Buchenwald concentration camp

Buchenwald
Nazi concentration camp
Polish prisoners forced to undress after arriving in the camp, c. 1940 Below: Roll call at Buchenwald
Location	Weimar, Germany
Operated by	Schutzstaffel
Commandant	Karl-Otto Koch (1 August 1937 – July 1941) Hermann Pister (1942–1945)
Operational	15 July 1937 – 11 April 1945
Number of inmates	280,000
Killed	56,545
Liberated by	6th Armored Division, United States Army
Notable inmates	Bruno Apitz, Phil Lamason, Elie Wiesel, Rudolf Brazda, Ernst Thälmann
Website	www.buchenwald.de/en/69/

Buchenwald (German pronunciation: [ˈbuːxn̩valt]; literally 'beech forest') was a Nazi concentration camp established on Ettersberg hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within the Altreich. Many actual or suspected communists were among the first internees.

Prisoners came from all over Europe and the Soviet Union, and included Jews, Poles, and other Slavs, the mentally ill, and physically disabled, political prisoners, Romani people, Freemasons, and prisoners of war. There were also ordinary criminals and those perceived as sexual deviants by the Nazi regime. All prisoners worked primarily as forced labor in local armaments factories. The insufficient food and poor conditions, as well as deliberate executions, led to 56,545 deaths at Buchenwald of the 280,000 prisoners who passed through the camp and its 139 subcamps.^[1]

The camp gained notoriety when it was liberated by the United States Army in April 1945; Allied commander Dwight D. Eisenhower visited one of its subcamps.

From August 1945 to March 1950, the camp was used by the Soviet occupation authorities as an internment camp, NKVD special camp Nr. 2, where 28,455 prisoners were held and 7,113 of whom died. Today the remains of Buchenwald serve as a memorial and permanent exhibition and museum.