A Voice for the Dead: Recovering the Lost History of Sobibór
Claus Hecking
Henchman
with the Nazi SS sought to cover up the mass murder that occurred at
the Sobibór concentration camp in eastern Poland. Archeologists recently
uncovered the site's hidden gas chambers and important artifacts that
shed light on the victims.
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The
remains of the killing machine are hidden deep in the forest. There's a
smell of moss, trees creak in the wind and a deer scurries through the
underbrush. The pine forest at the old Sobibór train station is a serene
place on this September day. It's the site where Nazi SS officers and
their henchmen once murdered tens of thousands of defenseless Jews and
Roma. Smoke billowed out of the crematoriums for months.
ANZEIGE
Freshly
uncovered foundations and remains of the walls can be seen in a
clearing, the suspected remnants of four gas chambers. Each measures
five by seven meters (16 feet by 23 feet) and served as death cells for
70 to 100 people at a time.
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"This
is where they forced the Jews in," says Yoram Haimi, pointing to the
gap between the red bricks. "And that's probably where the motor was
placed that fed exhaust fumes into the chambers, says Wojciech Mazurek.
The two archeologists, from Israel and Poland, constantly interrupt each
other out of excitement over the historical importance of their
discovery.
In
recent days, excavation work led by Haimi, 53, and Mazurek, 54,
uncovered the remains of the gas chambers of Sobibór some 71 years after
the Nazis destroyed the extermination camp where between 170,000 and
250,000 people were murdered. Haimi and Mazurek have found what the
Nazis sought to cover up. Their find will help to make the atrocities
committed at Sobibór become a more tangible reality.
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In no other place did the Nazis perfect their killing machinery
to the extent they did here in remote eastern Poland. Under the
codename Operation Reinhardt, they planned three camps under the
leadership of SS officials Odilo Globocnik and Christian Wirth --
Sobibór, Belzec and Treblinka. The camps had a single goal: to
systematically liquidate every Jew in occupied Poland.
In contrast to Auschwitz,
Sobibór, Belzec and Treblinka were extermination camps from day one,
with very few of the new arrivals used in forced labor. The vast
majority were sent directly from the freight trains to their deaths in
the gas chambers using a cruelly elaborate logistical system. An
estimate 1.4 million Jews from Poland, the Netherlands, Germany and
other countries perished in the three camps, more than in
Auschwitz-Birkenau, the concentration camp that became the symbol of
industrialized mass murder.
And
unlike Auschwitz, no barracks or mountains of glasses, shoes and human
hair or visible remains of extermination facilities were left behind in
Operation Reinhardt. In the middle of the war, the Nazi criminals made a
point of eliminating any traces of their own after they had killed the
Jews. Between November 1942 and December 1943, the Nazis exhumed bodes,
killed almost all of the remaining prisoners at the three camps and
burned any of the human remains still detectable.
The
killers destroyed plans, documents and stripped the buildings down to
their foundations, even carrying the rubble away. They leveled
structures, planted forests and established farms. Operation Reinhardt
was top-secret and it was meant to be the perfect crime.
Few Witnesses and Few Images
The
murderous apparatus proved extremely efficient. Around 30 SS officers
and 120 Eastern Europeans "volunteers," including John Demjankuk, the
man convicted in Germany in 2011 for serving as a guard at the camp,
were sufficient for the murder of 170,000 to 250,000 Jews in Sobibór.
The only people who survived the war from the camp were 50 who broke out
during an insurgency. In Treblinka, close to 800,000 people were
murdered, with only 60 survivors. In Belzec, where more than 430,000
people were killed, a mere eight survived.
This
has contributed to the fact that Sobibór is far less known, and far
less infamous, than Auschwitz. There are manifest reasons for this,
including the fact that there were fewer witnesses to share their
stories and because fewer photos have been found documenting the three
death camps. Also because not a single gas chamber had been uncovered
until the finding in Sobibór this month.
At the excavation sites, Polish workers cautiously shovel the sand into wheel barrows.
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Most
of the work here is being done by hand. Haimi and Mazurek say the
danger was too great that machines would destroy the fragile remnants of
the walls or that important objects might be lost. The two
archeologists have been researching Sobibór for years. Previously, they
excavated the remains of the platform where the deported Jews arrived.
They also discovered an escape tunnel that had been started as well as a
Himmelfahrtsstrasse, or "road to heaven," as the perpetrators cynically
referred to the 230-meter long path that naked Jews were told to take
after getting their hair cut, allegedly to the place where they were to
take a shower.
'I Always Suspected They Were Here'
The
archeologists have now laid open the sites of the gas chambers, located
just a few steps away from the old memorial to the victims, hidden
under a thick layer of asphalt. "I always suspected they were here,"
Haimi says.
The
Israeli came to the Sobibór site for the first time in April 2007 as a
visitor. He traveled here to pay honor to his uncle, who was killed in
the camp. "The museum was closed at the time," he recalls. "You could
see memorials, but nothing that showed how and where the murders took
place." He says the memorial site struck him as "abstract," and that
there were few other people around.
While
visiting, the archeologist, who had specialized in Israel in the
excavation of Neolithic Age sites, decided he would undertake the search
for the ruins of Sobibór himself. He soon found an enthusiastic partner
for the endeavor -- Mazrek of Poland. Both sought out private donors to
sponsor the project and convinced Sobibór administration officials to
grant permission for the excavations. Then they began digging -- at
their own risk for the first three years.
At
the time, people were starting to forget about Sobibór, just as they
had after the war. Justice officials had marked the approximate site of
the gas chambers during a war crimes trial in 1946, but the Jews were
unpopular with many Poles and the Communist government had little
interest in making an issue of their extermination, despite the fact
that they had once shaped life in the area.
This
includes cities like Wlodawa, the district in which Sobibór was
located, which had more than 5,000 Jewish residents before the war.
Mazurek says that only two Jewish families live here today. "Even today,
they don't profess their faith," he says.
Asphalt Covers Mass Graves
For
two decades, it was mostly farmers and lumberjacks who used the
property. During the 1960s, officials erected a memorial and a symbolic
mausoleum and the site was tarred over. "It was a very fortunate
development," Mazurek says, "Because it protected the foundations of the
gas chambers."
Claus Hecking
Archeologist Yoram Haimi examines bone fragments in the grass at the site of the Sobibór gas chambers.
In
2010, the archeologists discovered remains of a double fence that
encircled the camp and, one year later, the Himmelfahrtsstrasse. "It was
pretty clear to us that the gas chambers would be at the end of it,"
Haimi says. But they hadn't found them yet. The memorial was then faced
with closure because of a lack of funding. All the visitor facilities
had to be closed temporarily until the Foundation for Polish-German
Reconciliation and the State Museum at Majdanek stepped in to take over
responsibility for the site.
Haimi
and Mazurek resumed their excavations and found the remains of fences,
barracks and crematoriums as well as several skeletons. They began to
narrow down the search area. Finally, the rabbi of Warsaw gave
permission for the removal of the asphalt above the suspected grave.
They
finally reached their goal on Sept. 8, when the archeologists uncovered
the remains of a red brick wall and, soon after, the next ones. "Both
of us looked at it at the same time and smiled," Mazurek says. "We knew
we had succeeded."
The
archeologists still don't have final proof that these are the gas
chamber foundations, but everything suggests that they are -- the
position between the Himmelfahrtstrasse, the crematorium and the remains
of the barracks of the Sonderkommando -- the mostly-Jewish
prisoners responsible for removing the bodies -- as well as a water
hole. Last Wednesday, experts from Auschwitz visited the site. "They
immediately said, 'That's it'," says Haimi.
Claus Hecking
A map of the Sobibór death camp created by the archeologists
The
next day, the news about Sobibór made headlines around the world. David
Silberklang, a historian at the International Institute for Holocaust
Research at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, told Israeli daily Haaretz
the discovery is a "most important finding in the study of the
Holocaust." He says it will make it easier to more precisely estimate
the number of victims and to have better knowledge of how people were
murdered in the camp. "All of a sudden out of the ruins, from under the
asphalt, come voices of Jews who are speaking to us."
Piotr Bakun/Stiftung Polnisch-Deutsche Aussöhnung
An aerial view of the site of the gas chambers
In
some spots, the archeologists are continuing to sift every shovel of
sand by hand. By doing so, they are not only able to uncover remains of
the killing machine, but also traces of Jewish life, like a small amulet
found with the Star of David, a wedding ring engraved with an
inscription or a metal nametag with the name and birthdate of Lea Judith
de la Penha of Amsterdam, who was six years old at the time she arrived
in Sobibór.
After
its discovery, a Dutch broadcaster produced a documentary film about
the girl and her family. In their research they also obtained photos
showing the girl with loved ones in front of a decorated Christmas tree.
Indeed, the work has given a face to Sobibór's dead.
Wojciech Mazurek
Lea Judith de la Penha's metal nametag
"It's
a victory, not only for us survivors, but for humanity," Sobibór
survivor Philip Bialowitz told SPIEGEL ONLINE. The 84 year old, who
broke out of the concentration camp during a revolt on Oct. 14, 1942
(click here to read an interview with Bialowitz), is one of six or seven
former prisoners of the camp who are still alive today. Amsterdam's
Sobibór Foundation reported that one Sobibór survivor died last week in
New Zealand. Soon there will no longer be any witnesses left who can
report on the horrors that took place at Sobibór, Belzec and Treblinka.
This makes the new findings even more important. "People want
authenticity," says Haimi.
An Open Field of Bodies
A
few dozen steps away from the excavations, the archeologists kneels
down to the ground and lifts small white fragments filled with holes.
"These are all bone fragments -- there was a crematorium here," he says.
"When they are entirely white, it shows the fire was especially hot."
Even today, Sobibór remains an open field of bodies.
Next
year, construction is slated to begin here on a new, €7 million
memorial surrounding the foundations. After an extended tug of war, the
governments of Poland, the Netherlands and Germany will be providing
financing. Under Germany's previous government, there had been a debate
about whether to participate, but Chancellor Angela Merkel's new
administration recently gave the green light -- and none too soon. Last
year, a statement made by a senior official in the German Foreign
Ministry underscored just how little is known about Sobibór, despite the
scale of war crimes committed here. The official said that no Germans
had been among the prisoners at the death camp, but in truth several
thousand German Jews were murdered there.
Even
in the Poland of today, life still isn't great for Jews, as Wojciech
Mazurek has discovered. After the discovery of the gas chambers, he
visited one of the two Jewish families living in Wlodowa an invited them
to visit Sobibór. The family politely declined, saying they didn't want
to expose themselves as being Jewish to their fellow residents in the
community.
This article originally appeared in einestages, SPIEGEL ONLINE's history portal.
Interview with a Sobibór Survivor: 'The Best Moment of My Life'
Interview Conducted By Claus Hecking
SPIEGEL ONLINE
In
an interview, 84 year old Sobibór survivor Philip Bialowitz discusses
the importance of the recent discovery of the death camp's gas chambers
and his risky escape from the Nazis in 1943.
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Only
around 50 Jews survived the Sobibór Nazi death camp in eastern Poland.
At most, seven are still alive today. The majority of survivors suffer
from health problems today, but Philip Bialowitz, 84, who emigrated to
the United States after the war, still travels the world to "tell people
my story," the native Pole says. SPIEGEL ONLINE recently interviewed
the Holocaust survivor in Warsaw at the Museum of the History of Polish
Jews.
ANZEIGE
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Mr. Bialowitz, how did you feel when you learned that the site of the gas chambers at Sobibór had been discovered?
Bialowitz:
I was pleased! It was the best moment of my life. You know, Sobibór was
a top secret death camp in the middle of the forest; it was hidden from
the consciousness of the outside world. After its closure, the Germans
tried to do everything they could to hide their crime. But now
archeologists have discovered the gas chambers. Sobibór will become
better known, and it will serve as an educational center for future
generations. This is a victory -- not only for us as survivors, but also
for the whole mankind.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Of the between 170,000 and 250,000 Jews sent to Sobibór, not even 50 survived. How did you manage it?
Bialowitz: My
older brother Simcha saved me. When we arrived at the camp, an SS man
called out asking if there was anyone with a profession. My brother
immediately stepped forward and said he was a pharmacist and that I was
his assistant. My seven-year-old niece hugged me one more time and then
Simcha and I were separated from the group. The others were killed.
Photo Gallery
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17 Photos
SPIEGEL ONLINE: You
were used as a so-called "working Jew". That meant doing things like
shaving off the hair of the doomed before they were sent to the gas
chambers. What did you see there?
Bialowitz:
One time, when a large train from the Netherlands arrived in Sobibór,
an SS officer gave them a welcome speech. He apologized to the Dutch for
the inconvenience in travel and said they would now be relocated. He
told them to write a postcard for their loved ones back home to assure
them everyone was OK. Some clapped their hands and shouted: "Bravo".
After the postcards were completed, the Germans told them: Now you have
to take a shower and be disinfected. A guard collected watches and
jewelry and gave them fake receipts for their later pick-up. Then the
unwitting people were sent down the Himmelsfahrtstrasse, the "Road to
Heaven"…
SPIEGEL ONLINE: …
which led directly to the gas chambers. As a slave laborer, did you
suspect that they also planned to kill you sooner or later?
Bialowitz:
We all knew that. You could smell the smoke (from the crematoriums).
But we defended ourselves. My brother and I were in the group of
conspiracy, 40 people who prepared the revolt at Sobibór in 1943.
Russian prisoners of war showed us how to fight. We had no idea. One of
our leaders said that if one of us survived, he must tell the world
about this place and what was happening here. I promised that to him.
When everything started (on Oct. 14, 1943), I was the messenger. I went
to the SS people and told them that we had boots and leather coats for
them to try on. They came and we killed 11 of them with axes and knives.
Our next step was to cut the electricity supply and the phone lines. I
then climbed over the barbed wire and started running -- straight in the
direction of Germans' living areas.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Why that?
Bialowitz: Because I imagined they wouldn't have laid any mines there. And that proved to be right. I escaped.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: What happened then?
Bialowitz:
We ran into a group of Polish partisans. But when they found out we
were Jews, they were not so nice anymore. I escaped again. In the end, a
Polish farmer called Mazurek hid my brother and me in his farm until
the Red Army came.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: At the time, you were a teenager. Today you are well over 80 and yet you still travel around the world.
Bialowitz:
I am doing this because I swore that I would continue to go around and
tell my story about the Sobibor death camp to young people for as long
as I was still able to. We cannot allow what happened back then to be
forgotten.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: The remaining witnesses will pass away in the coming years. What will happen then?
Bialowitz:
I hope God gives me a few more years. But one day no one will be left
to tell their stories, and this is why this discovery in Sobibór is so
important. In the future, young people will be able to see with their
very own eyes what happened back then in Sobibór. Education is the key
to a better world. A new museum is supposed to be built at Sobibór, but
they need a lot of money there. Germany should help to build this museum
and support it. German carries responsibility for this place.
This article originally appeared in einestages, SPIEGEL ONLINE's history portal.
Read an Article About the Excavations at Sobibór
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Claus Hecking
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