Mauthausen con't II

Even in hell, the women somehow had it worse...

"Other than four Yugoslav women whom the SS brought to Mauthausen with 46 men to be shot in April 1942, the first female prisoners in Mauthausen were two dozen women from Ravensbrück, whom the SS transferred to provide sex for favored male prisoners. The women arrived in June 1942 and lived in the first bordello established in the Nazi concentration camp system. Over the next two years, the SS brought a few hundred women to Mauthausen either to kill them or to hold them temporarily in transit before transfer to other camps." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

If you look back to the last post you'll see a photo of the gates and barracks. As I state in the caption, the front portion of those particular barracks housed a sinister operation - the bordello mentioned above where women were systematically raped for the pleasure of the SS guards and favoured prisoners before they were killed. In some instances, women who contracted sexually transmitted diseases from forced sexual slavery were used to test experimental treatments, or studied as they got sicker and sicker.

I feel incredible anger over this particular point. The SS guards were the absolute spawn of the devil, so I can understand how they engaged in such behaviours without conscience, but the other prisoners...with everything they were going through, to think that they would show others also in hell no mercy...How could they?

Aside from the barracks, there are various external sites to the camp - I've already mentioned the quarry - which is outside the gates and down a path - but within the camp itself there are grassy areas where prisoners were kept outdoors year-round (the barracks were only built in the last few years the camp was in operation), the area where the sick were left to die, and the sites of the mass graves, now marked with plaques and religious symbols. As there were thousands of non-Jews who were murdered at Mauthausen, there are separate memorials in that section of the camp dedicated to various faith groups. 

The worst part of the visit, which I'm sure you can imagine, was going underground into the gas chamber. Because of the way the space is designed, we actually had to walk through it twice - a thoroughly horrific experience. A few days after our visit we learned that the company which provided the paint for the inside of the gas chambers at multiple camps was the same company which provided the graffiti-proof paint for the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin, a fact which - rightfully - outraged the public. (Sadly, our guide pointed out to us that you would be hard pressed to find any companies in Germany which did not, in some way, benefit from the Second World War. Awful...)

The intense sadness of the gas chamber itself and the basement corridors in general is simply indescribable. It is palpable. There were photos of some people known to have died there on the walls, as well as stories about them (which, thankfully, were not written in English - I think that would have sent me over the edge in there). When you leave the gas chamber you come to the room where the dead had their gold teeth/fillings removed before they were cremated. Death was not enough - every last thing must be stolen. Perhaps worse than the gas chamber were the ovens. The sight of them literally knocked the wind out of me then, and the memory brings tears to my eyes now. We learned that for a time, the Nazis actually notified relatives that their love ones had died and accepted a fee in return for their ashes. Of course, the ashes sent back to the loved ones were never really those of their dearly departed, if they were human at all.

The ovens at Mauthausen have become makeshift memorials decorated with offerings and prayers from all over the world.

Beyond the ovens is a room where the walls are filled with photographs and stories of those who were killed at Mauthausen. The sheer volume of photographs - which probably represent 1% of the victims, if even - is overwhelming and heartbreaking. How terrible it must have been to have suffered there, but also how terrible to have survived and to have come to know how your loved one(s) suffered...

It was not a pleasant experience, nor should it be - as much as I feel the camps should be burned to the ground so that those who died there may rest in peace, I also feel that the ones which are open to the public should remain that way. This isn't something which happened hundreds, or thousands of years ago - this happened in the era of our grandparents. We are not so far removed from these evils as we may like to believe.

Members of my family on both sides played a role in supporting the Allied Forces during the war, in Europe and in Canada. In a few weeks it will be the ten year anniversary of my Grandpa Norton's death. During the war he served honourably in Europe, doing his part to end the unfathomable cruelty of the Nazi regime.

Frank Norton Sr.

May all who suffered and served rest in peace, and may we honour their memory by ensuring such horrors never happen again.