Understand
Although not the only or, indeed, the first German concentration and extermination camp, Auschwitz has become a widespread symbol of terror, genocide and the Holocaust in the global consciousness.
A concentration camp was established by the Nazis in the suburbs of the Polish city of Oswiecim which - like the rest of Poland - was occupied by the Germans from the beginning of the Second World War 1939-1945. The name of the city of Oswiecim was changed 'Germanized' to Auschwitz, which became the name of the camp as well.
The camp was continually expanded over the next 5 years and ultimately consisted of 3 main parts: Auschwitz I, Auschwitz II-Birkenau, and Auschwitz III-Monowitz. Auschwitz also had over 40 sub-camps in the neighboring cities and in the surrounding area. Initially, only Poles and Jews were imprisoned and died in the camp. Subsequently, Soviet prisoners of war 'POWs', gypsies, and prisoners of other nationalities and minorities were also incarcerated there.
From 1942 onwards, the camp became the site of one of the greatest mass murders in the history of humanity, committed against the European Jews as part of Hitler's plan for the complete destruction of that people 'the Final Solution'. The vast majority of the Jewish men, women and children deported from their homes all over occupied Europe to Auschwitz were sent immediately to their deaths in the Birkenau gas chambers upon arrival, usually trained in in overcrowded cattle wagons. Their bodies were afterwards cremated in industrial furnaces in the crematoria.
At the end of the war, in an effort to remove the traces of the crimes they had committed, the SS began dismantling and razing the gas chambers, crematoria, and other buildings, as well as burning documents. Prisoners capable of marching were evacuated into the depths of the German Reich. Those who remained behind in the camp were liberated by Red Army soldiers on 27 January 1945.
A 2 July 1947 Act of the post-war Polish Parliament established the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum on the grounds of the two extant parts of the camp, Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau.
The site was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1979.
