01x10 - Over the Rhine and to the Camps

[bunniefuu]

[somber music plays]

♪ The bright horses have broken free
From the fields ♪

♪ They are horses of love
Their manes full of fire ♪

♪ They are parting the cities
Those bright burning horses ♪

♪ And everyone is hiding
And no one makes a sound ♪

♪ And I'm by your side
And I'm holding your hand ♪

[somber music plays]

[female reading in Yiddish] Diary of Hanna
Lévy-Hass, prison camp Bergen-Belsen,

August 26th, 1944.

"There is one thing
that baffles me completely.

It's to see that men are so much weaker,

so much less resilient than women.

Physically and often morally, too.

They don't know
how to compose themselves

and often display such a lack of courage,
it's pitiful.

Their hunger shows on their faces
and in their gestures

in a way that's alarmingly different
from women."

[Thomas] Hello again.

It seems that we've progressed a bit
in terms of the story of the liberation,

so I would like to go back
in time just a little bit

to the moment before D-Day,

to the moment when engineers and soldiers

put their expertise to the service
of their country.

And one of the biggest questions posed

in terms of the logistical success
of the liberation

was how are we to fuel our army?

Behind me here in this building,

they installed a massive oil pump

and then dressed it up
to look like a house.

The first person to come up with the idea
of a pipeline underneath the ocean

called 'Pluto' was Lord Mountbatten.

But all the experts rejected his ideas,
saying it was impossible to make it work.

However, a couple of years later,

an engineer by the name of
A. Clifford Hartley thought differently.

He was convinced that a pipeline
could be drawn to mainland Europe.

The idea was to weld together


and wind them on a giant floating spool
known as a conundrum.

One of these spools could store
up to 90 miles of pipeline.

The conundrum was towed by a tugboat,

and while it moved,
the spool would spin and unwind,

releasing the pipeline into the water.

[James] So the main idea
was to have two pipelines.

The first, codename Bambi,

was pulled from the Isle of White
to Cherbourg,

and the second, code named Dumbo,

linked the Southern English town
of Dungeness to Boulogne in France.

While the Allies were advancing
to Belgium and Holland,

they needed oil desperately
to keep the advance going.

On October 26th,
Dumbo arrived at the Port of Boulogne

and remained in use
until the end of the w*r.

[Géza] They pulled Dumbo over rivers,
over roads, terrain,

storms and snow, and they ended up
in Emmerich, Germany.

Here at my feet is a little piece left
of this Dumbo.

It's quite extraordinary.

[somber music plays]

At the end, the pipes
delivered about 575,000 tons of fuel,

which was around 8% of the fuel delivered
to the Allies on the continent.

It is clear that, contrary to what
has often been said,

the pipeline has hardly contributed
to the victory against the German Army,

but it remains a spectacular
and daring idea.

My name is Jennifer, Jennifer Teege.

I'm the author of the book
[Amon] My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me.

I was born in 1970, the daughter
of a Nigerian father and a German mother.

I discovered only by coincidence
at the age of 40

that my biological family
had a connection to the w*r.

My grandfather is Amon Göth.

He was portrayed by Ralph Fiennes
in the movie Schindler's List,

and he was the one who k*lled the Jews.

He was the Commandant
of the concentration camp Płaszów,

it's in Poland,

and he was hanged after the w*r
for the k*lling of thousands of people

in the camp,
but also in the ghetto of Krakow.

[somber music plays]

[Jennifer] During the Yalta Conference
between February 4th and 11th,

the heads of the Allies discussed
the post-w*r reorganization of Germany.

Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin
also discussed

the future of Eastern Europe
and the United Nations.

They agreed to include France
in the post-w*r-governing of Germany

and also that Germany
is partly responsible

for the reparations following the w*r.

They agreed that the future governments
of the Eastern European Nations

bordering the Soviet Union
should be friendly to the Soviet regime,

while Stalin pledged
to allow free elections

in all liberated territories.

They also released the declaration
on Poland.

[heavy g*n fire]

[sirens]

[Jennifer] The Allied bombing of Dresden

took place in the night
of February 13th-14th, 1945.

About 25,000 people were k*lled

and most of the historic city center
was destroyed.

Even now, there is a debate
as to whether the Allied carpet bombings

such as the one on Dresden should be
regarded as acts of terror and w*r crime.

[male reader] Slaughterhouse 5
by Kurt Vonnegut.

"He was down in the meat locker
on the night that Dresden was destroyed.

There were sounds
like giant footsteps above.

Those were sticks of high expl*sive bombs.

The giants walked and walked.

The meat locker was a very safe shelter.

All that happened down there
as an occasional shower of calcimine.

The Americans and four of their guards

and a few dressed carcasses
were down there and nobody else.

The rest of the guards had,
before the raid began,

gone to the comfort
of their own houses in Dresden.

They were all k*lled with their families.

So it goes."

[somber music plays]

[boat engine roaring]

FIRE DEPARTMENT

[Jennifer] It is one
of the longest rivers in Europe.

It is a natural border

and the final defense line
for the German Army.

The Allies were aware
that they had to cross it

in the next step in the liberation
of Europe.

[airplane engine roaring]

[explosions]

The bridge at Remagen
was called the Ludendorff Bridge.

It was the last bridge
over the Rhine that was still intact.

Hitler had personally ordered
that the soldiers couldn't blow up bridges

until the enemy
was within eight kilometers.

In the morning of the March 7th,
around 6 a.m.,

a company of the 9th Armored Division
left for the Rhine.

Company commander,
Second Lieutenant Karl H. Timmermann,

saw the Rhine and to his great surprise,
he also saw an intact bridge.

Facing the enemy, Hauptman Friesenhahn
gave the order to destroy the bridge.

The result was a ten-meter crater
in the roadway,

but the bridge itself was still intact.

Friesenhahn turned the detonation key
for a second time,

but nothing happened,

and volunteer Unteroffizier Faust
was ordered to do it manually.

After the expl*si*n
and when the smoke was gone,

they saw that the bridge
was still on its pillars.

Meanwhile, Lt. Timmerman realized

that he didn't have any time to lose
if they wanted an intact bridge,

and he gave the order to attack.

Sergeant Drabik was the first American
to reach the other side.

Interview from Don Whitehead,

Associated Press Correspondent
on March 10th, 1945.

"It was like this, he said.

Lieutenant Timmerman told us
to go across the bridge

with the first platoon leading.

I've got the third platoon
of a r*fle company.

We had fought through Remagen
to the river,

and our company was at the edge
of the town,

about 200 yards of the bridge.

I waited until the first platoon
got out on the bridge,

but they were held up by machine g*n
and sn*per fire

from those big stone towers
at the eastern end.

When I brought up my men,

the first platoon was keeping the Germans
in the tower busy,

so I went by them and yelled
to my men to go across."

The German Army tried everything
to destroy the bridge.

Bombing it with a*tillery, planes,

and even the V1 and V2 rockets
were deployed.

It was all in vain.

American engineers filled up the crater,
checked the bridge for damage,

and when everything was clear,

it only took a week to get 25,000 men
on the other side of the Rhine.

On March 9, the American engineers
started to build a pontoon bridge

around 40 kilometers downstream.

They were constantly under German attack
and lost 17 engineers and 19 platoons

were destroyed before they had
constructed the 315 meters long bridge.

A second pontoon bridge was built too,

and it was clear that the Allies
were unstoppable.

But on March 17th, the Kriegsmarine,

made an ultimate effort
and launched six divers

to put expl*sives
on the Ludendorff bridge,

but they were all shot or captured.

On the same day, disaster struck.

The bridge collapsed and seven men
were k*lled and 23 bodies were missing.

[man reading in German] Diary
of Joseph Goebbels, March 21st.

"The bridge of Remagen,
that gave us so many military headaches,

has now become a matter
of extensive polemic

between the western enemy and ourselves.

The western enemy now admits

that the bridge didn't collapse by itself,

but was demolished
by the German Luftwaffe.

I strongly believe that this is true.

The bridge took so many hits
that it didn't hold out in the end."

[in German] Diary of Oberst
Egon Artur Peller von Ehrenberg.

"On the 23rd, just before darkness fell,
we had a bottle of brandy.

Right now the only way
to calm down the nerves a little bit.

At that moment all hell broke loose
and everybody knew: this is it."

[piano music plays]

[Jennifer] Over 24,000 German civilians

on the west riverbank were evacuated
to the hospital of Bedburg-Hau.

On the east banks, still in German hands,
civilian life was not much better.

Young and old were forced
to dig anti-tank ditches,

while living in constant fear
of Allied airplanes.

Low flying planes fired
on everything that moved.

[female reading in Dutch]
Diary of Petronella Dozy.

"We heard on Friday March 23rd
on the radio that the allied forces

crossed the river Rhine at Wesel easily.

We wonder if our friends
are still alive.

The following night Frank returns again.

We greet him exuberantly and are
overjoyed with the positive outcome.

'We haven't lost anybody, it's a miracle',
he says over and over again.

Then he tells us about the swift advance,

how the Bailey-bridge was constructed
on the big Rhine in no time."

[Jennifer] The next day,
Operation Varsity,

the largest airborne drop on a single day
in the history of w*r, took place.

More than 16,000 soldiers
were dropped here

at the Triangle
of Wesel-Mehrhoog-Hamminkeln.

The American regiment that made up
the fourth and last wave of Varsity

got caught in flak fire.

Many planes were hit,
while others dropped their troops

in the middle
of two British landing zones.

[in German]
Ilse Jacobs wrote in her diary:

"March 24th.

Just before 10 p.m. the firing stopped.

But then we heard an eerie roar in the sky

which came suddenly
but ended equally abruptly.

But after that it happened again
several times.

Startled by this unusual sound,

the soldiers opened doors

just to see
what new horrors we had to endure."

[Jennifer] British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill arrived at Xanten,

and the next day he met Montgomery
and Eisenhower

in the Hotel ‘Wacht am Rhine’.

Suddenly, Churchill decided
to cross the Rhine, which he did.

On April 4th,
Germany's industrial heartland,

the Ruhr area, was encircled.

Over half of Germany's steel
and coal production

had now fallen into the hands
of the Allies.

The liberation of the German cities
wasn't a moment of joy

for the civilians
like in the other countries.

The tension was high,

and the Allied soldiers started to loot
and steal from the enemy.

[male reader] Letter from Jack Wolmer
to his parents on April 4th.

"Dear mom and dad, we just broke
into a safe and got over $200 each.

I have a lot of fun breaking anything
of use around here in Germany.

Not much left of Germany.

We've been ordered not to talk or to have
anything to do with the Germans.

Your son, Jack."

[Jennifer] On April 18th,
all forces in the rural area surrendered

and the Americans suddenly
found themselves

with an extra 317,000 prisoners of w*r,

which put the count at one million POWs.

[ominous music plays]

Right here in Jonastal

the Germans were building
a secret military construction.

Thousands of prisoners were forced
to dig tunnels under the mountains.

The project was probably intended
as a last-ditch headquarter facility

for Hitler and his staff
if they would fall back from Berlin

into the interior of Germany.

The Jonastal was liberated
by the Americans in April 1945,

and they combed
thoroughly through the place.

But Washington intends
to keep its records under lock

for a few more decades.

The Soviet Army, which took over
the site from the Americans,

immediately classified it
as a restricted zone

and then used it
as a military training ground.

It is rumored that the German Army
was testing a mass destruction weapon

on the spot, but it was never proved.

Two civilians, Cläre Werner
and Heinz Wachsmut,

testified about it in the 60s.

Werner said she had seen a glowing light
on March 4th.

She said that she and others
had nose bleeds, headaches, and so on.

Wachsmut from his side,

was ordered to help the SS
to build wooden platforms

in which the corpses of the prisoners
were cremated.

The bodies were covered
in horrific burn wounds.

Like Werner, Wachsmut reports

that local residents complained
about headaches,

some even spitting up blood.

[somber music plays]

The village of Neger near Olpe
was liberated by the youth troops

of the 8th Division on April 10th.

The village school teacher, Otto d*ck,

asked the children to write about the w*r
they experienced themselves,

came to an end.

[man reading in German]
Paper by Hedwig Hesse, 11 years old.

"The Americans are coming.

Quickly I went to the cellar.
Everybody and everything was in uproar.

Then a huge tank appeared on the road
and demolished our wall.

I went outside
and one tank after another rode by

One tank stopped in front of our house

and this American gave me a piece
of chocolate and some candy.

The Americans searched our rooms

and then Daddy's wedding ring was missing,
as well as his watch,

his fountain pen
and three more clocks.

The day before the Americans came

we were robbed by German soldiers
of two bikes and 12 jars of canned fruit."

[in German]
Paper of Gerda Brune, 11 years old.

"My daddy brought out the white flag
and we all went to the cellar.

Then we heard car noises
in front of our house.

My siblings, my mother and me too

were very afraid
and we all started to cry.

It was such a frightening idea

that we were about
to meet our enemies.

The door opened

and for the first time in my life

I saw an American.

I can't remember what my thoughts
were at that moment.

He stood at the door with his g*n

and he ordered us to come forward
with our hands in the air.

The soldier checked every room
in the house

and my father walked with him.

I went outside immediately
and many more soldiers walked by.

Even some Black people.

I had often seen negroes in pictures,

but now I saw them for real.

What a sight it was.

Negroes marching through our Negroland."

[somber music plays]

[explosions]

[piano music plays]

[Jennifer] On April 11th, 1945, American
forces liberated the Buchenwald Camp.

The camp was constructed
in 1937 in a wood area,

and most of the prisoners
at that time were political.

But after the Kristallnacht in 1938,

the German SS and the police
sent about 10,000 Jews to Buchenwald.

Later, during the w*r, lots of POWs
were imprisoned here.

On the day of liberation,

an underground prisoner
resistance organization

took control of Buchenwald to prevent
mass m*rder by the retreating camp guards.

The US forces liberated
more than 20,000 prisoners.

One of them was the young Thomas Geve.

In 1943, he was deported to Auschwitz
with his mother, who died in the camp,

and he ended up in Buchenwald.

After the liberation, he started
to draw these great drawings

that tell the Buchenwald story.

[somber music plays]

[Jennifer] Buchenwald had a program
of medical experiments,

and one of the most hideous ones
was ex*cuted

by Danish physician Dr. Carl Vaernet.

He claimed he would cure
h*m* prisoners

through hormonal transplants.

They were marked by a pink triangle,

but the n*zi's didn't want to exterminate
them but to reeducate.

The Russian POWs were ordered
to go to the doctor's examination

and one of the things they were asked
to do is to stand here

to know their length.

As you can see,
there's a narrow opening here.

The SS soldier was standing here
in a small room holding a weapon

while the Russian soldier stood there,
he was shot in the neck.

Around 8000 Russian POWs
were k*lled this way.

The first camp commander
was Karl-Otto Koch,

whose wife was Ilse Koch.

The prisoners called her
"The witch of Buchenwald"

and she was as gruesome as her husband.

She's been accused of skinning men
of their tattoo,

but that was never proved.

Commander Koch built
a zoo with a bear pit,

so his family and staff
could have some distraction.

The bear pit was only a couple
of meters away from the camp.

In 1942, Koch was prisoner
at Buchenwald himself.

He was accused of encouraging m*rder,
but later for corruption,

misusing the camp workers
for his own good.

He was tried, sentenced to death

and ex*cuted by a firing squad
on April 5th, 1945.

[male reader] Part of a letter
from Al Cohen to his mom in Milwaukee.

The letter starts with this sentence:

"Please pass this letter around mother,
let other people see it.

The hospital was a dirty, grimy building

and it was the smelliest place
in the whole camp.

This was probably caused
by the dirty bedclothes

and dead and dying people.

It was hard to tell the difference.

They both had purple skin.

The main cause of death was malnutrition.

There were barracks after barracks
filled with people

who were slowly dying from that cause,
whom it was impossible to serve.

The inmates were beaten down,
broken spirited people.

Till the time when the Nazis had to leave

there were 51,000 k*lled in the camp

and there was a high monument
with that number on it

in the center of the courtyard

which had been placed there by the Nazis

to commemorate
their murderous achievement.

I spoke to some Polish boys
of a group of boys my age.

They were placed in
the concentration camp at the age of 17

and were there for five years.

They told me that the only thing
that concerned the Nazis

was how to k*ll the people fast enough.

One of the methods they used at first
was to inject benzene

or strong acid either into the heart
or veins with a large hypodermic.

This k*lled them instantly

but it was not efficient
for large numbers of people,

so new methods were evolved.

They were herded into large barracks,


and all the doors and windows sealed off.

SS men stood guard.

A week later, all the people
in the barracks were dead.

The Commander's wife was an ugly woman,

but it meant 25 lashes for any man
who looked at her.

Her hobby was making lamps
and knick-knacks of parts of humans.

She left behind a lamp
made of a man's foot

with human skin used in the lamp shade."

After the w*r Ilse Koch was sentenced
to life for abusing people at Buchenwald

but due to lack of evidence,
she was not tried for skinning people.

[man reading in German] Testimony
after the w*r by Josef Ackermann,

former prisoner in Buchenwald.

"Sir, are you aware of cases

in which Dr. Hoven
pointed to an inmate and said:

'I want his skull for my collection?'

Yes, I can remember a day
when he approached me

as a prisoner was passing by.

I did not know this prisoner personally.

Apparently, he did know him.
He told me:

'Ackermann, I want his skull
on my desk by tomorrow.'

Then he gave me a piece of paper
with something written on it.

That evening, the prisoner
was brought to the hospital.

The next day he lay on my dissecting
table and the doctor got his skull."

"Herr Ackermann, do you know of any cases
of skin tattoos being collected?"

"Yes, that was early on a specialty
of the pathological ward in Buchenwald."

[Broadcast] Over the White House
at Washington,

the flag flies at half-staff

as a grief stricken nation mourns
the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt,

President of the United States.

Inside, in the historic Cabinet Room…

[Jennifer] Three days
after Roosevelt's death,

the British forces liberated
their first concentration camp:

Bergen-Belsen.

Around 60,000 prisoners,

most in critical condition
because of a typhus epidemic,

are found alive.

At least 10,000 people died
within a few weeks after the liberation.

And a total of 50,000 human beings
were k*lled

during the whole period of w*r.

[female reading in Yiddish] Diary of Hanna
Lévy-Hass in the Bergen-Belsen camp.

"I am terribly ashamed
to have lived through all this.

Men are rotting
and decomposing in the mud.

There are reports
that in one of the neighboring blocks

acts of cannibalism have arisen.

There was a personal statement
by a German doctor

who finally came to our block to take
stock of the progress of mass death.

He said that over the past two months,
in February and March,

more than 17,000 internees
per month have died."

The most famous child victim
was k*lled in this camp.

Anne Frank was gassed
and died in February 1945,

a month before the liberation of the camp.

[piano music plays]

[man reading in German] Letter from Adolf
Hitler to Benito Mussolini, April 20th.

"To Benito Mussolini.

Many thanks, Duce, for your
congratulations for my birthday.

The w*r that we fight for our mere
existence now reaches its highlight.

With limitless materials the Bolsheviks

and the Jews will try everything

to unify their forces in Germany

in order to turn our continent
into utter chaos.

With great risk for their lives,

the German people
and like-minded folk

must stop this tidal wave,
no matter what the costs are.

With true heroism we will alter
the course of this w*r.

On this historic moment in our century,
where Europe's fate will be determined,

I send you my heartfelt greetings.
Adolf Hitler."

[piano music plays]

[Jennifer] When the Allies
advanced from both sides

and got closer to the concentration camps,

the SS wanted to remove the evidence
of crimes against humanity

and clean the traces of the camps.

In order to get the prisoners
out of the concentration camps,

the SS invented the Death Marches.

About 700 to 800,000 people were forced
into Death Marches, most of them Jewish.

During the marches, about 250.000 people
died from exhaustion,

frostbite or because they were shot dead
by the SS men.

[somber music plays]

[male reader] Letter from Dr. Henry Swan
to his wife on April 21st.

"The Kreisleiter, through the local SS
and the party members,

organized the Volksturm of Gardelegen.

On Friday 13th, they were ready.

They collected all these gaunt
and tattered prisoners from the camps,

the hospitals, the buildings,
and assembled them at this barn.

They had two machine g*ns strategically
placed near the corners of the barn.

The Volksturm had r*fles and pistols.

They asked if any of the prisoners
could sh**t a r*fle.

Some said they could.

They stood in a line about 15 yards
from the barn,

with Volkssturmer and SS standing
behind them with pistols in their ribs.

The rest were herded into the barn.

Some refused to go,
knowing what was in store.

These were shot.

The rest were crowded in.

Then the big wooden doors were slid shut.

The ones with r*fles were ordered
to start sh**ting from the doors.

The machine g*ns began to rattle."

[male reader]
Investigation account of Bondo Gaza,

a Hungarian musician,
who survived this horror.

"The last group of 300 arrived
at the barn around 1900 hours.

It was still daylight.

Here, the 80 guards were joined
by some 20 Fallschirmjager,

two of them on motorcycles, who arrived
carrying Panzerfaust machine pistols,

hand grenades and flare pistols.

The prisoners, on foot,
waited outside the barn

for the carts with the sick to arrive,

who were put inside first.

Once inside, many immediately noticed
the strong smell of petrol,

but contented themselves

with the thought
that the barn must have been

used as a garage or to store fuel.

The prisoners were ordered to sit down.

The four big doors were closed
and wedged fast

on the outside with stones.

A few minutes later,
the door on the south-west side opened

and two soldiers entered.

One of them, identified as Braun by some,

set fire to the straw
with a match at several places.

As soon as they had gone out,
the prisoners rushed up

and frantically put out the flames
with their blankets,

clothes and bare hands.

Then they pushed all the straw
in the middle of the barn.

The soldiers re-entered
and again ignited the floor

by discharging the signal flares
into the straw.

Several times the prisoners
managed to put out the fires,

but finally soldiers prevented them
by throwing hand-grenades,

sh**ting Panzerfausts
and firing machine pistols and r*fles

into the frantic masses
through the south-west door.

Soon dead and dying men
were piling up at the doors.

Cries of pain and panic rung inside
the dark building as others were trampled.

To escape the rain of b*ll*ts,
some men feigned death

or hid under the dead bodies of others.

By now the fire
was completely out of control.

The inside of the barn began to fill up
with suffocating smoke.

Chaos and panic was complete.

Men were swearing, crying,
pleading, praying,

shouting 'Vive la France'
and 'Long live Poland'.

Several even broke out
singing their national anthem.

Men were being roasted alive."

[male reader] "I went to the barn
on Wednesday.

It was a sight to banish sleep,

emaciated bodies twisted
in grotesque shapes,

some charred, others just darkened
by the smoke, piled on top of each other,

four, five, ten deep,
especially near the doors and corners.

One had dug with his hands

a pit in the dirt of the doorway
just enough so he could get his face out.

[Jennifer] Eleven prisoners, seven Poles,
three Russians,

and one severely wounded Frenchman,
survived the devastating fire

and were found alive by the U.S. Soldiers.

SS-Untersturmführer Erhard Brauny,
the transport leader for the prisoners,

was put on trial in 1947
before a U.S. Military Tribunal

and was convicted
and sentenced to life in prison.

He died of leukemia in 1950.

None of the other perpetrators
were punished for their role

in this horrible, inhuman act.

[speech] The German people have been told

that stories of German atrocities
were Allied propaganda.

Here you can see for yourselves.

Some people will say
the n*zi's are responsible for this crime.

Others will point to the Gestapo.

The responsibility lies with neither.

It is the responsibility
of the German people.

To you Germans I say

that your culture has descended

to the systematic annihilation of groups

or peoples who come under your control.

Your so-called master race

has demonstrated that it is master only

of crime, cruelty, and sadism.

[female reading in German] Letter from
Magda Goebbels to Harald Quandt,

April 28th, 1945.

"My beloved son.

It's been six days now
in the Führerbunker

for daddy, your six siblings and me,

in order to give an honorful ending
to our n*zi lives.

If you'll receive this letter,
I don't know.

Maybe there is one kind soul

who makes it possible for me
to say farewell to you.

You must realize that I stayed
with daddy against his will.

The Führer himself offered me
an escape route last Sunday.

You know your mother.

We have the same blood.

And it was quite simple.

Our superior ideas will go down

and with it everything

I have ever admired and loved
in this life.

The world after the Führer and the Nazis

isn't worth living in

and that's why I brought the kids as well.

Since they would live a shameful life.

And a merciful God will understand me,

when I relieve them of this fate.

You will live on
and I have one request for you:

never forget that you're German.

And never do something
that will hurt our honor

and make sure that our lives and death

have meant something."

[somber music plays]

Arbeid macht frei.
Work sets you free.

It's not meant to be ironic.

It's not even a false promise to prisoners

that those who work
to exhaustion would get free.

It's rather to interpret
as some kind of mystical declaration

that endless labor brings
sort of a spiritual freedom.

Dachau opened only five weeks after
Adolf Hitler took power in 1933.

The original camp held
about 5000 political prisoners,

opponents of the n*zi regime.

During the next few years,
Jehovah witnesses, Gypsies,

h*m* and Jews
were interned at Dachau.

The Dachau camp also served
as a training center

for SS concentration camp guards,

and it was the first camp to use prisoners

for medical
and scientific experimentation.

[In German] Dr. Werner Nuernberg,

Dr. Hans Eisele, Dr. Fritz Hintermayer,
Dr. Ernst Holzlöhner,

Dr. Fridolin Karl Puhr,
Dr. Horst Schumann, Dr. Helmuth Vetter,

Dr. Wilhelm Witteler
und Dr. Waldemar Wolter.

[Jennifer] In 1942, the doctors
and scientists at Dachau

started to experiment
what impact freezing temperature

had on the human body.

[man reading in German] Diary of Edgar
Kupfer-Koberwitz, journalist and prisoner.

"Prisoners were brought
to a specially constructed building.

The air is adjusted to artificial
altitudes of over 5,000 meters

and the prisoners were thrown
in an basin with freezing water.

All were examined before, to make
sure they had strong, healthy hearts.

This experiment was done
because paratroopers died instantly

when they landed in cold water.

Now they wanted to find out
what the cause of their death was.

Many people,
no matter how strong and healthy,

died during these experiments.

They often selected unpopular people
from the barracks for this.

The experiments were adjusted
to see if a survivor

would recover when he lay
between two beautiful young women."

[man reading] Letter from Captain
David Wilsey from Maryland to his wife.

"We roared through the gates of Dachau
figurative minutes after its liberation,

while 40,000 plus wrecks-of-humanity
milled, tore, looted, screamed,

cried like depraved beasts
which the n*zi SS has made them.

In those early minutes,

I saw captured SS tortured
against a wall by US soldiers

and then shot in what you Americans
would call cold blood.

But Emily, God forgive me
if I say I saw it done

without a single disturbed emotion
because they so had it coming."

["Dachaulied" by choir]

♪ Stacheldraht
Mit Tod geladen ♪

♪ Ist um unsre Welt gespannt ♪

♪ Drauf ein Himmel ohne Gnaden ♪

♪ Sendet Frost und Sonnenbrand ♪

♪ Fern von uns sind alle Freuden ♪

♪ Fern die Heimat und die Fraun… ♪

[man reading in German]
The song of Dachau. Text by Jura Soyfer,

music by Herbert Zipper.

"Barbed wire, loaded with death,
that's our world.

The sky sends us her grace,
snow and sun.

Far away from joy, homeland and our girls.

When we go to mindless work,
all fades away.

We learned the ruthless
lesson of Dachau

and we got hard as steel.

Stay human, be a man,

do your job and love thy neighbor.

Because Arbeit macht frei…"

One of the most infamous experiments
at Dachau

was the research of different methods
of making seawater drinkable.

At a certain point,
a group of about 90 Romas

were given nothing but seawater
to drink from Doctor Hans Eppinger.

The seawater regime
caused serious injuries.

The Romas were so dehydrated
that they licked the freshly mopped floor

in an attempt to get drinkable water.

Another experiment,
directed by Doctor Sigmund Rascher,

was to help German pilots
who had to bail out of high altitude.

A low-pressure chamber
was used to simulate conditions

at altitudes up to 21,000 meters.

It was rumored that Rascher performed
vivisections on the brains of victims

who survived the first experiment.

Of the 200 subjects, 80 died outright
and the others were m*rder*d.

Only from 1944 on a women's camp
was added to the complex,

and women from Auschwitz were transferred
to Dachau as part of Death March.

[somber music plays]

[Jennifer] This is Sister Pia.

She adored Adolf Hitler
and was the only woman to march with him

through the streets of Munich
during the Putsch.

A publication in Der Spiegel called her
'The Nurse of the n*zi Nation'.

Sister Pia was known
as a fanatical National Socialist,

who hated Jews and Poles.

She had a close relationship
with SS Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler

and it was due to him
that she was appointed Welfare Sister

for the Waffen-SS at Dachau in 1933.

In 1943, SS Reichsführer Himmler
banned her from Dachau

because it had been claimed
that she wanted to smuggle

prisoners' letters out
of the concentration camp.

She also assumed the role
of a brothel madam

and recruited women
and girls from Poland and Ukraine

who had been forced to work
as prostit*tes,

giving them alcohol and narcotics,

and generally
prepared them for their role.

Sister Pia stated:
"There is only one Frederick the Great,

there is only one Adolf Hitler,
and there is only one Sister Pia."

In 'Bild' magazine in 1977, she said:

"I've always loved Adolf Hitler
and I always will.

He was a very sweet
and very wonderful man."

[somber music plays]

[man reading in German] Diary of Edgar
Kupfer-Koberwitz,

April 29th, 1945.

"Suddenly we heard people
screaming and running.

'The Americans are here, they're
in the camp! Yeah! They're outside!'

Everything was on the move.

Sick people got out of bed,
and everyone went outside."

[in German] Encrypted radio message
from Bletchley Park,

April 28th, 1945.

"From Himmler to SS-officer Berger:

'Make sure that all administration
in Dachau gets destroyed.'"

[man reading in Dutch] Diary of Nico Rost.
"Goethe in Dachau.

April 29th, 06:30 a.m.

The SS showed the white flag.

Are the Americans really that close?

Will the SS surrender the camp?

Without a fight?

Without k*lling us all?

I don't trust white flags from the SS.

Why are the watchtowers
around the camp still occupied?

Why was there
an ammunition delivery yesterday?

Why are the machine g*ns
still pointed at the barracks?

No, the SS will always be the SS,
until they are destroyed."

[Jennifer] According to certain sources,

Himmler also wrote that no prisoner
shall be allowed

to fall in the hands of the enemy alive.

But the last Lagerälteste, Oskar Müller,
thought differently.

Müller feared a mass m*rder
of the remaining prisoners,

so he sent two prisoners
to contact the Americans,

with the request to liberate the camp.

The Allies reached Dachau on April 29,

and the first thing they saw was a train
where about 2000 corpses were laying.

Later, at the crematorium,
they found another 3000 bodies.

The shock was enormous.

[male reader] Letter from
Private Harold Porter to his parents

on May 7th, 1945.

"While we were inspecting the place,

freed prisoners drove up
with wagon loads of corpses

removed from the compound property.

Watching the unloading was horrible,

the bodies squashed and gurgled
as they hit the pile,

and the odor could almost be seen.

Behind the furnaces
was the execution chamber,

a windowless cell twenty feet square,

with gas nozzles every few feet
across the ceiling.

Outside, in addition to a huge mound
of charred bone fragments,

were the carefully sorted
and stacked clothes of the victims,

which obviously numbered in the thousands.

Although I stood there looking at it,
I couldn't believe it."

[Jennifer] The American soldiers
were so upset

by what they saw and found there

that they forgot about
the Geneva Convention

and ex*cuted the camp guards.

The Americans freed about


[male reader] Letter from
Private Harold Porter to his parents

on May 14th, 1945.

"Today I've talked to several
Italian girls here,

through an interpreter,

who were left for the amusement
of the SS troops.

I gather that the life they led
is beyond descriptions.

We've already had other evidence
of the sexual orgies of these troops.

The Yugoslav, who was forced to operate
the crematory for the Germans,

is operating it voluntarily for us.

He tells of having to go to
the SS barracks

to get the bodies of the girls
after a particularly wild evening.

Girls who refused to cooperate
were burned alive before their companions,

who soon decided to cooperate.

[in German]
Telegram from Hitler to Alfred Jodl.

"Point one, where are Wenck's troops?

Point two, when will they act?

Point three, where is the 9th Army?

Point four, where will
the 9th Army break through?

Point five, where are Holste's troops?"

A total of 206,200 people
from 30 countries were detained at Dachau.

The estimated death toll is 41,500 people.

The same day that Dachau was liberated
Adolf Hitler married Eva Braun.

["Où vont les fleurs?"
by Marlene Dietrich plays]