Ravensbruck

Ravensbruck is a former concentration camp used mostly for women during the Nazi regime. It was taken over by the soviet army after the war.  The guard houses are now used as a youth hostel and the staff here educates the attendees on the Holocaust and the history of Ravensbruck.

Survivors are invited to stay at Ravensbruck in the guard's houses whenever they come to the area, but understandably many of them find that difficult to do. Ravensbruck is the first concentration camp built in Germany that confronts the issue of the people who perpetrated these horrific acts against others.  The Ravensbruck camp was preceded by the Lichtenberg camp which wasn't big enough to hold all the prisoners. The original Ravensbruck camp could hold 3000, but was expanded in 1940 to accommodate up to 35000.  Still the camp became very overcrowded. Barracks that were built to hold 300 prisoners would hold up to 1000. There was also a much smaller men's camp and a small camp for girls that was located nearby. The girls camp was originally for German girls who were seen as antisocial and the camp was used for their "re-education".  There were about 40 satellite camps of Ravensbruck in Germany and occupied territories. These included the nearby Siemens camp, a slave labor camp which made munitions for the SS and had up to 4500 workers.  While Ravensbruck was not made to be an extermination camp a lot of people died here from starvation, overcrowding and mass shootings.

Towards the end of the war one of the barracks was turned  into a gas chamber and about 2000 people were killed between January and April of 1945. In total over 120000 women were imprisoned in Ravensbruck. Our guide through the camp shares with us personal stories of people he actually knows or has met that were imprisoned in ravensbruck.

He speaks of how the SS officers and the female guards stationed here dehumanized the jews in order to justify their behavior towards the women prisoners.  For some of them it was difficult to process the fact that it was women who were perpetrating these vile acts against them.  The female guards who came here would sometimes find it difficult in the beginning but within weeks would act like all the other guards towards the prisoners.  He also tells us how the Nazis forced pregnant prisoners to have abortions, first secretly in a local hospital, and later in the camp itself. When babies were born to prisoners they were often murdered soon after birth. Babies who were allowed to live were separated from their mothers and put in orphan houses. Mothers were infrequently allowed to see their children and would often watch them starve to death because the mothers were so malnutritioned they couldn't produce milk to feed the babies. This visit is both deeply moving and deeply disturbing.  We are given half an hour to wander the grounds of the former camp and while walking through the former prison complex in the camp I am overwhelmed by some of the displays that represent  the various countries who were victims of Nazi atrocities. I am reduced to tears  again upon visiting the creamatorium on the grounds. I will end this post by quoting a friend who on yesterday visited a different concentration camp: "I love teaching history, but way too often I am horrified by it."