Skip to main content

A German concentration camp was no place for women

A German concentration camp was no place for women.


but the Germans thought otherwise, and designed KL Ravensbrück precisely as a place for women.

The camp, for years hidden behind the Iron Curtain and overshadowed by places like Auschwitz, received only cursory mentions in the literature on German Nazi terror. 

However, to quote author Sarah Helm, “Just as Auschwitz was the capital of the crime against Jews, so Ravensbrück was the capital of the crime against women.”
 
Over 100,000 of them went through Ravensbrück, and between 30,000 and 92,000 died there. They came from 30 countries, but the largest group were 40,000 Poles. 

In the six years of its existence, the camp and the population of the inmates grew severalfold, spawning nearly forty sub-camps, to great satisfaction of Heinrich Himmler, the camp founder.

The women were worked to death, beaten, shot, hanged, gassed and experimented on, and most of the dozens of Polish “Beinoperierte” who had their leg muscles cut or bones splintered – the wounds then infected to test treatment methods – either died as a result or were crippled for life. 

That was the work of Karl Gebhardt, the personal doctor to Heinrich Himmler, the camp founder.

As for children and babies – this wasn’t a place for them either, and those who were unfortunate enough to end up or be born here, disappeared quickly. 

Girls were sterilised, and newborns either drowned or starved to death. 

Ten kilometres away, in Brückentin, happy Fräulein Potthast raised the son she’d borne to Heinrich Himmler, the camp founder. 

Finally, on 30 April 1945, KL Ravensbrück was liberated by the Soviets, who found here fewer than 3,000 completely emaciated inmates – the rest removed on death marches in previous days. 

Only then did the six years of atrocities, abuse, humiliation, hunger, cold, despair, hopelessness and heartbreak finally end.  

 Don’t be fooled by KL Ravensbrück’s idyllic location on the Lake Schwedt: the only contact the inmates had with it was when their ashes were dumped in the water.

thank you for reading.

don't forget to leave your thoughts in the comment section below.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A great story about a little bit of 'humanity' during a terrible war.

A great story about a little bit of 'humanity' during a terrible war.                                                                                      In April 1945, 2nd Lt. Peter During was a South African fighter pilot (N.7 Squadron) running missions over Italy when his Spitfire was shot down by German AA fire. He managed to crash land his plane behind enemy lines where he was immediately captured.   Whilst been escorted to a German Lufwaffe Prisoner of War (POW) camp (he was a pilot and thus his interrogation and imprisonment was the responsibility of the German airforce), he opened a conversation with his captors. He was quickly able to establish that they could already see the writing on the wall, that the war was at an end and Germany would lose it. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

French woman accused of sleeping with Germans during the occupation has her head shaved by vindictive neighbors in village near Marseilles.

French woman accused of sleeping with Germans during the occupation has her head shaved by vindictive neighbors in village near Marseilles.  Antony Beevor wrote: "... In Paris, there were cases of prostitutes kicked to death for having accepted German soldiers as clients. (...) A large number of the victims were prostitutes who had simply plied their trade with Germans as well as Frenchmen, although in some areas it was accepted that their conduct was professional rather than political, others were silly teenagers who had associated with German soldiers out of bravado or boredom.  In a number of cases, female schoolteachers who, living alone, had German soldiers billeted on them, were falsely denounced for having been a "mattress for the boches. (...) Women accused of having had an abortion were also assumed to have consorted with Germans.  Many victims were young mothers, whose husbands were in German prisoner-of-war camps. During the war, they often had no means of supp...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Nazis assassinate Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss in a failed coup attempt.

The Nazis assassinate Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss in a failed coup attempt.  Engelbert Dollfuß (4 October 1892 – 25 July 1934) was an Austrian Fatherland Front politician who served as Chancellor of Austria between 1932 and 1934.  Having served as Minister for Forests and Agriculture, he ascended to Federal Chancellor in 1932 in the midst of a crisis for the conservative government.  In early 1933, the so called "Selbstausschaltung des Parlaments" happened, which made the Austrian parliament unable to govern.  Suppressing the Socialist movement in February 1934 during the Austrian Civil War and later banning the Austrian Nazi Party, he cemented the rule of authoritarian conservatism through the First of May Constitution.  Dollfuss was assassinated on 25 July 1934 by a group of Austrian Nazis, who entered the Chancellery building and shot him in an attempted coup d'état.  During mass trials which took place after the coup, Hudl was sentenced to li...
Post a Comment
Read more