Throughout the world, Auschwitz has become a symbol of terror and the Holocaust. The German forces occupying Poland During World War 11 established in May 1940, a concentration camp on the outskirts of the town Oswiecim. The Germans called the town Auschwitz, which also gave its name to the nearby death camp. Over the next few years, it was expanded into three main camps: Auschwitz
I, Auschwitz II-Birkenau,Auschwitz III-Monowitz and more then 40 lesser camps.
They were followed by Soviet prisoners of war, Gypsies, and deportees of various
other nationalities. Beginning in June 1942, however, the most massive murder
campaign in history began in Auschwitz when the Nazis put into operation a plan to
systematically destroy the entire Jewish population of Europe.
The SS would tell the masses of victims they were about to go on a journey to
resettle in an undetermined country. The Jews, Poles, Gypsies and all others from
various Nazi-occupied countries of Europe brought with them, not only items of
personal use, but also their most valuable and precious family possessions. Little did
they know that the SS would confiscate all these possessions upon arrival at the
camp and store them in warehouses. On a large open campground these buildings
contained the possessions taken from the prisoners. These sheds were cynically
referred to as "the houses of abundance". It was a crude name given by the SS as it
was also known as the "land of plenty". The SS used everything they could;
everything from gold found in the personal jewelry and in the dental work of the
murdered victims to human hair. The SS even confiscated their shoes, and gave
them others to wear once inside the camp. The leather was then used to make
articles for the uniforms worn by the German army. The confiscated articles, once
sorted by the prisoners, were then transported back to Germany to meet the needs of
the SS and the civilian populace....