Why was bergen belsen created

Both the Prisoner Camp and the Residence Camp were split into several different sections, which segregated different groups of prisoners. From July onwards, large amounts of prisoners arrived at the camp. These prisoners totalled approximately 15, people by the end of the year. They were primarily housed in the Residence Camp.

In , Bergen-Belsen started to receive inmates from various other camps across the eastern half of the Third Reich. By March , the prisoner population was approximately 45, prisoners, leading to severe overcrowding in all sections of the camp. One of the few prisoners that managed to escape on a prisoner-exchange from Bergen-Belsen was Ruth Wiener. Whilst incarcerated in Westerbork and then Bergen-Belsen with her mother and two sisters, Ruth recorded her experiences in this diary.

Here, a page shows her address in Bergen-Belsen. This menu is from the boat which took Ruth Wiener and her family to their new lives in America. Ruth later expressed her elation and shock at the amount and quality of the food served on the ship in comparison to the food served in Bergen-Belsen.

After the war, he was detained by the British and put on trial, where he was sentenced to death. Prior to his death, he gave this testimony on the conditions inside the camp. This document is a translation used in the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials. Throughout its existence, conditions inside the Bergen-Belsen were poor, as there was a lack of food, clean water and sanitation.

As a result, disease was common. Despite this, as the Nazis hoped to use some of the prisoners in exchange schemes, there was a higher regard for prisoner welfare than at other camps.

Some prisoners, such as those housed in the Star Camp, were also forced to complete heavy labour — usually on maintaining or expanding the camp. As the prisoners placed at Bergen-Belsen had the potential to be used in exchange schemes with the Allies, many hoped that they would soon be released from the camp. However, in fact, by the end of , the Nazis had exchanged just 2, prisoners out of the , people who passed through the camp. By , Germany was losing the war and the Allies were closing in on their occupied territories.

As the Nazis were pushed into retreat, they ordered the evacuation of concentration camp prisoners in the East to camps within Germany. To solve the problem of the epidemic of diarrhea in the camp, Kramer starved the prisoners. The weakest, unable to keep going, were left to die or were shot.

In August a women's camp was added. From Buchenwald, 4, women prisoners were transferred to the camp and then dispatched to Flossenburg. Most of them returned to Bergen-Belsen, sick or exhausted. On April 15, the camp was liberated by the British. Soldiers were appalled to find 60, prisoners close to death. During the next five days, 14, died, and in the following weeks another 14, succumbed. By early , prisoners would sometimes go without food for days; fresh water was also in short supply.

Sanitation was incredibly inadequate, with few latrines and water faucets for the tens of thousands of prisoners interned in Bergen-Belsen at this time. Overcrowding, poor sanitary conditions, and the lack of adequate food, water, and shelter led to an outbreak of diseases such as typhus, tuberculosis, typhoid fever, and dysentery, causing an ever increasing number of deaths.

In the first few months of , tens of thousands of prisoners died. On April 15, , British forces liberated Bergen-Belsen. The British found around sixty thousand prisoners in the camp, most of them seriously ill.

Thousands of corpses lay unburied on the camp grounds. Between May and April 15, , between 36, and 37, prisoners died in Bergen-Belsen. More than 13, former prisoners, too ill to recover, died after liberation.

After evacuating Bergen-Belsen, British forces burned down the whole camp to prevent the spread of typhus. During its existence, approximately 50, persons died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp complex including Anne Frank and her sister Margot.

Both died in the camp in February or March Most of the victims were Jews. After liberation, British occupation authorities established a displaced persons camp that housed more than 12, survivors. It was located in a German military school barracks near the original concentration camp site, and functioned until The number of SS functionaries in Bergen-Belsen varied over the course of the camp's existence. The SS succeeded in destroying many of the camp's files, including those on personnel.

The tribunal sentenced eleven of the defendants to death, including camp commandant Josef Kramer. Nineteen other defendants were convicted and sentenced to prison terms; the tribunal acquitted fourteen.

On December 12, , British military authorities executed Kramer and his co-defendants. Bardgett, Suzanne, and David Cesarani, editors. Belsen New Historical Perspectives. Portland, OR: Vallentine Mitchell, Herzberg, Abel Jacob. London: I.