Plaszow

PLASZOW, forced-labor camp that became a concentration camp. The Plaszow camp was established in 1942 in a KRAKOW suburb; its official designation was Zwangsarbeitslager Plaszow des SS- und Polizeiführers im Distrikt Krakau (Plaszow Forced-Labor Camp of the SS and Police Leader in the Krakow District). -In January 1944 Plaszow was made a concentration camp.

The construction of the camp was launched in the summer of 1942, within the Krakow city limits, on a site comprising two Jewish cemeteries, other Jewish community property, and the private property of Polish residents who had been evicted. From time to time the camp was enlarged, its maximum size in 1944 being 200 acres (81 hectares). It was encircled by an electric double-apron barbed-wired fence 2.5 miles (4 km) in length. The camp was divided into several sections - the German quarters, the factories, and the camp itself, which was divided into men's and women's sections, with separate subsections in each for Poles and Jews.

During the liquidation of the Krakow ghetto, on March 13 and 14, 1943, most of its Jewish inhabitants were deported to BELZEC, about -two thousand Jews were murdered in the Krakow streets (and buried in a mass grave in Plaszow), and the rest, some eight thousand persons, were put into Plaszow. In early July of that year a separate camp for "retraining by work" was established in the camp, for Polish prisoners charged with disciplinary infractions or political offences. The former were held there for several months, and the latter were given unlimited terms of "retraining." The Polish camp also contained several dozen Gypsy families, including small children.

The number of prisoners held in Plaszow varied from time to time; prior to the liquidation of the Krakow ghetto, it contained 2,000 persons, while in the latter half of 1943 its population was 12,000 persons. In May and June of 1944 the number of prisoners was at its height - 22,000 to 24,000, including 6,000 to 8,000 Jews from Hungary. The number of Polish prisoners in the early stage was 1,000, jumping to 10,000 after the WARSAW POLISH UPRISING.

Plaszow also contained German criminal prisoners, who were employed on various camp duties. The number of "permanent prisoners" (that is, prisoners who were given personal numbers) is estimated to have been twenty-five thousand, and in addition there was an unknown number of "temporary" prisoners and hostages. Amon GOETH, the camp commandant from February 1943 to September 1944 (one of five men to hold the post), was the person responsible for most of the heinous crimes committed in the camp-mass murder, Selektionen, death from overwork, and personal participation in murder.
Until 1944 most of the camp guards were Ukrainians in Nazi service; when Plaszow became a concentration camp, 600 SS men from the SS TOTENKOPFVERBÄNDE (Death'sHead Units) took over. While still functioning as a forced-labor camp, Plaszow was the scene of mass killing of Jews. When the SS took over, Poles who had been sentenced in summary police trials for patriotic activities were brought there and shot to death. Some eight thousand persons, individually and in groups, are estimated to have been murdered in Plaszow. In the summer of 1944, as the Red Army was drawing near, work was begun on the breakup of the camp, and prisoners were transferred to other camps or deported to extermination camps. The latter was the fate of two thousand Jewish prisoners who in late May 1944 were deported to AUSCHWITZ and gassed to death there.

In September 1944 the Polish section was also liquidated, and efforts were made to obliterate the traces of the crimes that had been perpetrated in the camp by opening the mass graves, exhuming the bodies, and burning them in heaps. On January 14, 1945, the last prisoners were evacuated from Plaszow and sent to Auschwitz.