In early 1933, the National Socialists came to power in Germany. In October, after the Reichstag fire, Hitler received special powers and began decisive action to establish the order he had conceived in the country.
The Dachau concentration camp became the first institution of mass re-education of the population, for the beginning of German. The place was chosen in Bavaria, not far from Munich, practically in the suburbs (only 17 km), on the site of an abandoned factory.
The Social Democrats and the Communists, who for various reasons failed to create a parliamentary coalition, formed the basis of the special contingent. In addition to them, homosexuals, prostitutes, criminals and all those whom the Nazi leadership considered asocial elements ended up in the dungeons. In total, the first race consisted of five thousand people. At the same time, a mocking slogan appeared on the gate: “Work makes you free.”
In the early years, the Dachau concentration camp really became a place of "reforging". Former communists and social democrats, after working for several months in the open air with a strict diet, often expressed sympathy for the nationalsocialism. They were released and given the opportunity to prove their devotion in practice.
In 1934, it became clear that much more camps were required. The Dachau concentration camp became a forge of personnel for the staff of the penitentiary system of the entire Reich.
Then, after the all-German pogrom, which received the poetic name "Kristallnacht", they seriously took up the Jewish population. The first ten thousand were brought here in 1938.
With the outbreak of World War II, the national composition of prisoners expanded. All over Germany and beyond (in the occupied territories) new institutions were set up, which were no longer intended for re-education. People were brought here to be killed.
The Dachau concentration camp has become a site for industrial methods of killing "human material". Everything that could be of value to the war economy was disposed of - dental crowns, hair, clothing, ashes remaining from burned bodies. But that's not all - the prisoners were used to conduct experiments to study the borderline regimes of the body within the limits of survival and beyond them. To this end, the prisoners were subjected to hypothermia, poisonous substances and protective equipment were tested on them, and they were given lethal injections of toxins. In quarantine blocks, observations were made of those infected with phlegmon. SS butchers slaughtered people to record their death throes.
At the end of April 1945, units of the American Seventh Army approached the outskirts of Munich. On their waywas Dachau (concentration camp). Photos taken by American soldiers immediately after the release of the prisoners showed mountains of corpses, skeletons covered in leather. The guard chose to surrender without a fight. What happened next was something no one expected. The SS men were taken to the fence and shot all without exception. This mass execution was not even revenge - the American soldiers simply killed non-humans like mad bloodthirsty animals.
In the post-war years, much has been done to perpetuate the memory of the victims of Dachau. The concentration camp-museum, however, according to the surviving prisoners, does not give a complete picture of the real atmosphere of the "death factory". The blocks are carefully repaired, plastered and whitewashed, inside - clean and tidy. Only the cold ovens of the crematorium and mocking iron letters above the entrance remind of the horrors of twelve years of Nazi rule and two hundred thousand people turned into ashes and yellowish smoke here.
