70
years ago on this date, May 5, 1945, Mauthausen-Gusen Concentration Camp was
liberated by American Forces. I will post information about this Nazi
Concentration Camp from Wikipedia and other links.
 |
| Gate to the garage yard in the Mauthausen concentration camp |
Other names
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Mauthausen, Gusen
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Location
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in and around Mauthausen and Gusen, Upper Austria
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Operated by
|
DEST cartel and the Nazi Schutzstaffel (SS)
Soviet Red Army (after World War II) |
Commandant
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Franz Ziereis
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Operational
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August 1938 – May 1945
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Number of inmates
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mainly Soviet and Polish citizens
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Killed
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between 122,766 and 320,000 (estimated)
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Liberated by
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US Army, May 1945
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Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp was the hub of a large group of German
concentration camps that was built around
the villages of Mauthausen and Gusen in Upper Austria, roughly 20 kilometres
(12 mi) east of the city of Linz. The camp operated from the time of the Anschluss,
when Austria was annexed into the German Third Reich in early 1938, to the
beginning of May 1945, at the end of the Second World War. Starting with a
single camp at Mauthausen, the complex expanded over time and by the summer of
1940 Mauthausen had become one of the largest labour camp complexes in the
German-controlled part of Europe, with four main subcamps at Mauthausen and
nearby Gusen, and nearly 100 other subcamps located
throughout Austria and southern Germany, directed from a central office at
Mauthausen.
As
at other Nazi concentration camps, the inmates at Mauthausen-Gusen were forced
to work as slave labour, under conditions that caused many deaths. The subcamps
of the Mauthausen complex included quarries, munitions factories, mines, arms
factories and plants assembling Me 262 fighter aircraft. In January 1945, the camps
contained roughly 85,000 inmates. The death toll remains unknown, although most
sources place it between 122,766 and 320,000 for the entire complex.
The
Mauthausen-Gusen camp was one of the first massive concentration camp complexes
in Nazi Germany, and the last to be liberated by the Allies. The two main
camps, Mauthausen and Gusen I, were labelled as "Grade III" (Stufe
III) camps, which meant that they were intended to be the toughest camps
for the "Incorrigible political enemies of the Reich". Mauthausen
never lost this Stufe III classification. In the offices of the RSHA (Reichssicherheitshauptamt)
it was referred to by the nickname Knochenmühle – the bone-grinder
(literally bone-mill). Unlike many other concentration camps, which were
intended for all categories of prisoners, Mauthausen was mostly used for extermination
through labour of the intelligentsia – educated people and members of the
higher social classes in countries subjugated by the Nazi regime during World
War II. The main camp of the complex in Mauthausen is now a museum, some of its
subcamps also turned into memorials.
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