4 July Majdanek

Majdanek was established  near Lublin in October 1941 by the Nazis as a  concentration or  forced labor camp; however during Operation Reinhart, more than 79,000 people, mainly Polish Jews were killed. It was captured intact by the Russian Soviet Army in July 1944. It is the best preserved camp as the Germans had no chance to destroy the evidence.

This massive memorial is at the entrance to the camp.

Beyond the monument is the camp. Here Marcelina explains the layout of the camp.

The camp is big but what was planned was even bigger as the actual camp is only the blue part.

We walked down from the monument and surveyed the huge expanse to the right. The Mausoleum is directly in front of us.

Many of the buildings are open with displays. Markers along the way help.

What the barracks look like today

With the sentry towers that prisoners passed by

Quotations of inmates bring everything alive.

Zyclon B gas was used as a disinfectant,

And also to murder people.

This gas chamber shows the telltale Prussian blue of the Zyclon B.

Zyclon B Gas

Maps help tell the historical details. This one shows the death camps in red.

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This map shows the many places where the prisoners were brought from for imprisonment or death in Majdanek.

Photographs show the Nazis--this is Himmler, called the architect of the Holocaust

I was interested in the woman in this group of Nazi guards. It made me think of The Reader by Bernard  Schlink.

Nazi uniforms

Frightening photographs of people being rounded up for deportation to camps.

Photographs of prisoners over glass cases containing belongings that they brought with them.

What the prisoners wore,

Their shoes,

What they ate,

Where they slept,

Things they made,

Maybe the maker was a filmmaker,

The turtle symbolizes the prisoner's mantra, "Work Slowly"

Newspaper Accounts

Changing Borders--what havoc WWII made!

Revenge of the Nazis

Memorial to the "Emtefest"

Long view of the Memorial and execution ditches which the prisoners dug before their execution--today a bucolic scene with haystacks, grazing cows in the distance...

Wild flowers

And birds

What the Red Army  found when they captured Majdanek

Today's Mausoleum for all those who died at Majdanek,

Inside lies the mound of ashes and bones of those who died at Majdanek.