Dachau Concentration Camp.

[Adrian]

I had a short break in Germany a few weeks ago and one of the places I visited was Dachau Concentration Camp.

It was established in March 1933, was the first such camp and was the base model for all subsequent camps. It ran for 12 years during which time over 200,000 prisoners were incarcerated, 43,000 of whom died here. It was liberated on 29th April 1945.

Alot has changed since that day in 1945 and the camp itself has almost been swallowed up by the surrounding industry and housing. Therefore, it's quite a surprise to be in such a place with so much going on around it.

The actual camp visit only takes up about a fifth of the original site as you can see on the map in the first photo, it is the area marked 'A'.
The second photo is self explanatory.

There is quite a bit to get through so for the sake of continuity please be patient until I've uploaded everything if you have any questions or comments..

[Adrian]

Walking down from the visitors centre you arrive at the railway and platform where prisoners were unloaded prior to entering the camp. This was uncovered only recently.

To the right of the photo showing this platform you can see some of the former buildings which have now been taken over and are used for modern industry and business. The Commandant's house is also there and is now the headquarters of the Bavarian Riot Police.

[António Fragoeiro]

Lovely photos so far.
Still havent been in Dachau but its on my to visit list.
Cheers.
Nuno

[Adrian]

Looking left from the platform you are faced with the camp entrance and Gatehouse or 'Jourhaus', so named because of the 24 hour SS guards on duty.

Walking through the arch there are two plaques mounted on the walls honouring the U.S. units who liberated the camp.

The gate with it's ubiquitous motto is there to see as you enter.

The final two photos in this sequence are from inside the camp looking back at the Jourhaus.

[MD Helmets]

There is nothing like being able to look at "Now and Then" photos of historic places. It helps one walk back into time. Very much looking forward to more photos. Thanks, Adrian!

[Adrian]

Inside the camp and standing with your back to the Jourhaus you have the 'Appellplatz' or Roll Call Ground in front of you. The rollcall happened daily in all weathers, the information board tell you more.
The photo of the prisoners was taken by the SS and was intended to demean and belittle the inmates. Note the angle of the photo, looking down upon them, the shaved heads and identical garb taking away their identity, the prisoners themselves made to look down at the ground, not up at their 'superiors'.

Looking across the roll call ground and to give a sense of perspective you will see a watch tower just to the right centre of the photo. This same watch tower can be seen in the photo on the information board in the upper right quadrant of the image.

The last image shows a map of the camp and the red dot shows you where we are.

[Adrian]

Moving on we now see the camp maintenance building. It survives pretty much intact as you can see from the photos. Not much more to add from me on this one, the information board says it all........

I'll come back to this building later.

[Adrian]

Between the maintenance building and roll call ground there are a few memorials erected to the thousands who died or were kept prisoner here.

[milmuseum]

I ran into a soldier a few years back, who was one of the liberators. He lives in Southern Oregon. He showed me a bunch of original pictures he took with his Brownie camera. One of the most striking photos was supposedly of the camp commander. They made him stand on top of a pile of bodies for several days at attention in his SS uniform until one of the guards finally shot him. He said no one cared that he got shot. There must have been 200 bodies in this pile. Another one showed a concrete table with a bucket of gold teeth next to it. Many of his pictures are still used today to show what happened there. He said he still has nightmares from everything he saw there.

Burt

[Adrian]

With our backs to the maintenance building we can now see the 'Camp Road'. The information board shows a couple of period images, the one on the left is looking up it towards the far end of the camp from where I stood to take the 'now' image with the roll call area in the forground. The one on the right is looking back towards the maintenance building.

The last three photos are of each side of the road where the barracks once stood and an arial shot to give an idea of the layout.