Chelmno, Death Camp
The entire camp consists of a building no bigger than Lindenbaum. It was one of the first death camps to be put into action. The camp had a huge castle in the front where the transport of Jews would undress. They were then chased into the back of the castle into trucks. They were gassed within those trucks by using the exhaust pipes. The entire camp is only known about through escapees because the Nazis destroyed the camp and destroyed all the evidence. Twice. And they did a good job of it because when we first arrived I didn't even realize where I was standing. I thought we were just sitting in a courtyard until Rav Brown had me read a request to make the trunks of the car smaller so they won't have to use more carbon monoxide to "process the units" (kill the Jews) and need sewer holes built into them to "dispose of the solid waste" (get rid of the corpses).
Ruins of Chelmno Castle
Map of original Chelmno Castle
Church used to keep imprisoned Jews overnight
The second part of the camp really got to me. You walk through a huge gate into a field where there were 3 long rows. Graves. Mass graves. Like the ones I've seen in pictures. We held a tekes for all of the people whose names were lost because of the Nazis. Then we walked along the graves where a lot if polish cities erected their own monuments in honor of the memory. This is all while walking along the remnants of a crematoria and bone grinder. When I got to the final wall, I couldn't believe my eyes. There were two plaques next to each other, and they had the names Ya'akobovitz and Grossman written on them. My families, both sides, had died in Chelmno. The realization shook me. I lit two yortzeit candles for these lost relatives I had never known.
Chelmno Memorial
Views of the three Mass Graves
Memorials by individual Polish towns
Ruins of Crematoria Wall (memorial)
The plaques with my great-grandparents family names
The Next Generation
No comments:
Post a Comment