Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp

Arriving at Auschwitz I.

I have to say, that Deb and I visited Dachau Concentration Camp outside of Munich about 4 years ago.  I guess I didn't know what to expect then...but I do today.  My stomach is in knots and I feel sick and anxious.  If we do not want history to repeat itself we HAVE to remember.

Auschwitz-Birkenau was the largest of all the concentration camps.  It's main focus was not to imprison but to exterminate.  The word stabs at the heart.  

Ethnic cleansing of the innocent Jewish population of Europe and everyone else deemed an "inferior nation" by the Nazis.

Almost 80 years later and I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY!!!  How could this have happened in a civilized world.  My heart breaks.

Tears already and I haven't even begun to share my photos of this horrific place.

I want to say in advance, there were many things Deb and I saw that we did not take photos of.  Out of respect for the dead and for anyone else who reads this blog, you can chose to see it in person if you wish.  

Most of the photos speak volumes...no words necessary.

The "Arbeit Macht Frei" gate which many thousands walked through at Auschwitz I.

"Work Will Set You Free."

Walking on this ground is unsettling and sad to say the least.

From June 1940 - June 1945 Auschwitz-Birkenau was situated in occupied Poland.

Before the war, beginning in 1933, concentration camps in Germany were already imprisoning political prisoners, Jehovah Witnesses, German homosexuals, and many others.

After the war started, Germany began building concentration camps in the countries they defeated and occupied.

Before the war 80% of Europe's Jewish people lived in Poland... about 3,500,000.

One out of every 5 Polish citizens dead.  90% of the dead were civilians.

Six million Jews were murdered by the Nazi, by the end of WWII.

By the end of the War only 300,000 Polish Jews survived.

Today only about 10,000 Jews live in all of Poland.

"Auschwitz-Birkenau is not your standard museum of martyrdom.  It is a place of murder.  It is a cemetery.  For eternity it must remain a burning wound for humanity.  We must make every effort that...(in) the words of the Book of Job, cherished by Christians and Jews alike, are fulfilled at this Memorial Site:  'Earth do not cover my blood;  may my cry never be laid to rest!" (Job 16:18)

A quote from an address for the 66th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the President of the International Auschwitz Council, former inmate of Auschwitz, Professor Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, 27 January 2011.

A view of "Judenrampe" which was the main place of arrivals at Auschwitz II-Birkenau.

"The origin of the "Final Solution," the Nazi plan to exterminate the Jewish people, remains uncertain.  What is clear is that the genocide of the Jews was the culmination of a decade of Nazi policy, under the rule of Adolf Hitler."  a quote from the Auschwitz Museum.

Regardless of age, sex or views, all, including children, were to be killed.

Many immediately after arriving at this train station with this view....Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

Our tour group and others are walking towards the 'selection process' and gas chambers, as the Jews did.  

They were told prior to boarding the train cars, (from the Jewish Ghettos, travelling from every corner in Europe), to leave their luggage on the platform as it will follow them later.  A lie.  Here, at the train platform at the camp, they are told they will be going into the 'showers' and will be 'processed' 

before going to their barracks.  Another lie so that there would be no panic.

More than half a million Jews were transported here.  As well as tens of thousand Poles, Roma, and Soviet prisoners of war.

What is left of one of the crematoriums.  The Germans blew them up when the Russians were breaking through their defences and liberating Poland.

14,000 prisoners were kept at Auschwitz I with another 100,000 at Birkenau.

1.1 million people were murdered here...approximately 960,000 of them were Jewish.

It is beyond comprehension....unspeakable inhumanity.

A Star of David etched into the wall of one of the barracks.

At the end of 1944, the Germans began destroying evidence of the crimes of what they had done.  Files and lists of the deported Jews.  The items, property that they took from the prisoners were shipped to other areas, and the last of it was burned in the storehouses on the site.

Mid January 1945, as the Red Army was approaching 56,000 prisoners were forced into a 'Death March' which resulted in more than 9,000 deaths.

January 27th, 1945 the Soviet Army liberated the remaining 7,500 prisoners at Auschwitz-Birkenau.

All Polish students come at least once when they are 14 years old and often again at the end of high school.  We saw a lot of students from Israel here visiting.  Families, young people, older people, disabled people, every nationality....

It is now mandatory to make a reservation for a timed, tour of Auschwitz I before you arrive.  The amount of people coming still after 80 years is outstanding and moving.

Flowers, candles, notes, are left in remembrance.

I will not forget.

For more information on visiting or reading about Auschwitz-Birkenau,  you can go online to

www.auschwitz.org