Mauthausen
Seventy
years ago, on 5 May 1945, Mauthausen Concentration camp was liberated.
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| Liberation and Liberators, seventy years ago. |
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| The huts and the entrance. |
Winter was
a fitting time to visit. Bleak, grey, depressing. Thousands of people were sent
here, never to return.
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| No escape |
Mauthausen
death camp was the site of a quarry, where stone was hewn to build in nearby
Linz, (Hitler’s birthplace). It was opened late, in 1938, and was liberated
late in 1945. Many occupants of other death camps were forcibly marched to
Mauthausen, once other camps had been liberated. The 186 steps from the camp to
the quarry, die Todsstiege, became a symbol for the survivors. Mauthausen was a grade
III camp, meaning that inmates were never released. At least at other camps,
Arbeit Macht Frei, gave the illusion that hard work might one day have its
reward of freedeom.
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| Sign to the Death Stairs |
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| The Stairs of Death |
During the Second War, Messerschmidt war planes were secretly built at the quarry.
After the
assassination of Haydrich, one of the architects of the ‘final solution’ those
who might had harboured the soldiers who carried out the killing were taken to
Mauthausen, if they weren’t shot beforehand.
Bleak,
cold, sad. Who were the thousands of people who suffered and died in the Death
Camp?
Then came
the photos. All incoming inmates to the camp were photographed. When the SS
knew the Allies would liberate the camp, all records of the camp inmates were
destroyed.
What I saw
at the camp exhibition were hundreds of familiar names and face. Spanish names
and faces. Good, handsome young men. All died at Mauthausen.
This brought things home. Rocognisable names and faces. ‘We are people, not beasts.’ One inmate recalled shouting to the SS guards. Many inmates had clerical roles had the camp.
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| Spanish prisoner |
More than 23000 Republican prisoners of war were based at Mauthausen. 16000 Spanish prisoners died.
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| Spanish prisoners |
Two clerks were in charge of the dark-room, where photographs of the prisoners were developed and printed. Three copies of each were to be made. There, secretly and at great risk to their personal safety, printed a secret fourth copy and hid them. These are the photos were are seeing know as all the others had been destroyed. It is thank to the personal bravery of people like Antonio Garcia alonso, that we know what went on at Mauthausen. Francesco Boix gave evidence at the Nuremburg trials in the late 1940s.
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| Memorial boeard to Spanish prisoners. |
In the
exhibition, postcards from 1940s were on exhibit from holiday makers at this
pretty riverside village on the Danube. Did they know what happened at the
quarry a few kilometers up the hillside? In 1943 locals complained to the
military authorities about the smell coming from the camp. Did they talk
mention that they knew that this stench was of burning human corpses?
We must
remember what happened at the death camps, to ensure that nothing like this
ever happens again, or that people forget and question what happened.
Blank photo
for the gas chamber. Why do people want to take photos of this?
Czech
prisoners took any physical evidence home, knowing the SS would destroy as much
as they could. Parts of the the death chambers, the gas tubing, for example
were returned for the exhibition.
15000 Nazi
soldiers worked at Mauthausen in the 7 years it operated. Of those, 200 were
prosecuted. It was known that the SS would cover up crimes that
All this
sounded like a bad dream. But it really did happen. Die Todesstiege (the
deathstps). The 186 steps were a symbol of people walking to their death. Now
it is a symbol of hope.
May is the
70 anniversary of the liberation of Mauthausen. I will remember this place as
constantly bleak and in winter.
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| Camp electric fence. |
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