Photo. Shoes from children reminds of a horrifying crime committed by the Germans under the Second World War. © Travel Explorations.
I almost got paralyst when I watched these small shoes in a glass monter, and it took a while before I were able to walk further. A lot of thoughts stroke through my head. The huge berg of shoes displayed illustrates also the dimension of the killing of childen in the concentration camp and the Holocaust. It`s a shocking testimony of the children`s destiny in Auschwitz that have burned into my memory forever.
I walked around with a constant lump in my throat. It`s impossible to be unaffected walking around the network of barracks, factories and extermination areas in the Auschwitz-Birkenau complex outside Krakow. Photos of victims, human hair, things made of human skin, eyeglasses, artistic objects, clothes, shoes and suitcases from the murdered people tell an incredible sad story. The whole site has been turned into the Museum of Martyrdom. The history is full of paradoxes and details from what happened in the death camps that made me really sick. Inside I burned with the continuing repeating question: why? why? why?
The fate of the children in Auschwitz
The Selection conducted by the Nazis was well organised. To be sent to the right meant slave labour; to the left, the gas chambers. At Auschwitz children were often killed upon arrival. Children born in the camp were generally killed on the spot. Near the end of the war, in order to cut expenses and save gas, cost-accountant considerations led to an order to place living children directly into the ovens or throw them into open burning pits. Children in this camp were also sexual abused.
Based on the partially preserved camp records and estimates, it has been established that there were approximately 232.000 children and young people up to the age of 18 among the 1.3 million or more people deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp.
Photo. Entrance to Auschwitz with the slogan “Arbeit mach frei”. The complex consisting of Auschwitz I, Auschwitz II (Birkenau) and Auschwitz III (Monowitz) is the largest Nazi extermination camp.
This figure includes about 216.000 Jews, 11.000 Gypsies, at least 3.000 Poles, over 1.000 Byelorussians, and significant numbers of Russians, Ukrainians, and others. The majority of them were deported to Auschwitz along with their parents in various campaigns directed against whole ethnic or social groups. Slightly more than 23.500 children and young people were registered in the camp, out of the total of 400.000 registered prisoners (Source: Pañstwowe Muzeum Auschwitz-Birkenau Oœwiêcimiu – The Memorial and Museum Auswitch Birkenau). For more detailed information: Website (click here)
The children were the most innocent and helpless of all, but the German Nazis didn`t spare almost any of them in the war time. From all occupied areas, children were deported to Auschwitz since 1942. Small kids were usually killed immediately because they were too young to work. Mothers who held their babies in their arms were gassed together with the children. A child made a mother look like "unable to work". Also grandmothers, who were with their grandchildren, were killed.
Horrifying experiments
Josef Mengele (16 March 1911 – 7 February 1979) was a German SS officer and a physician in the Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. He was known as the Angel of Death. Mengele used Auschwitz as an opportunity to continue his research on heredity, using inmates for human experimentation. He was particularly interested in identical twins of children. Most of the victims died, either due to the experiments or later infections.
The gate to hell
All over the world, Auschwitz has become a symbol of terror, genocide, and the Holocaust. Auschwitz was established by Germans in 1940, in the suburbs of Oswiecim, a Polish city that was annexed to the Third Reich by the Nazis. Its name was changed to Auschwitz, which also became the name of Konzentrationslager Auschwitz.
After a while mass murder became a daily routine. Trains rolled in to the camps on a daily basis and the stench of burnt bodies regularly filled the air. The Nazis turned killing into an industry. People become killed through gassing, starvation, disease, shooting, and burning. The harsh work requirements, combined with poor nutrition and hygiene, led also to high death rates among the prisoners.
Auschwitz-Birkenau was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1979. This camp was the most important of the six death camps established by Nazi Germany to implement its Final Solution policy. Its aim was mass murder of the Jewish people in Europe.
For me Auschwitz is the symbol of everything that is irrational and full of paradoxes. To say it in other words: totally insane.
This article continues in Part 2.
Stein Morten Lund, 30 June 2009
Additional information
Conservation work involved in the cleaning children’s shoes found after the Red Army liberated Auschwitz Concentration Camp in January 1945. The conservation of the children’s shoes was awarded a prize as Museum Event of the Year in 2005. About 80 thousand shoes, including some 8 thousand children’s shoes, were preserved in the years 2003-2005. The conservation of the children’s shoes was awarded a prize as Museum Event of the Year in 2005.
Source: Pañstwowe Muzeum Auschwitz-Birkenau w Oœwiêcimiu: Read more about the conservation of children’s shoes:
Article about children`s shoes.
Article 2 about children`s shoes
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