Retelling a survivors story: junio 2015

During the World War II, the Nazi regime kept the prisoners of the war in concentration camps, this were camps in which people were detained and kept there, usually under harsh conditions without regard to legal norms of arrest and imprisonment. Concentration camps were an integral feature of the Nazi regime during 1933 and 1945. One of the largest concentration camps made by the Nazis was Auschwitz. It consisted of three main camps: Auschwitz I (in April 1940), Auschwitz II also known as Auschwitz – Birkenau (in October 1941) and Auschwitz III also known as Auschwitz – Monowitz (in October 1942). In this concentration camp, people were forced to work and also as extermination camp. Auschwitz was located in Poland, near the city of Oswiecim. At least 1.1 million people died in this concentration camp (around 90% were Jews). Other people also went to this concentration camp (for example: Poles, Gypsies, Soviet prisoners of war and other people from different nationalities). One of the countries that suffered from war was Czechoslovakia; the Nazis took this country on March 1939. But this occupation of the Nazis was partially settled in September 1938, when the Munich pact was signed, this pact gave Sudentenland (a part of Czechoslovakia where 3 million ethnic Germans lived), but this also gave the Nazis a lot of other resources. With those resources the Czech nation was left vulnerable to complete Nazis domination. The complete domination occurred when Hitler had a meeting with the president of Czechoslovakia, Emil Hacha. During this meeting Hitler threatened Hacha about realizing a bombing raid in Prague, unless he obtained a free passage for the German troops into the rest of Czechoslovakia.

Miso (Michael) Vogel was born in 1923 in Czechoslovakia; in 1949 he was deported to the Novaky camp and then to Auschwitz. In his story, he is describing his arrival to Auschwitz. Vogel said that they had marched them through the gate with whips and beatings and dogs jumping on them. He said that they had come to a huge brick building. He also said that they had shoved them into the huge brick building, and that there had been prisoners and SS telling them what to do next. He said that it had been tables, long tables. He said that the first area, where they had to undress and strip their clothing. He said that there had been hooks behind them. He said that they put the clothing through a piece of wire, hang the clothing up, take their shoes off and put the shoes on the floor. He said that next table were the barbers, the barbers had shaven their head and had shaven the entire body. Vogel said that they had said it was for hygiene. Then, he said that they had moved to another table where the tattooing was done. He explained that the tattoo was done on the left forearm. He said that there had been one person who would rub a little piece of dirty alcohol on their arm and that the other one had the needle with the inkwell, and he would do the numbering. He said that his number was 65,316. He explained that that meant there had been 65,315 people numbered before him, tattooed before him. He said that after the tattooing had been done, they putted them where they had given them the clothing, but not what they had come with. He said that they had given, them a striped brown cap, striped jacket, a pair of striped trousers, a pair of wooden clogs, and a shirt. He explained that they didn’t give them socks or underwear. He said that then the last area, when they had given them the uniforms; they had given them tow strips of cloth. He said that the cloth had bee around six inches long and an inch and a half wide. He said that it had been starred with the Star of David, corresponding with the number on your left forearm. He said that it had been sewn on your left breast and on the right pant leg. He said that the last item, which had been the most important one they received, had been a round bowl. He explained that the bowl had been the lifeblood of your being. He said that without it, you couldn’t get the meager rations that they had got. He also said that the bowl was important because the bathroom facilities had been almost non-excitant.

Its important to retell this testimony because it’s a way to understand how the Nazis treated their prisoners, we can see in Miso Vogel’s testimony that prisoners had almost no bathrooms or food, or that they made dogs jump on them and they beat them. We can see how it is to enter for the first time the concentration camp (knowing you will live there as prisoners). I learn from this testimony that I am very lucky because there is other people how have suffered a lot, because some people have passed very harsh situations. It helps me realize that there are some people that have been treated like animals and that this people lost everything they had. I chose to report this testimony because I found very interesting to see how the people entered the Auschwitz camp and what they had to do.

As a conclusion we can say that Nazis treated their prisoners as animals since the very first day they arrived, that they had nothing inside the camp. We can say that the people who lived there were in some really harsh conditions and they had to live like that for many years.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

"Auschwitz." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Council, 20 June 2014. Web. 08 June 2015. http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005189

"Nazis Take Czechoslovakia." History.com. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 08 June 2015. http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/nazis-take-czechoslovakia

"Auschwitz — Photograph." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Council, n.d. Web. 08 June 2015. http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/media_ph.php?ModuleId=10005189&MediaId=653

"Auschwitz-Birkenau Extermination Camp (Poland)." Auschwitz-Birkenau Extermination Camp (Poland). N.p., n.d. Web. 08 June 2015. http://www.jewishgen.org/ForgottenCamps/Camps/AuschwitzEng.html

lunes, 8 de junio de 2015