Chelmno.docx

Chelmno

The deathcamp at Chelmno was established to kill the Jews of the Warthegau (the annexed Polish province of Poznan and parts of the vojwodships Bydgoszcz, Lodz, Pomorze and Warsaw). In 1939 4,922,000 people lived in these districts, among them 385,000 Jews.
Gauleiter Arthur Greiser declared the Warthegau as the "drilling ground" of National Socialism, where Nazi population policy would be undertaken. Poles, Jews and Roma were classified as subhuman creatures. Discrimination against the Poles was followed by the persecution and eventual extermination of Roma and Jews. Those who survived the initial excesses, were deported to forced labour camps and ghettos, the largest of the latter being situated in Lodz. Gauleiter Arthur Greiser ultimately received Heinrich Himmler's agreement to kill all Jews who were incapable of forced labour.

This first Nazi extermination camp was located in the small Polish village of Chelmno nad Nerem (German: Kulmhof). Chelmno is located 60 km northwest of Lodz and 14 km southeast of Kolo. Kolo is located on the railway line Lodz - Poznan. Already before WW2 Kolo and Chelmno were connected by a narrow gauge railway, which ran from Kolo to Dabie.
The Nazis chose an empty manor house in Chelmno (called the "Castle") for extermination purposes. Several other buildings of the former estate were located within a 2.5-3 m high wooden fence and densely planted trees. The granary is still visible today. For security reasons the main gate to this site was constructed as a sluice: When the guards opened one gate, the other one was closed.

The camp was constructed in November 1941, after the expulsion of nearly all inhabitants from the area. The extermination of Romany and Jews was carried out by the so-called Sonderkommando Kulmhof, also known as Sonderkommando Lange. This special unit was named after its first commander SS-Hauptsturmführer Herbert Lange. It was later called Sonderkommando Bothmann, after SS-Hauptsturmführer Hans Bothmann, Lange's successor.
Herbert Lange already had gained some experience in killing mentally ill persons in Poland between late 1939 and June 1940 utilizing gas vans. In Chelmno the Jews were destined to perish in such gas vans.
In the early stages of activity, the SS-Sonderkommando Lange was made up of about 15 members of the Security Police, who occupied all of the important positions in the camp; and 50 - 60 police men of the 1. Kompanie des Polizeibataillons Litzmannstadt (Lodz) as well as some police men of the 2. Company, divided into "Transport", "Castle" and "Forest Camp" details.
The regular police may have eventually numbered as many as 100. These SS- and policemen also guarded the entire vicinity. According to witnesses Artur Greiser and Heinrich Himmler visited Chelmno in its early stage.

All members of the Sonderkommando received special pay. There is conflicting evidence concerning the amounts involved. Bruno Israel testified that he received an additional 13 RM per day, paid directly by Bothmann. The former head of police at the camp, Alois Häfele, stated that ordinary policemen received an extra salary of 12 RM per day, the NCOs 15 RM. The wife of Josef Peham, a police NCO, reported that the supplement varied from 10 - 13 RM per day. Whatever the precise figure, the Sonderkommando's" total salary, including the bonus, more than doubled their basic pay.
In early March 1943, at the end of Chelmno's first phase, Greiser arrived together with some members of the NSDAP. At the "Riga Inn" in Kolo (German: Warthbrücken) a party was organized, and each member of the Sonderkommando got 500 RM from Greiser (for one time only), combined with the promise that each of them can spend two holiday weeks at his private estate in Berlin. The party bill was sent to the NSDAP Gauleitung Wartheland.

Directly subordinate to the Kommando were group of former prisoners (mainly from Fort VII in Poznan) who had been selected during the euthanasia actions. They worked mainly, but not exclusively, in the forest camp. These men received many privileges, particularly after they had completed their day's work, and in effect were not treated as prisoners (see a letter!). Those comprising this special unit were Franciszek Piekarski, Henryk Mania, Kajetan Skrzypczynski, Lech Jaskolski, Stanislaw Polubinski, Henryk Maliczak, Stanislaw Szymanski and Marian Libelt. They worked in Chelmno in the first stage of the camp's existence, up to the time of the arrival of Bothmann.

Most of the Jews were brought by train (1,000 persons usually, in 20 - 22 wagons) to Kolo station. Until mid-March 1942 each incoming transport was locked in the Kolo synagogue until lorries were available to ferry the people to Chelmno. Because the German administrative authorities complained about this method of imprisoning the Jews in the town centre, the procedure was changed from mid-March. From that time onwards, the Jews had to change trains at Kolo station, and board narrow gauge railway wagons, which carried them 6 km to Powiercie village. There the train stopped, and the victims were ordered to march 1.5 km through a forest to Zawadka village where they were locked in the mill for their last night. The next morning they were brought by lorries to Chelmno. Some other transports were taken by lorries directly to Chelmno where they spent the night before being gassed. According to witnesses Christian Wirth visited the location in spring 1942.
In the second phase of Chelmno (1944) the victims were transported by the narrow gauge railway directly from Kolo to Chelmno because the railway track has been repaired (the wooden bridge over the tributary of the Warta River between Powiercie and Chelmno had been destroyed by Polish troops during their retreat in 1939).

In Chelmno itself, the people arrived at the Schlosslager (Castle Camp). In the first phase the incoming Jews were addressed by camp commander Bothmann, his substitute SS-Untersturmführer Albert Plate, Polizei-Meister Willy Lenz, Polizei-Meister Alois Haeberle or Franciszek Piekarski, also member of the "Sonderkommando". He was disguised as the squire of the estate: feather hat, nice dress, jack-boots, smoking his pipe...
They told the Jews that some of them will go to work to Austria or further eastward, others will work at his estate. They would be fairly treated and receive good food. For sanitary reasons they had to take a shower first, and their clothes had to be disinfected. After this reassuring speech the Jews were led to the undressing room in the first floor. There the Jews had to undress and hand over their valuables. During Chelmno's second phase an SS man welcomed the Jews in possibly the same way.
Those valuables not embezzled by SS men were sent to Pabianice near Lodz, together with the victims' clothing. There the Lodz ghetto administration had set up some warehouses for the collecting and sorting of the loot. The spoils (e.g. furs) were first examined and then transferred to Germany or sold to Germans who lived in the Warthegau. On 9 September 1944 for example, 775 wristwatches and 550 pocket watches were sent from Chelmno to the Lodz ghetto administration. Much clothing was stained with dirt and blood. Some still had the Jewish stars attached. Many people in Germany must surely therefore have been aware of the fate of the Jews.

After undressing, the people were brought downstairs again, to a corridor whose walls carried signs such as, "to the bath" and "to the doctor". There the SS told the Jews that they had to enter a lorry which would take them to the baths. Pieces of soap were given to the people. Three Poles, who were probably sentenced to death, hit the Jews with whips if they did not get into the gas van fast enough. The victims finally entered the gas van by passing up an enclosed wooden ramp which was placed in exact alignment with the door through which the Jews had to leave the building. The SS quickly closed the airtight doors of the van and the driver (Walter Burmeister among others / "The Good Old Days" - E. Klee, W. Dreeßen, V. Riess, The Free Press, NY, 1988., p. 219-220) switched on the motor, but allowed the vehicle to remain stationary. While the gas van was waiting for a new batch of victims, the driver connected the van's exhaust to the loading space (gas chamber) with a tube, so that the exhaust fumes could be discharged into the loading space. After 5-10 minutes of horrible screaming, all of the people in the loading compartment had been suffocated. In Chelmno one large gas van (probably Magirus, for 150 victims) and two smaller ones (Opel Blitz and Diamond Reo, for 80 - 100 victims) were used. According to the witness Bruno Israel a fourth van was used for disinfection of clothing. The Sonderkommando may have used special petrol, mixed with poison. The van's engines were driven by petrol and not diesel.