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Auschwitz–Selected for the Gas Chamber
Hungarian Jewish men, women, and children selected for death in the gas chamber wait in the wooded area next to the killing facility at Auschwitz-Birkenau, Poland. Their numbers dwindled rapidly as they were taken to the gas chamber and crematorium.
Nazi Concentration Camps in Europe, 1933–1945As early as 1933, with Hitler's rise to power, concentration camps were created in Germany. The concentration camp system expanded rapidly; Dachau became its model, and was the only camp that remained in continuous operation from 1933 until 1945. By 1939, six more large concentration camps were established; by the end of the war, over 1,000 camps were in existence.
Six camps were situated in the former Polish territory: Chelmno, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka, Auschwitz-Birkenau, and Majdanek. These were designed as extermination camps. Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest camp, and Majdanek served as both slave labor camps and killing centers. Gassings began in 1941 and continued until January 1945. SS physicians at Auschwitz carried out murderous and horrific medical experiments. The victims at Auschwitz numbered more than 1.1 million Jews from all over Europe; Poles, Gypsies, prisoners of war, and others were also killed there.
In October 1944 at Auschwitz, Nazis made the prisoners blow up one of the gas chambers, destroying the adjacent crematorium. The next month, the SS destroyed the remaining installations as Soviet forces approached. The SS began evacuating Auschwitz and its subcamps in January 1945; 60,000 prisoners were forced out on death marches.
