“The official offenses—and there were so many—the repeated threats, the decrees preced-ing the ghettos, the “Aktions,” the camps of slow or immediate death—and there was such a variety of them, large and small, known and lesser known: this is a new universe that the Enemy built with its only goal: to wipe out from history even the memory of its victims.

“Therefore, reader, study this Encyclopedia which you hold in your hands: say to your-self that its message comes from afar but, for the sake of humanity, appeals to the future.” —From the Foreword by Elie Wiesel

The development of this encyclopedia was made possible by the generous support of the Helen Bader Foundation, the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, Inc., and the William Zell Family Foundation.

May 20091796 pp., 192 b&w photos, 23 mapsRights: WorldwideUSHO1C cloth 978-0-253-35328-3 $295.00

1.800.842.6796 • iupress.indiana.edu

Published in association with the

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

EncyclopEdia of caMpS and GHETToS, 1933–1945Geoffrey p. Megargee, Editorforeword by Elie Wiesel

This monumental 7-volume encyclopedia, the result of years of work by the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, will describe the universe of camps and ghettos—some 20,000 in all—that the Nazis and their allies operated, from Norway to North Africa and from France to Russia. For the first time, a single reference work will provide detailed information on each individual site.

This first volume covers three groups of camps: the early camps that the Nazis established in the first year of Hitler’s rule, the major SS concentration camps with their constellations of subcamps, and the

special camps for Polish and German children and adolescents. Overview essays provide context for each category, while each camp entry provides basic information about the site’s purpose; the prisoners, guards, working and living conditions; and key events in the camp’s history. Material from personal testimonies helps convey the character of the site, while source citations provide a path to additional information.

Geoffrey P. Megargee is an applied research scholar at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. He is author of War of Annihilation: Combat and Genocide on the Eastern Front, 1941 and Inside Hitler’s High Command.

From the Preface

the universe of Holocaust-era camps and ghettos more thoroughly. . . .

Our goal has been to produce a work that will be useful both for members of the general public and for scholars wishing to pursue further research. The researchers and editors of the Museum’s Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies—with the assistance of hundreds of researchers around the world—have labored to answer fundamental questions about each site as completely as possible and to provide information on sources for additional research.

How many camps and ghettos existed? Who ran them? Who were their victims? How long were various camps and ghettos in operation, and for what specific purposes? Who profited from them? Where can one consult archival and other research resources regarding a particular camp or ghetto? The answers to these questions have been mostly anecdotal and scattered, when they have been available at all. This encyclopedia attempts to help close the gaps in our knowledge and offer assistance to those who would like to probe more deeply into some aspect of

The resulting work . . . has revealed the sheer scale of the system of perpetration constructed by the Nazis and their allies—well over 20,000 camps and ghettos of various sorts identified thus far. This volume alone describes over 1,000 camps, the vast majority of which were unfamiliar to any but a small circle of specialists when this project began. Future volumes will address thousands more. The evil, misery, and grief that existed in those places is impossible to quantify—perhaps impossible to grasp—but also impossible to deny. Here was a central pillar of the system of perpetration: the willingness

and ability to incarcerate, enslave, torture, and kill in the name of assumed racial, cultural, and social superiority. The universe of camps and ghettos epitomized the exercise of raw power against a society’s supposed enemies, the manifestation of unadulterated hatred, fear, and cruelty, which many embraced wholeheartedly and many more witnessed and tolerated.

As part of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s mission to inform the public about the Holocaust and to enhance future scholarship and teaching regarding the Holocaust, we are proud to present this milestone contribution to Holocaust research, with the expectation that it will inform and guide its users for years to come.

Paul A. Shapiro, Director

Center for Advanced Holocaust StudiesUnited States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Alvin H. Rosenfeld, ChairAcademic Committee of the United StatesHolocaust Memorial Council

Sara J. Bloomfield, DirectorUnited States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Part A Foreword by Elie WieselPrefaceAcnowledgmentsEditor’s Introduction to the Series and Volume IReader’s Guide to Using the Encyclopedia

Section I: The Early National Socialist Concentration CampsIntroductionCamps: Ahrensbök-Holstendorf–Zwickau

Section II: Camps and Subcamps under the SS-Inspectorate of Concentration Camps/Business Administration Main Office

The Genesis and Structure of the National Social Concentration Camps

Arbeitsdorf Main Camp

Auschwitz I Main CampAuschwitz II-Birkenau Main CampAuschwitz III-Monowitz Main Camp (aka Buna)Auschwitz Subcamp SystemCamps: Altdorf–Tschechowitz

Bergen-Belsen Main CampCamps: Bomlitz–Unterlüss

Buchenwald Main CampBuchenwald Subcamp SystemCamps: Abteroda–Wolfen

Dachau Main CampDachau Subcamp SystemCamps: Augsburg–Zangberg

Flossenbürg Main CampFlossenbürg Subcamp SystemCamps: Altenhammer–Zwodau

Gross-Rosen Main CampGross-Rosen Subcamp SystemCamps: Aslau–Zittau

Herzogenbusch Main Camp (aka Vught)Camps: Amersfoort–Venlo

Hinzert Main CampCamps: Bad Nauheim–Zeltingen

Kauen Main Camp (aka Kaunas, Kovno, Kowno, also Slobodka)Camps: Kauen-Alexoten–Schaulen

Part B

Krakau-Plaszow Main CampCamps: Kabelwerk Krakau–Zabłocie

Lublin Main Camp (aka Majdanek)Camps: Bliżyn–Trawniki

Mauthausen Main CampMauthausen Subcamp SystemCamps: Amstetten–Wiener Neustadt

Mittelbau Main Camp (aka Dora)Mittelbau Subcamp SystemCamps: Artern–Wickerode

Natzweiler-Struthof Main Camp (aka Natzweiler, Struthof)Natzweiler Subcamp SystemGruppe “Wüste” ComplexCamps: Audun-le-Tiche–Wesserling

Neuengamme Main CampNeuengamme Subcamp SystemCamps: Alt-Garge–Wöbbelin

Ravensbrück Main CampRavensbrück Subcamp SystemCamps: Ansbach–Zichow

Riga-Kaiserwald Main Camp (aka Mežaparks)Camps: Dondangen–Riga

Sachsenhausen Main CampSachsenhausen Subcamp SystemCamps: Bad Saarow–Wulkow

SS-Baubrigaden andSS-EisenbahnbaubrigadenCamps: Alderney–Wuppertal

Stutthof Main CampStutthof Subcamp SystemCamps: Adlershorst–Zeyersvorderkampen

Vaivara Main CampCamps: Aseri-Vivikonna OT

Warschau Main Camp

Wewelsburg Main Camp (aka Niederhagen)

Section III: Youth CampsIntroductionCamps: Litzmannstadt–Uckermark

A Note on the Recently Opened International Tracing Service DocumentationList of AbbreviationsList of ContributorsAbout the EditorIndexes

Volume i. Early camps, youth camps, and concentration camps and Subcamps under the SS-Business administration Main office (WVHa)

Summary of Contents

“The most efficacious way of fighting the scourge of Holocaust denial is with the facts. No argument posed by deniers can withstand the overwhelming weight of the truth. This encyclopedia will provide a host of detail about crucial aspects of the Holocaust that cannot be found elsewhere. It will also give readers a sense of the scope of the Nazis’ effort to annihilate the Jewish people.”

—Deborah E. Lipstadt, Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies, Emory University, and author of History on Trial: My Day in Court with David Irving

“The project to create an encyclopedia of camps, ghettos, and other sites of deten-tion in Nazi Germany and Nazi-dominat-ed territories is tremendously ambitious and very important. . . . An encyclopedia that not only categorizes these sites by or-ganization and function but also provides identification, basic information, and a bibliography for each of these sites puts into the hand of every scholar of Nazi Ger-many and the Holocaust an indispensable source that no individual could compile in a lifetime of research.”

—Christopher R. Browning, the Frank Porter Graham Professor of History, Uni-versity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and author of Ordinary Men: Reserve Bat-talion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland

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