Advanced Search

Learn About The Holocaust

Special Collections

My Saved Research

Login

Register

Help

Skip to main content

American soldiers stand near the charred bodies of prisoners who were killed by the SS in a barn near Gardelegen.

Photograph | Digitized | Photograph Number: 17076

Search this record's additional resources, such as finding aids, documents, or transcripts.

No results match this search term.
Check spelling and try again.

results are loading

0 results found for “keyward

    American soldiers stand near the charred bodies of prisoners who were killed by the SS in a barn near Gardelegen.
    American soldiers stand near the charred bodies of prisoners who were killed by the SS in a barn near Gardelegen.

    Overview

    Caption
    American soldiers stand near the charred bodies of prisoners who were killed by the SS in a barn near Gardelegen.
    Date
    1945 April 14 - 1945 April 18
    Locale
    Gardelegen, [Prussian Saxony; Saxony-Anhalt] Germany
    Photo Credit
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of John Irving Malachowski
    Event History
    A barn on the outskirts of the town of Gardelegen was the site of the massacre of over one thousand concentration camp prisoners evacuated from a sub-camp of Dora-Mittelbau in the face of the Allied advance. On April 4, 1945 between two and three thousand prisoners of the Rottleberode labor camp were boarded onto a freight train. After changing directions several times the train arrived in Mieste, 12 kilometers from Gardelegen. The prisoners were taken off the train and led on a forced march in the direction of Gardelegen, during which many were shot by their SS overseers. Twelve hundred of the prisoners made it to the hospital complex between Mieste and Gardelegen. During their short stay on the grounds of the hospital, the SS selected three hundred German political prisoners among them to act as guards over the rest of the group. For their services they were promised their freedom. The following day the death march continued, and more were shot along the way as they fell out of line. On the evening of Friday, April 13, the column of marchers reached a barn on a small hill outside of Gardelegen. The prisoners were herded into the empty building measuring approximately a hundred by fifty feet, and ordered to sit down. The floor of the barn was covered with straw that the guards soaked with gasoline. At the last moment the German prisoner guards were also forced into the barn. A 16-year-old SS corporal then ignited the straw, and the barn doors were quickly closed and barricaded. Prisoners who tried to escape were shot by the SS. It is estimated that 1,016 prisoners were killed; only two managed to escape from the barn and remain alive. The next morning local slave laborers were rounded up to dig large trenches around the barn in which to bury the remains, and conceal the evidence. Their work was interrupted by the arrival of the Ozark troops of the American 102nd Infantry Division. The Division commander ordered that the civilian population be forced to view the site and to disinter and rebury the victims in a new cemetery. After digging the graves and burying the bodies, they erected a cross or a Star of David over each grave and enclosed the site with a white fence. Though the SS troops who participated in the massacre managed to disappear, several local officials who were implicated in the atrocity committed suicide soon after its disclosure.

    [Source: U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. "The Year of 1945 Liberation," Washington, D.C., 1945, pp. 69-70.]

    https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/gardelegen.

    Rights & Restrictions

    Photo Source
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
    Copyright: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
    Provenance: John Irving Malachowski

    Keywords & Subjects

    Record last modified:
    1997-09-30 00:00:00
    This page:
    http:​/​/collections.ushmm.org​/search​/catalog​/pa1059533

    Download & Licensing

    In-Person Research

    Contact Us