After yesterdays’ rousingly emotional roller coaster of the one two three punch of Nazi Germany and Berlin Wall madness we thought to complete the experience with a tour of Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp. It didn’t have the gut impact of the past day’s trip in large part IMO because it was rushed. Not the fault of the tour guide who operated under the time constraint of the tour but the subject matter deserves to not be rushed. And rushed the experience was as we flitted from exhibit to exhibit never fully engaged.
If you do visit take your time which, for better or worse, should be the whole day. The train from Berlin to Oranienburg takes 45 mins each way so plan accordingly.
Netto market at the turnoff to Sachsenhausen. I wonder how it must be to have a house, or a business, or an office so close to such a place? I suppose one gets used to it.
Ironically the Polizei Academy is right next to the old SS guards quarters at Sachsenhausen.
Arbeit Mach Frei – more irony
The gate
The death strip.
The mortuary where medical experiments on living were carried out. Occasionally it was used for autopsies on German prisoners when paperwork needed to be processed. Foreign prisoners who were butchered didn’t need paperwork
Sign for the medical building
Guard tower – naturally it only needed to face in.
Another wonderful Nazi invention. The execution trench. The far side leads to a crematorium
Here the SS executed 10,000 Soviet POWs in March 1945 – evidently because they were worried the Soviets would capture the camp
Some of the Soviet POWs who were shot and executed
In Building Z – the death building. The sink hole in the room is to catch the blood
Remnants of the gas chamber. This was a small one – the big ones are in Auschwitz. To the left is the neck shot building. Prisoners would stand as if to get measured and would be shot through the neck and dragged into the crematorium. Very efficient
A memorial statue built during the East German times, each red triangle represents the country from which the prisoners came. When this was East Germany it was more of a park where you could come and get married.
Punishment block. The 3 posts at the end of the building is where they would hang the odd prisoners
The hanging posts