Summer Journey: Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, July 5

Bergen-Belsen was built in 1940 as a prisoner-of-war camp for French and Belgium prisoners. It was changed to a concentration camp in 1943 as a holding place for Jews with foreign passports who were to be exchanged for German nationals imprisoned aboard. Very few exchanges were ever made.

The camp was designed to hold 20,000 prisoners, but by the end of the war more than 60,000 prisoners were detained there.

The conditions of the camp after 1944 rapidly deteriorated and many peopled died from a typhus outbreak including Anne Frank and her sister Margot in 1945.

There were no gas chambers at Bergen-Belsen, but over 35,000 peopled died of disease, starvation, brutality and sadistic medical experiements that are too difficult to write about.

The story of the liberation of Bergen-Belsen is an incredible one. Members of the British Royal Artillery 63rd Anti-Tank Regiment liberated Bergen-Belsen on April 15, 1945. The German commander Josef Kramer was arrested. The liberators had no idea what they would find at Bergen-Belsen as it was the first camp liberated by the allies. There were sixty-thousand prisoners at the camp at the time of liberation however 14,000 died shortly after due to typhus and starvation. The allies had to burn everything down in order to prevent the spread of typhus. Mass graves were made to hold the copses.

The pictures taken from the liberation are horrific, and etched in my mind forever. I remember being shown these pictures when I first started learning about the holocaust. The bulldozers had to push thousands of bodies into mass graves.

Bergen-Belsen became a displaced person (DP) camp for individuals left after the liberation efforts were completed. I was amazed to learn about the DP camp that housed over 11,000 Jews. The life that was formed at the DP camp was in such contradiction to the life within the camp. The refugees formed a camp committee within three days of liberation and cultural, religious and political activities were organized immediately. It is inspiring to see how fast life seemed to resume back to "normal." After seeing the atrocities committed at this camp it is a true triumph of the spirit that these individuals were able to go on. And it is because they were able to go on that the Jewish community started the process of rebuilding in whatever way they could.

It is a testement to the Nazi's not being able to succeed that 2,000 children were born, and over twenty marriages a day were performed at Bergen Belson in the following months after liberation. In addition, schools were founded and life was able to flourish. The DP camp served many until 1951 when most of the refugees had immigrated to the United States, Canada and Israel.

I had the honor to meet Matthew Rozell on my trip. Matthew is a fellow participant, with an incredible mission. Matt is a history teacher at Hudson Falls High School in New York who dedicates himself to reuniting Holocaust survivors with their liberators. Matt's incredible stories are available in the link below. They are beyond inspiring!!

Here is a movie made about Matt and his incredible discoveries.

http://www.ushmm.org/remembrance/dor/years/2010/liberation/

Here is the link to his blog.

http://teachinghistorymatters.com/tag/matthew-rozell/

One of the many amazing stories of survival; this one close to home. The picture below is Sam Bloch getting married in the DP camp. Sam is the president of the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and is the umbrella organization that is sponsoring our trip.

http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/15/style/holocaust-survivors-on-pilgrimage-of-rememberance.html