KZ-Außenlager Ebensee, project "Zement"

[pzb14]

Hello friends,

I wanted to add some additional information from the region I am living. The history of the town is often described as dark, most of what happened is not allowed to be talked about. The camp, has been totally destroyed after war, and now a small village was built on it, only the old entry is still standing.
The tunnels in which the rocket parts were tested are one of the last memorys which were original to the time. Also the place were the SS baracks were standing has been destroyed. I will have to make pics myself from them when I have a little more time.

Here some info I found:

The SS Camp:
The Ebensee concentration camp was erected as a labour camp subordinate to the Mauthausen concentration camp. The first inmates arrived in Ebensee on 18 November 1943. Until the time when the construction of the first barracks was finished, the prisoners had to stay in a storehouse of the weaving mill. To cover up the existence of the camp, SS officers used the code names Kalk (limestone), Kalksteinbergwerk (limestone mine), Solvay and Zement (cement).


Purpose:
The main purpose of Ebensee was to provide slave labour for the construction of the enormous underground tunnels which were to be used for research purposes and the development of the A9/A10 Interkontinentalrakete (intercontinental rocket). The original plan had to be given up as other productions of military importance were assigned a higher priority.

Inmates:
Apart from a few exceptions, all prisoners were registered in the Mauthausen concentration camp and then transported to the subordinate camp in Ebensee. According to the camp registers, 27,278 male prisoners were incarcerated in the Ebensee camp between 18 November 1943 and 6 May 1945. About 1,500 camp inmates were transferred from Ebensee to other subcamps, e.g. to Redl-Zipf (code name Schlier) or Wels and after several months brought back to Ebensee; as a result these prisoners were registered in the camp records a second time. From January 1945 onwards, transports with masses of prisoners arrived from evacuated concentration camps and led to an unbearable situation and the complete breakdown of supply. On 23 April 1945, the number of inmates in the Ebensee camp reached its peak with 18,509 prisoners. Members of the SS command tried to bring about the death of the new arrivals most of whom were of Jewish origin and therefore to minimise the number of camp inmates.

[pzb14]

Some more pics i found. The old entry as seen the only revival of the old camp...

[HJ-Collector]

hi thanks for the informative threads

[johnhmcgary]

Are the tunnels still there? It would be a great place to wander around......if it's safe Thanks for the info and pics. John

[Alan M]

Hi pzb , it`s amazing to see the photo of the main gate of the camp as it was then in b / w and as it is now in colour in such beautiful surroundings !! It doesn`t look to be the same place. A very historical area ,

cheers Al

[Paul D]

Some more pics i found. The old entry as seen the only revival of the old camp...

Very informative and interesting posts and photos , thanks

[ironcross1]

Great reading , very interesting history , cheers Raymond

[Zable]

The old black and whites make it look an even dark and sinister place, as i am quite sure it was in its day. Interesting to see such a horror camp within Austria itself. I believe it was named as ''one of the most diabolic concentration camps ever built''

Do you have any idea what the plaque on the gate reads.

Thanks for sharing.

[pzb14]

Hello, I will read it next time when I am there. Some of the tunnels broke already down, one is used for memorial, its the one with beton inside. Some tunnels where started but never finished till end of the war.

The steps are in the middle of the way from the former KZ to the tunnels, they were called Löwengang "~lion gate" because, the inmates were screwed through like animals in a circus, surrounded by electric fence and the deadly eye of the ss tk.

[CARL]

Thread moved to the Konzentrationslagers forum.

Guest Zable quote: "Interesting to see such a horror camp within Austria itself. I believe it was named as ''one of the most diabolic concentration camps ever built''

In fact, there were many camps within Austria. The Mauthausen-Gusen camp system alone was vast, with well over fifty satellite camps. Many sub-camps - not only of Mauthausen-Gusen but others too, were established to provide the tunnel driving work required for construction of the rocket and jet fighter manufacturing facilities. Concerning the severity, one must remember that the main camp(s) at Mauthausen and Gusen were horrific - Mauthausen was a category-III Konzentrationslager, reserved for the "Knochenmühlen" (bone mills) attached to a stone quarry. Typically, the death rate was much higher than at a category-I Arbeitslager (work camp) such as KZ-Dachau.

At Ebensee, in addition to the rocket manufacturing work, prisoners were also exploited within a ball bearing manufacturing workshop - for Steyr-Daimler-Puch AG, as well as a distillation plant for fuel production. Although Kommandant SS-Obersturmführer Anton Ganz ordered the inmates assembled on the Appellplatz (roll call area) to move into the tunnels as the US forces approached, the inmates refused - fearing an SS massacre once they had been driven inside. Shortly afterward, the remaining SS staff fled - leaving only the former prisoner functionaries to watch the inmates. Over fifty former collaborators were then killed as the prisoners took revenge. Of the 27,000 inmates interned at the camp, over 8,200 died before liberation.