One of the most exhausting, saddening, and fascinating places I visited in Germany was Dachau Concentration Camp. And I don't mean fascinating in a "positive" way, but more in a "my mind can't even begin to wrap about the truth of this horror" kind of a way. This is a definite must do if you visit Germany. A truth that needs to be told and remembered a thousand times over in honor of the innocent and to truly make sure "Nie Wieder":Never Again. It is just unbelievable to see first hand....nothing like your history books will ever begin to put into true prospective.
Dachau was the first Nazi camp in Germany to open, and was used as a model for others to come. When you walk in, you see the words "Arbeit macht frei" on the front gate, which means "Work makes you free". It was really surreal to walk through those gates while thinking about the thousands of terrified people that walked through those VERY same gates...to meet absolute torture and in many cases, their death. Surreal feeling for sure. And that was just the beginning for my tour; walking through the gates doesn't even touch the reality, emotion & horror that was to come from my visit.
We joined a tour guide for this and it was a 3 hour tour of the camp. He was really passionate about sharing the stories behind this camp and was a great guide. We watched a video that did not hold back. It was very graphic and really makes your stomach turn when you realize you are standing in the very spots that this horror happened. Absolutely disgusting the things that humans can do to one another. The video was so heart-wrenching and disturbing that people in the audience literally started gasping and crying.
The first room we went in was the "waiting room" where prisoners were actually excited because they were told they would get to shower. They were even given soaps to mislead them so they were willing to go into the next room, the gas chamber. This looked like a shower, but instead of water coming out, gas came and killed them in mass quantities. And since the guards didn't want to have to see or deal with it, they had other prisoners come in to clean it up and move them into the next room, which was bodies to be cremated. Below is a picture of the "shower room". I honestly can't even put into words the way I was feeling as I stood in these rooms. No words that I share could really explain it.
The crematories were sickening to see. Can you believe that thousands of people-HUMAN BEINGS-innocent human beings-were literally stuck into these things?? And at Dachau, their first crematory wasn't big enough so they had to build a second, and disgustingly they put them both to use in the years the camp was open. If you look closely in the picture below, you can see chains from the wooden panels. These were used to hang prisoners like an X as torture, or as they await death. UGH. Just GROSS. Sick, sick things happened here. Again, can I really describe the things I learned/saw/felt here? No way. It's a silencing realization that you need to experience first hand.
I learned so much from the afternoon at Dachau. It would take me forever to blog about all of the facts I learned, or the things I saw. It was very informative, though at times also very disturbing. I really gained a lot of knowledge from my trip here. Like I said, I definitely think it is something that every visitor to Germany must do. It is such a devastating part of our world's history, but I think it is important to learn about and to remember. And once again, in the end, I am PROUD to be an American. In 1945, the American troops came in and liberated the prisoners.
Dachau was the first Nazi camp in Germany to open, and was used as a model for others to come. When you walk in, you see the words "Arbeit macht frei" on the front gate, which means "Work makes you free". It was really surreal to walk through those gates while thinking about the thousands of terrified people that walked through those VERY same gates...to meet absolute torture and in many cases, their death. Surreal feeling for sure. And that was just the beginning for my tour; walking through the gates doesn't even touch the reality, emotion & horror that was to come from my visit.
Above is the grounds for roll call.
Inside the prisoners' barracks. The picture above shows their "beds".
The restrooms for prisoners.
The rows and rows of barracks. All have been removed except the two in the front which are set up to view, (where my above pictures came from). "This camp served as a model for all later concentration camps and as a "school of violence" for the SS men under whose command it stood. In the twelve years of its existence over 200.000 persons from all over Europe were imprisoned here and in the numerous subsidary camps. 41.500 were murdered."-from http://www.kz-gedenkstaette-dachau.de/index-e.html.
The trenches so prisoners couldn't escape. If they crossed the border, they would be shot before they could even reach the barbed wire fences. And our guide told us that if a guard disliked a prisoner, he could simply take his cap and throw it in the trench. The prisoner was sure of death at that point: either he reaches for it and gets shot, or he leaves it and is killed at roll call for not having it. Disgusting stories to be told from this place.
As if the tour wasn't sickening enough yet, this last leg of it was the worst. You actually walk through the entire REAL buildings for these parts...not an inch of it has been renovated. You are walking through the real deal where thousands of innocent people stood, were tortured, were killed, were put through the crematory. Silencing to be standing in these rooms.
The first room we went in was the "waiting room" where prisoners were actually excited because they were told they would get to shower. They were even given soaps to mislead them so they were willing to go into the next room, the gas chamber. This looked like a shower, but instead of water coming out, gas came and killed them in mass quantities. And since the guards didn't want to have to see or deal with it, they had other prisoners come in to clean it up and move them into the next room, which was bodies to be cremated. Below is a picture of the "shower room". I honestly can't even put into words the way I was feeling as I stood in these rooms. No words that I share could really explain it.
"Some mornings I wake up and I am so worn out I cannot go to work. I am free but I am still in the concentration camp. You go through it again and again. Whenever I hear singing, God Bless America I have to repeat several times: God bless America. That's freedom. Nobody is going to bother me here anymore."
-Josepn Sher, Cieszanow Camp Survivor
Well-written, as always. You're getting such a lifetime of education over there!
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