (Special Orders) was implemented which exposed prisoners to brutal treatment, imposing punishments as well as death. Wäckerle on Himmlers order had details worked out as far back as May 1933. These regulations divided the prisoners into three categories: one privileged, one basic and one punishment. A permanent state of emergency prevailed in the camp with draconian application of the death penalty.The guards had the right to use their weapon for any attempted escapes which was often an excuse for just a killing. For minor infringement this could result into a re-classification of a prisoner into a lower category or a death penalty. The Camp Commandant appointed a four-member Court of the SS with him as its chairman who decided  penalties over life and limb. The verdict was final the victim had no defense or appeal against the outcome.
It makes it clear looking at the background of the events in Dachau that the motive for the creation of these special provisions of Heinrich Himmler's was an attempt  to gain complete control over the inmates and to avoid any interference from the Justice System . Himmler's idea was a state within a state with its own Laws, with its own Leader and to commit violence. Only the funding would be the responsibility of the state of Bavaria and that of the Reich. Even in those days Himmlers plans could not be realized . The arbitrary declaration of a permanent state of emergency and the entitlement to their own rules, including the right to impose the death penalty presented, even at that time unheard of measures. The document of implementation  met with resistance in the Bavarian government and Justice Department. Himmler was forced to replace the camp commandant Wäckerle. The new camp commander was appointed on June 26, 1933 by the name of SS-Oberführer Theodor Eicke .He made immediately a revision of the collected writings of Wäckerle of the camps running operations. From 1 October 1933 the Disciplinary and Criminal Procedure entered into force for the prison camp.A prisoner could be shot as a revolutionary and hanged later as a deterrent. Guards had the right to open fire and use their weapon without warning to shoot anyone who made an alleged attempt to escape. Any SS-man killing in line within his duty could not be brought to answer for his actions. Only to quote two of his regulations, which reads:
Article 11. The following offenders, considered as agitators, will be hanged: Anyone who politicizes, holds inciting speeches and meetings, forms cliques, loiters around with others, who for the purpose of supplying the propaganda of the opposition with atrocity stories, collects true or false information about the concentration camp, receives such information,buries it, talks about it to others, smuggles it out of the camp into the hands of foreign visitors..... etc
Article12. The following offenders, considered as mutineers, will be shot on the spot or later hanged. Anyone attacking physically a guard or SS-man, refusing to obey or to work while on detail or bawling, shouting, inciting or holding speeches while marching or at work.....
identical Orders were introduced in all other Concentration Camps based on these guide lines. Eicke taught his sub ordinates to hate inmates as criminals and enemies of the state and a number of these indoctrinated SS-men at the "Dachauer Schule" became later leading functionaries of other camps.




THE ORGANIZATION OF THE CAMP

Eicke shaped in Dachau an organizational structure which later found its application in all other concentration camps. The camp was divided into Headquarters, Chief of Staff of the Commander or Adjutant, SS-Guard Units, Prison Camps (later the Protective Custody Camp(Schutzhaftlager), Physician, Political Department and the Department of Economic Affairs (Administration). The guards formed the SS Unit D (Dachau), under the command of SS Major and his deputy leader Michael Lippert and Max Koegel. The guards (prisoner escort in supervisory capacity) managed and controlled the barracks on a daily basis. The Political Department was the department which was run by an arm of the police. They interrogated prisoners and prepared inmates eventually for their release back into the community The Department of Economic Affairs managed the workshops and factories that were established within the camp. The responsibility to administrate these facilities was not entirely clear at first. To a certain extent it was the responsibility of the workshop manager. Since May 1934, the function of a Protective Custody Camp was established and administered by Günter Tamascke. He controlled the SS personnel at the camp as well as that of the inmates. Later there were two to three protective custody camp leaders, who served as the first step for all activities, reporting to the camp commander.
The organizational structure of the camp resulted in the the placement of prisoners in ten huts, each of which had five rooms. Each room at full occupancy totaled 54 prisoners, which was called a"Platoon", with a "Corporal" at the top. The prisoners of a whole barracks was designated as a "Company". It stood under the guidance of a "sergeant" appointed from the ranks of inmates. The seventh company was the penal company, which consisted mainly of Jews and political figures (Bonzen) and worked at the gravel pit and road constructions.
The highest function, which could be exercised by prisoners was that of a "Working Sergeant." This position was held by the communist Josef Zauner. In the fall of 1933 Karl Kapp became the"Working Sergeant". The most popular personalities among the inmates next to a communist Georg Zauner was Gröner, due to their tolerant attitude towards other political-minded fellow prisoners which was appreciated by them.[Theodor Eicke commanded his Totenkopf Division in Russia from 1940 which fought with unmatched ferocity and ruthlessness. He was shot down during an aerial observation and killed Feb.1943 over Russian lines. I had an SS-Instructor who participated in the assault group (Stoßtrup) to retrieve his body 1 km into Russian territory. Sic]

LIVING CONDITIONS

The barracks of the camp were one story, built partly of stone and the roof covered with tar paper. The floor was made of concrete.Only the three-tier bunk beds provided a place of some privacy. The room had long tables and benches. On its head of the bed was a small closet for the few items of daily use and eating utensils. A towel and an enameled bowl for the daily meal was kept on the other end of the bed. On the wall next to it and in other accessible places the prisoner could hang photographs of his next of kin. At six o'clock in the morning a trumpet signal was given to get up. After the washing and making beds to military standards, the prisoners received a cup of thin ersatz coffee. At 6:30 am the whole camp was assembled at the roll call square. There was a wooden stage, from here orders were issued and the names of prisoners to be released were read out, as well as those required for interrogation. By the command of:"Form work details" the prisoners then lined up into the labor gangs, headed by the "capos". In the company of the guards they marched to their jobs. At 11 clock they returned to the camp and entered a half-hour rest period.




The needs and requirements of the Garrison as well as those SS-Units stationed within the vicinity of Dachau were catered for from their own operated enterprises, which included a slaughterhouse and a large bakery worked and run by inmates. Other prisoners were used in the general maintenance of the facilities, repairs, renovations and extensive new building projects. With the vision of national-socialist autarky(i.e.independent from imports)of Germany which included the establishment of a Heilkräuterplantage (herb garden plantation) but also the cultivation of indigenous spices were the focus of this project from spring 1938 on the east side of the camp. Due to the low labor costs the camp developed an economic base for the SS, with their affiliated farms the cost effectiveness of these projects gained them a substantial profit unheard of in the nineteen thirties.[making profit for one-selfs was frowned upon by the NS Regime as profit was associated with Jews sic]
A formidable and hated workplace was the gravel pit, (Die Kiesgrube) which employed mainly Jews and and Communists, but also prisoners whose personal files were marked by the police with the words "Release of prisoner is not desirable." (later: RU =Return Unwanted), or prisoners who were selected by Headquarters to physical annihilation. In the gravel pit, they rushed them to death, shot them for alleged "Fluchtversuch"( trying to escape) or drove them to commit suicide. In the fall of 1933 the first transport of prisoners at Dachau from the workhouse of Rebdorf arrived, in January 1934  more shipments of this kind followed which was motivated primarily by the need for additional labor, and presented unfair competition  to local businesses, the relationship with SS Administration deteriorated. On 28 November 1933 the Chamber of Trade wrote to the Bavarian Ministry of Economics expressing concerns that the Dachau concentration camp is setting up a "work house", which presented the local craft to an intolerable disadvantage as competitors. In May 1934,  the police requested additional political detainees about 300-500 from these workhouses, citing specific needs. They showed interest mainly in tailors, shoemakers,saddlers and construction workers.
 From July 1933 on Sunday afternoons there was a church service, first on the parade ground, where a temporary altar was erected, and later in a small room next to the post office. On the average about 20 people participated  during these services. The Priest of the congregation appeared regularly at the Camp, although the SS tried to hold him back from these visits by provocations and insults.[He was the Priest Pfanzelt and I have met him sic] The detainees wore initially their own clothes. Later, they were gradually issued with second hand Drill-uniforms and boots. The civil suit they originally had in the first months were kept in their closet. As food the prisoners received  soldier's bread(1.5 kilos) for three days. Breakfast was coffee substitute (Ersatz Kaffee). [The civilian population right through the war did not have anything else either sic].Dinner was usually a piece of sausage or cheese, or meat-jelly, occasionally salted herrings. With this tea or coffee was consumed.Stew for lunch was prepared in the kitchen
On October 16, 1934 the Bavarian Interior Ministry ordered Beggars, Drunkards and men who had rejected the work assigned to them for a period of three months or up to three years to the Dachau concentration camp. In a sweeping action of this kind from 7 to July 16, 1936  a total of 1306 beggars, work-shy individuals, vagrants and wandering journeymen
were arrested, 736 of them came to Dachau.
On 1 August 1936, the Bavarian police introduced policies to the imposition of "Schutzhaft"(Protected Custody) towards "the enemies of the people". The term used were for beggars, vagrants, gypsies, work-shies, loafers, prostitutes, habitual drunkards, brawlers, summarized traffic offenders, psychopaths and the mentally ill. In protective custody also fell members of Jehovah's Witnesses, an initial group was already in Dachau internment since December 1933, because the persons concerned had not attended the election of Hitler. SS members shot on July 4th 1935 near the Bavarian-Czech border in the vicinity Altenberg-Geising two communists who attempted to smuggle publications across the border. This incident  served Himmler as a pretext to order the Bavarian political police the arrest of 200-300 communists and affected primarily those who had been previously interned in a concentration camp. In this way a number of previously released inmates from Dachau returned for the second time into the camp and many of them stayed there until the collapse of the Nazi regime. In 1936 Eicke was working on a special statute for the "second-timers". They should be assigned to the penal company, working ten hours a day and may write only once every three months a letter to their next of kin. Smoking was strictly forbidden for them,and they were allowed to receive only ten Reichsmark on a quarterly basis from home. They should stay a longer time in prison and the review of their personal files should not be carried out at the standard three monthly period instead after three years.This shows these regulations referred to were not new subversive activities of the affected persons, but arose from administrative arbitrariness. [And a display of arrogance who runs this place sic]
The number of prisoners which had decreased as a result of the Amnesty in August 1934 only slightly. At the beginning of summer 1935 there were a total of 3555 prisoners held in various Concentration Camps, of it 1800 in Dachau.

THE ELIMINATION OF THE SA AND THE NEW CAMP COMMANDER

In the summer of 1934, Eicke and his guard troops from Dachau took a leading role to liquidate the the SA leadership. Two units of the guard troops took part under the pretext of a "Röhm Putsch" in Bad Wiesee and made ​​arrests.[The leader of the SA, Ernst Röhm was shot point blank by Michael Lippert at Stadelheim Prison near Munich.[Hitler and Röhm were close friends, he, Röhm was one of the few that were allowed to call him "Adolf" and the familiar "Du" instead of the formal "Sie, mein Führer" sic] In the concentration camp a total of 17 men were shot in connection with the so called "Röhm-Affair who had previously been arrested. The Nazis used the opportunity to settle outstanding "scores"with other opponents. So the 71-year-old Gustav Ritter von Kahr was shot at Dachau, who had refused in 1923 as Commissioner General to join  the Hitler coup. Eicke also took this opportunity to shoot five prisoners, some of whom had already spent several months in the Bunker.The control of the concentration camps by the SS was accelerated by these events of 30 June 1934. On behalf of Himmler, Eicke revamped since May 1934 the reorganization of all Prussian state-controlled internment camps. Eicke used his own Dachau  rules as a model as far as Discipline and Criminal Procedures were concerned and guidelines for Guard Duties (Wachdiesnst).Arrest bunkers were built and expanded and the practice of mistreatment including public beatings found general application. In July Eicke was appointed Inspector of the concentration camps and the SS Death's Head Units(Totenkopf Division). In this capacity he was directly subordinate to Himmler with other responsibilities for the Administration and Security of all Concentration Camps.He remained for some time formally commander of the camp at Dachau with the assistance of  Michael Lippert responsible for Security and Günter Tamaschke as head of the Protective Custody Department.
On December 6, 1934, Himmler appointed SS Colonel Dr.Alexander Reiner, a dentist as commander of Dachau. But because of corrupt behavior at SS Section XXVI(Danzig), he was suspended from his office before starting work at Dachau. In the period of 10 December 1934 to April 1936 SS chief leader Heinrich Deubel held the office of Camp Commander, a professional soldier and one of the oldest members of the SS since 1926. Eike held Deubel however, for "almost too good-natured" and "working poorly" and had his appointment rescinded. After Deubel  SS Top Leader Hans Loritz took over on 1 April 1936 as commandant, he had as camp commander of Esterwegen (Emslandlager) demonstrated his cutting and was the first commander, who had already proven his experiences in other internment camps. The position of officer in charge of the Protective Custody Department was held by the brutal SS  Obersturmführer Jokob Wiesenborn. Loritz  who run the camp until 1939, is remembered by prisoners of his arrogance and cruelty and witnessing of public corporal punishment [sadistic as he may have been usually receive sexual pleasures out of it sic]. After the annexation of Austria (Anschluss) in March 1938 he used Dachau inmates to build  a holiday villa at Gilgen. During construction the prisoners were housed in the nearest jail.Under Loritz the striped inmate garments (Häftlingskleidung) were introduced in the years 1937 to 1938. While the individual categories of prisoners were formerly distinguished by colored dots and stripes on their clothing, they now featured colorful triangles on the left side of the chest and the right trouser leg.
The political prisoners wore a red triangle, the criminals a green, the anti-socials a black, Jehovah's Witnesses a reddish and homosexuals a pink one. The garments of Jews were marked additionally with a cross-stitched yellow triangle so that a two-tone Star of David was visible. The prisoner number was printed and sewn  on the corner on white linen. [prisoners in Dachau were not tattooed sic]The "second-timers" could be recognized by a strip between the inmates number and the triangle in the color of their category. Under Loritz a number of changes were made in the designation of the inmates accommodation. In future a Barrack was called "Rooms"(Stube) or "Blocks" which was headed by a Block Leader or an elder (Stubenführer). The SS-company commander would be reclassified as SS-Blockführer.
The press coverage changed. Initially positive reports dominated the headlines highlighting the "care" that was given to the inmates by the administration. Now the people were warned not to go within the vicinity of the camp, because the guards could make use of their weapons. It was to read that some well-known politician in Dachau had been shot during an escape attempt or had committed suicide. The Propaganda described on one hand, the provisions and certain allocation the prisoners received, but noted also that they did not deserve this, because 80 percent of the inmates are"bastardized" mongrels with Jewish blood as well as Negro and Mongolian mixture which otherwise would impact badly if they became part of the wider community.As part of Nazi propaganda were visits that led two types of visitors to Dachau. The first were NS-dignitaries, in which Himmler boasted his methods and effectiveness in the fight against political opponents, enemies of the state and ethnic minorities. The Bavarian Minister-President Ludwig Siebert wrote after his visit to Dacha in March 1934 a laudatory open letter published in the Press to Himmler, in which he paid tribute to Dachau as a "model"- Internment Facility. The second category were foreign journalists and representatives of international humanitarian organizations. The settings had been staged to convince them that the bad reputation of the concentration camp was completely unfounded. They, however, did not miss the fact that these performances and the effect had been unnaturally arranged.

THE NEW CAMP

 In September 1937, Himmler re-organized  the operational areas of each camp. Dachau served as a central place of detention for southern Germany. In early 1937 construction began on a new prison camp, which was built only partly to the ground plan of the original one. In view of the preparations for war, the SS drove the prisoners without regard for their physical condition to work. Above all, the earth and demolition work was a grind, since no machines were made available.The guards rushed the prisoners in an untenable pace and in addition spent their time with various cruelties and atrocities. A deterioration of living conditions took place which resulted in a higher rise in the mortality rate. Of the eleven dead in 1936, the death toll rose to thirty eight a year later The new camp measured 583x278 meters. It was surrounded by a high wall which was topped with four strands of high tensile and electrified barbed wire. On the inside of the wall was also an electrically charged barbed wire fence and coiled barbed wire in front of that .Another obstacle was a 2.5 meter wide and about 2 meter deep ditch, before that was a 3 meter wide strip, the neutral zone. If this was entered the guards opened fire without warning. There were seven guard towers, which were each equipped with two heavy machine guns.
The entrance to the camp was located on the west side. Where you first  passed the SS buildings and went through the iron gate with the inscription ("Arbeit macht frei") "Work makes free" of the one-storied"Jourhaus", you then entered the large parade ground (Apellplatz), to the right of the camp was a large building that  stretched over the entire width,  the(Wirtschaftshaus)Utility Building, which housed the kitchen, the shower facilities, laundry, storage rooms, workshops including space for personal effects.  Behind the building hidden was (der Kommandanturarrest), the Bunker, with 136 cells. On the opposite side of the parade ground stood  two long rows of 34 barracks, between them the general "camp road"which went straight through.[I have a 1937 motion picture tape of these facilities being built sic] In the first two barracks on the right side the infirmary was housed, on the other side was the cafeteria, the anthropological museum, the office, the labor assignment Dept. and (der Schulungsraum) the "training room". The remaining 30 barracks kept the detainees and were called blocks. On the right side of the road camp, they were marked with odd Arabic numbers from 1 to 29, up on the left side they had the straight numbers  starting with 2  to 30. Each block consisted of four residential units, the"rooms", each room was for 52 men, so that the capacity of the camp was built for 6240 persons. The accommodations were consistent with the former standard of German military barracks at that time. Each room was divided in a living- and bedroom. The 10x9 meter-sized living room was equipped with narrow lockers and ten tables with stools. In the center was a free standing tile-lined fireplace(Kachelofen). In the locker every prisoner had to keep a soup bowl (Essenschüssel), a plate, mug and cutlery, all made of aluminum, in addition to a military towel and a shoe brush. In the bedroom were three-tier bedsteads with straw mattresses plus one pillow stuffed with straw and two blankets.In July 1938, the number of prisoners increased from 3410 to6166. As the intake of the anti-social and criminal prisoners increased the make-up and character of the concentration camp changed . But the mainstream of political prisoners kept the Self-Administration (Selbstverwaltung) firmly in their hands and thereby able to keep criminal prisoners from occupying any functional positions.

DACHAU AFTER THE WAR BEGAN

With the outbreak of war all lawful and administrative standards  were abolished, the powers the SS had over prisoners which had previously been partly restricted and made a difference between life or death, was lifted. Releases from prison with a few exceptions was stopped. With the outbreak of hostilities the existing Guards were called up for active duty to the front lines and replaced by older members of the SS-Replacement Units (Ersatzreserve). There were delays to implement and introduce these new measures, as the entire camp in late September 1939 was needed for the training of the SS-Totenkopf Division for combat duties. The evacuation of the camp started on the evening of September 26th, with1600 men transported to Mauthausen, 981 to Flossenbürg and a further 2138 moved to Buchenwald. Only 100 prisoners remained in Dachau to perform urgent work, especially on the plantation. Among the Buchenwald contingent  were Czechs and all prisoners held in the bunker, these prisoners never returned to Dachau. To the Mauthausen camp the SS sent the German and Austrian political prisoners[the exact figure is not recorded sic], including the inmates of the criminal category and blocks as well as all "second timers", 44 Jehovah witnesses, 571 asocial prisoners, 11 emigrants, 53 Homosexuals and 227  criminal prisoners. They expected not only  hard work at the Mauthausen quarry, but also the hatred of a group of criminal inmates who had been sent in August 1938 from Dachau to help in the construction of the camp facilities there.
In February 1940 the SS-Units left the camp and the inmates returned. To start with only the rear part of the camp was made available for the prisoners and another entrance was provisionally opened up. On the 18th of February 1940 only 390 inmates arrived from Mauthausen. Even if one considers that these were the ones out of a group of political prisoners, that means that either 204 lost their lives there or were unable for some reason to travel.[The figures do not tally, I am unable to verify this statement sic] Of the 981 men transferred to Flossenbürg late September 1939 only 921 returned to Dachau on the 2nd of March 1941. Three days later 1500 inmates arrived from Sachsenhausen and the camp once again filled up.

CRUELTIES

Since 1938 corporal punishments in Dachau were carried out in the courtyard of the new Bunker on seven specially installed stakes which had hooks driven into them and prisoners tied onto them and beatings carried out. Since 1940 when these stakes were no longer sufficient the location was changed towards[outside sic] the prison bath (Häftlingsbad)  were a crossbar held up by two support posts was erected . The crossbar had a number of hooks with a spacings of about 40-50 cm between them. This way you could torture now around 50 people at a time. The duration of the punishment lasted for one hour, in some exceptional cases even longer. The prisoner had his hands tied with a chain on the back and after stepping onto a footstool an SS man attached the chain to a hook and would kick the stool from under his feet. After the first  initial excruciating pain the victim would slowly faint and  fall into unconsciousness. The SS men then punched the prisoner in the face, or by pouring cold water over him to regain consciousness. The unnatural position with the upper arm twisted at the back restricted breathing and could after two hours lead to death. Unfortunately  after an hour of this type of torture in most cases this resulted in long-term  paralyzes of the hands and the shoulder blades.
For serious offenses, the public beating was imposed. It was originally performed with a stick, and later with a (Ochsenziemer) leather strap(ox whip), and soaked in water.To ensure the "Delinquent" could not move was standing on a wooden block with his legs encased in a sort of box. After each beating the prisoner  received a stay in the Bunker for a minimum of three days. Corporal punishment was imposed in each case by the Inspector of Concentration Camps, which at time was Schutzhaftlagerführer Egon Zell who since 1940 arbitrarily changed the methods in as much that he counted the lashings of two SS-man as one strike as well as other little quirks he had in mind. This was a typical example of how Himmlers orders were interpreted and cynically carried out to give the impression that procedures were strictly adhered to. The tortured victim in addition to this had to count in a loud voice the number of lashings he received, if he made a mistake, Zill gave the orders to start again. Should the prisoner faint during this procedure he was doused with a bucket of cold water and the whole process started again as soon as he became conscious.
In the Punishment Block you had a number of prisoners which had the "Fluchtpunkt"(EscapeDot) a very visible red-white Target Marker sewn onto their chest, on their backs and on the trouser leg. This way those inmates that were accused or suspected of attempted escapes were clearly visible. For others it was sufficient that a prisoner overheard the signal for assembly and arrived too late, overlooked the weekly haircut or that he was caught contrary to standing orders only with his shirt on, or seen only in his underpants or worse still that he had used an outer garment while sleeping. These violations resulted in a minimum of 25 double lashings, 42 days in a darken cell of the Bunker, withholding of nourishments and subsequent transfer to the Punishment Block where Escape-Dot inmates were subjected to regular torture and chicaneries. Finally he could be sent onto a work detail were death was inevitable.
Actual attempts to escape before WWII and the first years of the war were very rare, only since 1943 as more prisoners stayed in satellite camps (Außenlager) in Bavaria and Austria where the restrictions as in Dachau could not be enforced, escape attempts did occur and some actually succeeded.[inmates on outside work details would smuggle electrical wires into the camp by replacing their shoe laces to short circuit the electric fence sic]
During autumn of 1944 the Administration installed the so called (Stehbunker) Standing Bunkers to save space and at the same time intensify the method of torture, thus  inmates were kept for a shorter period to return them to their work details as soon as possible. These constructions looked like a small chimney and measured about 75x80 cm with four of them in some of the cells. At the top they had an opening for air and at the bottom a small 50 cm wide opening which was shut and locked from the outside.
The implementation of Punishments took a long and often difficult procedure, it had to take the preliminary hearings, as well as the clinical examination taken into account and every step had be verified, signed and approved by its own Department Head. After the arrival of foreign prisoners from German occupied countries, the use of the Bunker as a means for punishments and incarceration was no longer an option, the original requirements of 136 cells was no longer sufficient of events to come.

COMPOSITION OF THE 'INMATE SOCIETY'

Of the most depressing experiences in the concentration camp was, that the Nazis exercised their rule by means of using Inmates to implement their overall orders. They tried to break the cohesion and solidarity of the prisoners by racial and national differentiation. In the camp hierarchy a Czech prisoner, and later on the Polish,French, Russian or Italian was of a lower "class" than a German, not to mention the Jews who were on the lowest rung. In Dachau, the Selbstverwaltung (Self-Administration) was in the hands of German political prisoners who were mostly recruited out of the ranks of Communists.[These were almost ex-members of the Thälmann Brigade who had fought in Spain sic] In this respect, conditions in Dachau were more bearable than in other camps where the "greens" the criminal prisoners ruled. The Communists established in Dachau their own idea of ​​an iron military discipline that should defy the Nazis, and  forced a regime themselves to establish their idea of a "Model Camp" much to the consternation of the SS leadership. They founded the Exerzierkommando (Exercise Commando) Gröner, which Eicke finally prohibited, because he saw an attempt at Dachau to form a Red Army within its confines. Also associated with their orders(i.e.SS) of the cleanliness mania a certain amount of harassment took place, from inmate to inmate, which was the work of zealous official prisoners.

CHANGE OF PACE

The first major transportation of Czech prisoners was conducted on 16 June1939, from Mauthausen to Dachau. This transport comprised of 105 representatives from public life out of the area of Kladno were they had been arrested in retaliation for the shooting of a German policeman. All the Czechoslovakian prisoners were strictly isolated from other inmates and most of them assigned to the punishment block. On the night of 9 to 10 September 1939 a transport of 630 Czechs the so-called Protectorate-Prisoners arrived at Dachau. This group was composed of representatives of political, public and cultural life that had been taken on 1 September 1939 as hostages into custody. During the evacuation of the camp they were sent to Buchenwald. The vast majority of Czechs who were brought to Dachau until the war ended, had been arrested for or of suspected resistance activity.[During my own military activity in Czechoslovakia we pasted written warnings onto window panes with the warning we will take and execute hostages on the ratio 1:3 if any of us is shot sic]
About 17 Poles arrived on the 16 September 1939, they were the first, an additional 54 followed on 23 September. These were mainly Functionaries that had belonged to cultural and other organizations of the minorities living in Germany. The Administration classified them as "Heckenschützen" (Snipers)[which seems rather far fetched sic] and locked them into the Bunker where they received rather harsh and brutal treatment. The majority of deportees came mainly from the new "germanized" Reichsgauen, between March 1940 and years ending 1940 a total of 13377 Poles arrived at Dachau.
Up to the year 1938 the number of Jewish inmates in Dachau hardly exceeded a two figure number. However, since the annexation of Austria, when at the end of May and within the frame work of the "Aso-Aktion" in 1938 the transportation of Jews commenced, this figure increased dramatically. Between September 23rd and 24th a total of 2282 Jewish prisoners were shipped to Buchenwald from Dachau.
After the pogroms started at the 9th and 10th of November 1938 more than 10,000 Jewish prisoners arrived at Dachau and the next day their number increased to 11911 of which 3700 were from Austria. The total number of Jewish  prisoners in Dachau reached on the 1st  December 14232. The recording procedures, combined with the usual humiliations, stretched over several days. The supplies to feed them had stalled, and the starving  prisoners had to endure during the day the arbitrariness of the SS men on the Appellplartz and go through the usual humiliation standing at attention and often received a taste of punishments until it was their turn to be registered. At night they were housed in sparsely furnished barracks. As a way out of this hell, the Nazis gave the Jewish inmates the choice in waiving their rights to property and other assets they had in exchange for a passport and permit to leave the country and emigrate. This was already part of the so called "Arsierung" of a planned emigration method. End of November 1938 began the gradual release of those that were able to leave.
From a total of 14232 prisoners the number dropped during December 1938 to 8989, in January 1939 to 7273, in February 5871, in March 4326, and from April it leveled off from between 3300 to 3900. In the thirties, clergymen were only occasionally detained for a short time. Austrian priests were transported in greater numbers to Dachau. When the first "Pfaffen" (priests) arrived they were exposed to a considerable amount of viciousness and cruelty from the SS. By the end of 1938 their number increased to fourteen.  During the year 1939 saw an  additional  eight Austrian priest. From the end of 1940 all priests were consolidated from other  concentration camps and sent to Dachau. By the end of the Nazi rule a total of 2720  priests were deported to Dachau from 20 nations. The majority,1870 were Poles. The second largest group with 447 persons were the Germans, followed by French (156) and Czechs (109). At the beginning of 1941 in block 26, a chapel was set up. The altar consisted of a small table covered with a bed sheet, two wooden candle holders, a tiny cup, a wooden monstrance and a cross. The windows of the chapel were painted, so no one could see into the barrack and surrounded by a wire fence. The entrance of the chapel was only allowed to the clergy. The first Mass was held on 20th of January 1941. Over time the prisoners improved and  completed the provisional establishment of the chapel. They adorned with a carved wooden cross and pictures of the Station of the Cross. From pieces of tin cans they made a monstrance. In March 1941, the SS used priests to dig at the extended Herb Garden, project Friedland II. At the end of March, they were removed from these work details and assigned for the distribution of meals covering the entire camp. Since the 11 April 1941 priests got a bigger bread ration, better food and in general conditions improved for them.
Larger convoys arrived since 1943, when the Nazis began to deport the working age population from the areas behind the advancing front as laborers into concentration camps.Soon the Soviet prisoners were the second largest nationality group. They were the poorest of victims singled out for SS terror, and were designated as part of the camp pariahs. Among them were the highest proportion of successful and not successful escape attempts, and most of those executed for sabotage came from their ranks. In October 1941 the barracks 17-29 were prepared for the reception of Soviet POW's and surrounded by a tall wire fence, at the entrance gate a sign went up with the inscription Kriegsgefangenlager  "Prisoner Of War Camp". The inside of the barracks were stripped of nearly everything  and 250 beds installed in each room without mattresses or blankets.Although accommodation for at least 7000 prisoners of war was made, provided each would have its own bed, the entire actions failed in as much that only a few hundred arrived due to their catastrophic physical condition.
The first mass executions of Soviet prisoners of war commenced on the 27th August 1941. Due to the difficulty to keep the killings secret, they were moved to the nearby shooting range at Hebertshausen.  It first took place there on the 4th September 1941, followed by two to three times a week of  further executions.The bodies were cremated in both Dachau and Munich crematoriums and the ashes deposited in a collective grave. After a transitional period the SS-men had the executed men burned in the Dachau crematorium only, a Jewish work team was used there whose members were always killed after a certain time. The members of this work team was housed in the bunker and did not come into contact with other inmates.[Normally the Wehrmacht did not send Prisoners of War to a concentration camp unless these Russians were Political Commissars, which according to a Führer-Befehl would be executed sic]
About three-quarters of the executed Soviet POWs were from prison camps of the Military District XII (62 officers' camp in Hammelburg, Gestapo Office Regensburg)
and transported to Dachau. The executions took place until about mid June 1942. One has to estimate that the total of victims that perished this way amounted to 4500.
In mid-February 1944, 31 Soviet Air Force officers were transported to Dachau, who had risked a common attempt to escape from another prison camp.On the 22nd of February they were killed inside the crematorium building by a Genickschuss (shot through the neck). These execution took place only days before the order of "Kugelentlass"(Bullet- Regulation) of March 1944 was released, which stated that all Officers and non-working NCO caught during an escape attempt, with the exception of British and American prisoners of war shall be the responsibility of the head of the Security Police and SD for execution in the Mauthausen concentration camp.

OTHER NATIONALITIES AND MINORITIES

Gypsies were used in part together with the Jewish inmates to work on cultivating the plantation. In the second clearing of the camp in late September 1939, a part of them went to Buchenwald, another lot was sent to Mauthausen where they remained. Much of the Sinti and Roma arrived1944 from KZ- Natzweiler which was evacuated and brought to Dachau. 200 of them took up work in the Satellite Camp outside Munich-Riem. On 14 November 1944, a large transport with 156 Gypsies from Budapest arrived, and on November 30th a total of 242 Sinti and Roma are registered as "Abgänge"(Departures) from Dachau, where to is not mentioned.. Prisoners from other countries that were occupied by Germany  in 1940 and 1941, were initially arriving singly only or deported in small groups to Dachau. Mass deportations took place from the year 1942. The first French prisoners were from Alsace-Lorraine. From 1941 the French made up only a small number who had committed minor crimes like work sabotage. At the end of September 1943 there were approximately 150 French citizens in the camp. Mass deportations did not commence until the summer of 1944, on or about 21st June  of 1944, a transport from Compiegne with 2140 people arrived and other larger transports followed,  the French prisoners subsequently became one of the largest groups in Dachau.  French-speaking inmates in particular, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germans from Alsace and Lorraine were trying to help them to settle in. Within a short period a total of 14076 French prisoners came in, some were subsequently deported to Auschwitz. Shortly before the liberation on 26th April 1945 a total of 5387 French inmates were registered at Dachau of which a large part stayed mainly in satellite  camps located at Munich-Allach. In the declining days of the Reich a number of evacuation trains arrived between the 18th and 29th April 1945 that came to Dachau with 2909 French prisoners which were apparently not all listed in the inmate inventory as at 26th April 1945.
The first 17 Belgians came to Dachau in 1940, four more in the course of the following year. It was not until the summer of 1942 that transports were made in larger numbers, All together a total of 1756 Belgians went through the camp. They consisted of various ethnic groups and formed a cohesive unit and maintained good relations as well as contact with other inmates. A total of 945 Belgians internees was processed through the system before the end of the war.  A number came sporadically from the Netherlands in the first years of the war until the end of 1941 Dachau held only 26  there. Most were taken into custody in connection with the landings of the Allies in Normandy. When the typhus epidemic in early 1945 broke out  they were the first to come forward and registered as blood donors. Before liberation there were 836 of them in Dachau. On March 25, 1942 about 17 Luxemburg  policemen arrived at Dachau, young men who had served for their country before the German occupation in the "Freiwilligenkompanie" (Volunteer Company). They were arrested because they refused to swear allegiance to Adolf Hitler. To the very last days there were 211 prisoners from Luxemburg in Dachau.
 As a result of the rise of the partisan movement in Yugoslavia a proportion of them came to Dachau in 1942. In January 1943 they numbered over 800, this figure did rise to about 3000 later on. A total of 7583 Yugoslav's had been interned they were held and categorized as Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. Block 24 which held most of them was called by other inmates as the "Partisanenblock". Among the Yugoslav's were also some children that had been helpers to the partisans and thus taken into custody. Schooling in some cases was provided by their own teachers.
 Mid September 1943 the first transport of 1857 Italian prisoners arrived and were housed into a Block that normally held 200 people. The SS-Administration treated them very similar as the Russian inmates as far as cruelty was concerned.[General Badoglio had sided with the Allies sic] On September 24th 1943 a group of Greeks in British uniforms arrived. Apart from these only those that had been forced as slave laborers stayed in the camp. Prior to the liberation there were 334 Greeks in Dachau. On the 11th of December 1943 about 80 Albanians arrived, a total of 200 people of Albanian nationality had been processed, by April 26th 1945 there were 44 only of them present. Bulgarians were very few inside the camp and came out of the number of the so called "Fremdarbeiter" (Foreign Workers within Germany) that would have been detained for various misdemeanors. During the night of December 15th 1944 51 Bulgarian students that attended the High School in Bratislava were taken into custody and deported  to Dachau, where five of them perished.[Bratislava is located in Czechoslovakia unless they studied there, the researcher got this wrong sic]. In addition to these there were 21198 Hungarians including 17604 Jews incarcerated at KZ Dachau.

THE INTEGRATION OF CONCENTRATION PRISONERS INTO THE WAR EFFORT FROM 1942

The year 1941/42 brought an ominous development for Germany of the war. The regime was faced with the task of changing the entire economy, which had previously focused on a blitzkrieg production to an outdrawn process . The problems within the armament industry was expected to be solved through the use of concentration camp inmates. However, due to the high mortality rate in the concentration camps and the catastrophically ill-health of the emaciated prisoners was not the solution the Rüstungsindustrie (War Effort) wanted.Commander Alexander Piorkowski, who led after Loritz from February 1940, who did not interfere significantly in the running of the camp in the day to day activities to improve living conditions. The tone was set by the brutal and primitive camp commander Franz Josef Hoffmann and JosefJarolin as well as the orderly officer Seuss. At the head of the prison staff were the hated  camp elders Karl Kapp and Martin Schaferski. From the infirmary in early 1942, the infamous capo Joseph Heiden had been transferred to the Waffen-SS but staff appointed by him remained in charge. Under these conditions arrangements for the improvement for the prisoners, which should have contributed to an increase of its work output were either ignored or done very superficially.
On 1 September 1942 Piorkowski was replaced by Martin Weiß who since 1940 held the position of the camp commander at Neuengamme. Weiß who had known Dachau since its early days, he had first worked there as a security guard and later as Technical Director. From March 1938 to 1940, he had worked as aide to the commanders Loritz and Piorkowski. Now it was under his leadership that he introduced radical changes. Weiß forbade the public beatings, the cruel harassments, the punishments on the posts. The penal company was dissolved. He stopped  the mid-day assembly and reduced the duration of the morning and evening roll calls. Furthermore, he removed the Camp Leader Hoffmann, Rapport Leader Seuss and Camp Elders Kapp and Schaferski from their posts. Shortly after his arrival in Dachau  food parcels were again  permitted for shipments to the prisoners.
[Although Weiß was tried and executed 29.5.1946 sic]All this was for the prisoners an unexpected and surprising change. They believed that the new conditions was the work of Weiß. But Weiß was only following orders which were based on purely economic achievements. Weiß finished his work at Dachau on 31 October 1943, in order to take up on the 4th  November the position as commander of the camp Lublin-Majdanek. As the new camp commander followed Eduard Weiter. The lives of the working prisoners at Dachau had changed under the regime of Weiß. The most important turn for the better were the food shipments whose weight and number were no longer restricted. Some prisoners especially foreign ones  were now very well catered for.Thanks to the solidarity existing between the inmates this  improved the situation for those who received no parcels at all. The Polish Clergy who received food parcels to their requirements founded a kind of charity. They instituted collections, and distributed on the basis of need for food to their fellow countrymen who did not receive any. [they apparently ignored hundreds of inmates that starved to death sic]This also had an impact on Soviet prisoners who had no contact with the homeland, many of them had friends among the prisoners of other nationalities, who helped them along.  Among the prisoners a new ranking system emerged, the barter trade flourished, and who had food could now purchase anything possible, including a "good" work assignment. As a result of the prohibition of harassment and beatings, however, which were never entirely eliminated, there was a marked change for the better between inmate-functionaries and the lower rank of inmates not least helped by the food parcels The capos and members of the camp personnel were predominantly German workers, their families were usually suffering themselves and had very little to spare or nothing at all to send them. They were now dependent on those who formerly belonged to the pariahs of the camp who they had in parts previously mistreated.
Oswald Pohl, Head of the SS Economic Administration in May 1943 issued a regulation on rewards for extraordinary work results for working prisoners. This was done in form of "Premium Tickets" in the value of one to four Reichsmark, you could not purchase food or any type of clothing, but they could be redeemed in a brothel. The brothel in Dachau existed only as of May 11, 1944  and was, however not an incentive to the increase in work performance of inmates.The political establishment of the camp ignored this establishment. At the turn of 1944/45 the brothel was closed.

THE HOSPITAL

The infirmary lacked the most basic and necessary equipment, there was a great shortage of bandages and medicines. Medical attention, with the exception of isolated cases that seemed interesting to SS doctors, did not take place. All work performed was done by orderlies who did not have any training. The sick that soiled their beds were removed. In some blocks beds for this purpose had been set up in the bath houses fitted with shackles. If the victim survived a night even after repeated dousing with cold water, he was killed by an lethal injection next day. The physical remains of prisoners in the mortuary were used as"material"  for hand craft production by inmates. Skeletons were sent to numerous institutes and schools. Scull specimens would be prepared for pathological studies. Also corpses may have been used to make utensils and souvenirs. [I find this statement of the researcher incomprehensible although a source is indicated, the German text reads:"Außerdem wurden möglicherweise aus den Leichen Souvenirs und Gebrauchsgegenstände hergestellt (41)" the author Stanislav Zamecnik is Polish and could be biased.sic]
At the beginning of 1941 (Krätze) a scabies epidemic spread through Dachau, within two months 4000-5000 people had been infected. Most patients however died from pneumonia due to the lack of sub standard accommodation within the isolation wards. The most common diseases in Dachau were cellulitis, hunger edema, diarrhea and tuberculosis. In the TB department in March 1941 an experimental station was established by the German Medical Association, which was led by SS Captain Dr. Rudolf Brachtel. The patients received additional rations of white bread, butter and milk. These allowances were retained for some of the patients even after the dissolution of the trial operation (Versuchsstaion). In addition the infirmary kept the Pneumathorax Apparatus, thus the treatment of TB patients as well as condition in this respect were more favorable at Dachau than in other concentration camps.
On Himmler's request (wish) in  the spring of 1941, all concentration camps had to be included within the" euthanasia program". In Dachau, the first major selection which was part of the "14f13" Aktion (action)  took place on 3rd September 1941. Those that took part in these experiments were the two top experts, Professor Werner Hyde and Professor Hermann Paul Nitsche, who had brought his wife and daughter, also Dr. Gerhard Wischer, Dr.Theodore Steinmeyer, Dr. Rudolf Lonauer and Dr.Victor Ratka from the Psychiatric Hospital at Tiegenhof near Gnesen in the Warthegau. The preselection of "incapacitated" prisoners were broadly held in the infirmary. The selection of inmates  from work blocks took place on the parade ground (Appellplatz). The naked prisoners had to run in front of the Camp Doctors and the assembled members of the Commission. The physical handling of those that had been chosen was done by section capo Heiden who presented them for viewing. This was conducted in the presence of one SS-Camp Doctor and a Depute of the commandant who had to provide pertinent details of each prisoner. Every "Appraiser" singled out and selected about 100 detainees daily. [Göring had a handicapped sister, it is alleged he went and told Hitler to have the euthanasia program stopped sic]

HUMAN GUINEA PIGS

In the year 1941 Germany started to work intensely on the development and construction of fighter jets. Medical knowledge  (Flugmedezin) remained behind the development of
technology because there was no human trials to verify the difficulties whether and under what conditions a person capable of working at great heights and what rescue options for a pressure drop when jumping with a parachute a pilot might have at  high altitude. All these issues were discussed at a Study Seminar (Schulungskurs) in Munich, which was attended by the Air Force Military Physician Dr. Sigmund Rascher. He asked Himmler to provide appropriate testing inmates. The camp provided the medical establishment, the prison staff and the human "test material". The Air Force transferred as a scientific collaborator Dr. Wolfgang Romberg and provided a mobile compression chamber for him. The experiments ran from February to May 1942 and according to Romberg, the experiments were carried out on 10 to 15 inmates. Every trial had been documented in writing and filmed. In the absence of Romberg, Rascher conveniently used the compression chamber for his own, far more radical "scientific" purposes Forschungsprogramme). Of the results of these tests he informed only Himmler. From detailed reports it is clear a number of inmates would have to die stating that this was planned in order to perform autopsy examinations. Himmler was extremely interested in this information. He ordered Rascher to proceed with the tests and also determine whether the subjects were able to be revived after high altitude conditions. In the course of three months apparently 70-80 inmates died in the compression chamber.
 Rashers initiative showed  Himmler a way to increase his prestige by taking advantage of the concentration camps facilities for military medical research. With his order dated 7th July 1942, Himmler therefore established the Institute for Armed Forces Research Science Purposes.(wehrwissentschaftliche). This department was subordinate to Himmlers research facility "Ancestral Heritage Association"(Ahnenerbe e.V.) which he had founded in 1937 and almost exclusively used for medical research in Concentration Camps. Raschers facility at Dachau with the topic of hypothermia experiments were parts of the institute. Later still, the Entomological Institute and the Department of malaria research of Dr. Kurt Plotner was added. Alas another department was incorporated into conglomerate, the Anatomical Institute of Professor August Hirt from Sraßburg. For his experiments with war fare poison gas he received from Dachau at least once "material" for his laboratory tests.
As with the altitude tests, the focus of Rascher's hypothermia experiments was the observation of the dying process and the subsequent autopsy. With onset of winter he began a series of the so-called dry hypothermia trials. The prisoners were tied naked on stretchers, lying outside overnight in the cold. Since the winter of 1942/43 was not severe, Rasher had the victims covered with a bed sheet and every hour cold water poured over them. In a  letter dated February 17th, he reported to Himmler that he had performed the experiments on 30 inmates. The under cooling experiments were completed in May 1943. There were 300-400 trials conducted in which 80-90 people lost their lives.
 In the summer of 1942 the so-called biochemical quality tests commenced. They were based on a notion of Himmlers, who was hoping for an equivalent drug to penicillin. Biochemical acting tablets were used already against cellulites and sepsis, to conduct the trials they which artificially induced to victims by injections of pus.Six Jewish prisoners died in these experiments. Beginning of November 1942 another 29 prisoners died in agony in experiments with sulfonamides.
 After its rapid and hypothermia experiments, the researchers were confronted with the problem of airmen and sailors surviving in sea water: the supply of drinking water. It was decided therefore to examine the invention of an engineer of the Air Force, the Viennese Berka. His agent called Berkatit desalinated sea water, but it only just tested better. On June 7th 1944 Professor Oskar Schroeder Chief of the Medical Department of the Air Force, asked Himmler to provide him with 40 healthy subjects for a period of four weeks, and recommended that the experiments be conducted in the Dachau concentration camp, since the necessary laboratories were available there. Thus 40 young healthy male Sinti and Roma youths were selected from Buchenwald. In Dachau, Wilhelm Beiglböck a lecturer led the experiments. Before starting his military service he worked  as senior physician at the University Hospital of Vienna.There he led a team of three Air Force doctors, three medical officers, chemists, and the in-house nurse.[it is not clear if they assisted him during these experiments sic].  During the tests themselves there were no deaths, but that does not mean that there were no post trial complications resulting in the loss of lives.

THE REMOVAL OF THE DEAD

The traceless removal of the dead was also a problem in Dachau. In 1933 twenty two people were killed. In 1934 the year of the "Roehm Putsch" it had risen to 34 dead, 13 in 1935 and a year later eleven people. In 1937 the number of deaths amounted to 38 The increased mortality in Dachau with the arrival of Jewish transports from Austria in 1938 inresed then rapidly. They did, however, does not compare with the high mortality rate during the war years
In the summer of 1937 the Department of the Reichsführer SS in conjunctions with Camp Commandant Loritz negotiated with the Firm Müller of Munich-Allach for the delivery of  an oven for the cremation of bodies. The outcome of these discussions were not recorded and not known. Up to this time the garage type looking building was used as a Funeral Parlor for the dead.It was equipped with a catafalque, a Christian Cross as well as candle stick holders. The deceased were kept in coffins with the lid nailed down[this not a German practice sic] and after a short service if appropriate taken to Munich for cremation. Mid 1940 the first oven was erected and used . As all deaths had to be reported to the Public Registrar (Standesamt now the Amtsgericht für Tote in Dachau) and to keep the very high mortality rate within the Camp secret from the public the SS established their own Office where Death Certificate were issued.[ I do not know if the Totenbuch was ever shown as  evidence during any War Crimes Tribunals sic]During 1941 this oven did not have the capacity to handle over 2500 dead bodies in addition to the more than thousand Russian POW's that had been shot.[ If you inspect the oven now you will notice that the sidewalls have buckled under the intense heat and are almost convex sic].The building of a new Crematorium commenced early in 1942 and was commissioned spring 1943, its design and efficiency of the so called Baracke X was mainly based due to the high influx of Russian prisoners which was a factor in its final completion. The Gas-chamber, like in all other Concentration Camps was built to use Zyklon B pellets, next to the crematorium was the place of execution where victims were shot through the back of the neck(Genickschuss). Execution by hanging or shooting was the most used method towards the end of the war to eliminate prisoners, while the Gas-chamber if ever used, never for mass homicides. There are reports from survivors that talk of "Trial Gassing".[I did comment on this subject before sic]

SATELLITE CAMPS

The first sub-camp of the Dachau concentration camp was built before the war at Gröbenried. Between 1940 and 1941 fourteen additional satellite camps were added, where prisoners were doing mainly construction and craft work for the SS. In addition, there were numerous clearing and demolition squads as work details. The largest of these with 180 men was located in May 1940 and worked for the SS Junker School in Bad Tö