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Selection (German: Selektion) was the process of designating inmates either for murder or forced labor at a Nazi concentration camp. [ 1 ] The arrival selection was first a separation by gender, and then a separation into either fit or unfit for work, as determined by a soldier or bureaucrat or doctor after a visual inspection or perhaps a ...
According to the Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, there were 23 main concentration camps (German: Stammlager), of which most had a system of satellite camps. [1] Including the satellite camps, the total number of Nazi concentration camps that existed at one point in time is at least a thousand, although these did not all exist at the same time.
The names of extermination camps are rarely mentioned in primary sources originating from the Western side of the Reich. [16] Comparatively, areas near the east of Europe make references to the camps. Particularly, primary sources report the Polish resistance movement comparing the Katyn massacre to the Auschwitz concentration camp. [16]
The Nazis had no plan for concentration camps prior to their seizure of power. [11] The concentration camp system arose in the following months due to the desire to suppress tens of thousands of Nazi opponents in Germany. The Reichstag fire in February 1933 was the pretext for mass arrests.
The Nazis distinguished between extermination and concentration camps. The terms extermination camp (Vernichtungslager) and death camp (Todeslager) were interchangeable in the Nazi system, each referring to camps whose primary function was genocide. Six camps meet this definition, though extermination of people happened at every sort of ...
The major concentration camps in Serbia were Sajmište and Banjica but many others like Topovske Šupe, Šabac, and Niš concentration camps also interned considerable numbers of Jews. [376] Before the war was concluded, upwards of 14,500 Serbian Jews were murdered. [ 377 ]
[59] From June 1943 until January 1945 at the concentration camps, Sachsenhausen and Natzweiler, experimentation with 'epidemic jaundice' (i.e. viral hepatitis) was conducted. Test subjects were injected with the disease in order to discover new inoculations for the condition. These tests were conducted for the benefit of the German Armed Forces.
The Nazis also operated concentration camps, some of which provided free forced labor for industrial and other jobs while others existed purely for the extermination of their inmates. A notable example is Mittelbau-Dora labor camp complex that serviced the production of the V-2 rocket. See List of German concentration camps for more.