Auschwitz 3

Two books that I am currently reading are Miklos Nyiszli’s “I Was Doctor Mengele’s Assistant,” and Primo Levi’s “If This Is A Man.” The two differ not just in content but in tone. Though not himself an especially sympathetic individual, Nyiszli provides detail of the heart of Auschwitz 2: Birkenau, the gas chamber/crematoria complex, as well as the relationship of his superior, Mengele, to the whole. Levi, who on arrival was sent on to Auschwitz 3: Monowitz-Buna, an industrial slave labour camp close to the other sites, gives, on the other hand, a thoughtful recounting of his introduction to and daily struggle to survive the brutal conditions of the work camp. Both men came to Auschwitz in 1944: Levi, about the beginning of March from Italy, and Nyiszli, in May from Hungary. On January 27, 1945 the 7,000 prisoners still alive in the camp were discovered by Soviet forces moving eastward toward Germany. The survival of both men was at least in part due to their relatively short period in the camps though death came to many quickly and without preamble. I will write at another time about the conditions of their survival. Their subsequent writings are important documents for an understanding of the day-to-day working of the different sections of Auschwitz, and, especially with those of Levi, thoughtful reflections on the effects of such incarceration upon human beings.

Nyiszli arrived at Auschwitz 2: Birkenau in the company of 26 other physicians, 8 pharmacists, their wives, children, and parents. Their boxcar was one of 40 carrying about 4,000 Hungarian Jews. Mengele, a young SS officer, was in charge of the process of greeting. Under his orders, other SS troops separated men from women and children into two long groups. Speaking with calm, reassuring voices the SS told the newcomers that they were being sent to be bathed and would be reunited with their families later. Next the lines filed singly by Mengele who with a hand gesture sent some to the left and some to the right. To the left went mainly women with children, the ill, infirm, and the elderly. To the right, a smaller group, those who looked capable of work. Those on the left were taken further along the path beside the train and eventually disappeared behind a clump of trees, through a gate leading to the crematoria. Mengele addressed the group of physicians who remained, asking for an experienced pathologist. Nyiszli stepped forward.

Mengele himself took Nyiszli by car to one of the many areas within the camp structure: Camp F. Here his personal information was written onto an index card by one of the prisoner-doctors of that camp; his clothes were taken; he was bathed, shaven of all hair; tattooed with his camp identification: A8450; and given fresh, civilian clothing. Through slats in his boxcar when arriving, Nyiszli had seen the enormity of the Birkenau facility and the hundreds of one-story barracks laid out in straight lines from the central axis of the railroad’s pathway. On the disembarking platform he had noticed the enormous chimneys further on, spouting flames, with smoke that filled the air with the stench of burning hair and meat. He realized that they were massive crematoria. Nyiszli remained in Camp F for a few days until he had proven his worth to Mengele by performing some autopsies for him. In the meantime he learned a great deal about Birkenau from the block overseer, a former career criminal, and the doctors of Camp F with whom he lived and slept.

Tens of thousands of prisoners were kept in barracks within tightly confined spaces. All were awakened by dawn by other prisoners, forced out of their barracks regardless of weather, and forced to stand in file for roll call rituals that could take hours. Those who died during the night would be brought out and laid at the back. He saw the “Gypsy camp,” an enclosure of about 4500 people allowed to live together in the barracks as families. Their sole responsibility was the policing of neighbouring Jewish camps and barracks, where Nyiszli states, “they exercised their authority with unimaginable cruelty.” One despised “race” set upon another. Within the Gypsy camp was the experimental barracks, as it was on these people that Mengele and his co-workers focused their so-called research. Identical twins were closely examined and compared with one another. If one died from any cause (or was murdered), his or her twin was immediately murdered with an injection directly into the heart. Autopsies were conducted on both – one of the functions for which Nyiszli had been chosen. There was a curiosity about multiple births, an idea that if its mechanism could be understood, that German women could produce more offspring for the Reich. Another focus was on dwarfs and others with unusual deformities. Their skeletons were preserved and sent to the genetic studies offices in Berlin. Nyiszli began to realize their conceived function: to show future generations of Germanic conquerors why degenerate races had to be destroyed: to prevent their contamination of the purity of Aryan blood.

Having proven his worth to Mengele, Nyiszli was taken on his third day in the camp to an area farther along the unloading ramp, through a locked gate, and into a spacious lawn courtyard. Central to this area was a redbrick building with its chimney spewing flames. He was to reside and work at Crematorium 1. Nyiszli was given a pleasant room to himself, a modern dissecting room, clothing as he wished from the storeroom, and food from the SS kitchen; he was not obliged to attend roll call, nor was he answerable to anyone but Mengele himself. Aside from his laboratory work and autopsies, he was to provide medical care to the 120 SS men and 860 Sonderkommando prisoners who lived and worked in the four crematoria premises. He was to visit all of the sick daily and report their numbers and conditions to the commander of the crematoria. He could move without escort among the four crematoria and was given all medicines, instruments, and dressings necessary for his work.

On his first evening at the crematorium Nyiszli was invited to have supper with the Sonderkommandos who were not on duty. Their space was a large corridor with single beds on either side; each bed was covered with silk. Some of the prisoners were asleep – half the Kommandos rested while the others worked their shift. The crematoria functioned continually, 24 hours a day. The Kommandos were able to take anything they wanted from the transports: clothing, bedding, books, food, and alcohol. The dining table was covered with a lovely cloth and laid with fine porcelain dishes. With them Nyiszli enjoyed fine food, cigarettes, and tea laced with rum. In conversation with his hosts he learned the history of the crematoria: they had been built out of stone and concrete two years earlier by tens of thousands of prisoners who had been driven in all weather and on little food. As these men fell by the wayside from exhaustion or brutality, newly arrived workers were put in their places. When the furnaces were completed, the workers themselves were among their first victims.

The position that the Sonderkommandos found themselves in when chosen for crematoria duty seemed preferable to that of the ordinary prisoner in the camp. Their initiation showed them clearly its limitation, however. The first job of every newly selected Kommando force was to disrobe and burn the members of the previous group who, earlier had been surrounded and shot by a squad of SS troops. Each group lasted about four months and was then replaced. Nyiszli had no illusions that he would not share a similar fate when the time came. No prisoner could be allowed to leave the crematoria except as they quipped, “up the chimney.” The secrets of Birkenau were absolutely to remain there.

The next day Nyiszli observed the entire procedure from the introduction of “the selected” to the crematorium facility to its finale: the removal of ashes. The thousands of people brought there that day had been told that they were to enter a rest camp. Accompanied by SS men, they came through the gate to the facility and walked along the pathway to concrete steps leading underground. A notice board in several languages announced a bathing and disinfecting facility. The group of about 3000 people then entered a large, brightly lit chamber about 200 meters long. Benches and above these, hangers for clothing were distributed about the sides of the room and at columns. They were to undress and to tie their clothing and shoes carefully, memorizing the number of the bench near where it was left. Confusion at the order to undress among all of these people – men, women, and children – was stilled when the order was given again, this time urgently and with impatience. SS men at the far end of the room opened the large doors and the now naked people crowded into the next room, half the size of the original. In the center were pillars with metal conduits and a kind of latticework down their sides. The SS and Sonderkommandos left and the doors were slammed shut. The lights went out. Outside a van arrived with two officers with four green tins. They crossed over to the flat roof of the shower room, donned gas equipment, and poured the greenish-coloured beans down the shaft. Zyklon B vapourizes on contact with air. Within seconds the room was filled with gas and within five minutes all were dead.

After twenty minutes extractor fans were turned on to dissipate the gas. Lorries arrived on which some Sonderkommandos began to load the people’s clothing; these would later be sorted, disinfected, and sent to German distribution centres. Sonderkommandos wearing gas masks and rubber boots hosed the bodies down with jets of water. Each body was then separated from the pile and pulled to a lift outside the chamber. When the number of bodies reached about 25 the lift would take them up to the area of the ovens. Here another squad took them from the lift and down to one of 15 burning ovens. Before placing them in the oven, however, their heads were shaved and any gold teeth extracted. Rings or chains were removed and placed through a slit in a locked case. Nyiszli estimated that about 8-10 kilos of gold were collected daily in each crematorium. After this final indignity, bodies were placed onto metal stretchers and were tipped into the white-hot flames. Ashes in the courtyard were loaded onto lorries and driven to the Vistula to be dumped.

I know that these details are very difficult to read about. Nonetheless they are what was done to over a million people who arrived in boxcars from 1942 until the crematoria were destroyed in 1944. Over the next months Nyiszli learned further things about the functioning of the camp. He entered into a conspiracy with some of the Sonderkommandos to document the criminal activities of the camp and to find a way of communicating with the outside world. He was also present for the rebellion of Kommando 12. I will write more about these things in my next post.