Buchenwald les horreurs des camps de torture nazis – Buchenwald – The Horrors of the Nazi Torture Camps – Photographic Reports. Numéro Spécial – “Special Edition.” The first publication of harrowing photographs from Buchenwald Concentration Camp as it appeared to the Allied forces upon its liberation. France, May 1945 – First and Rare Edition.
“Germany, a School of Death…” – A rare booklet published only a month after the camp’s liberation by the United States Army, aimed at revealing to the world for the first time the scale of the atrocities that took place in the camp. The booklet contains harrowing photographs taken on the day of Buchenwald’s liberation as discovered by American soldiers of the 6th Armored Division, commanded by George Patton, accompanied by detailed text describing the torment endured by the prisoners of Buchenwald in Germany. When American forces arrived at the camp, they found approximately 21,000 prisoners, starving, beaten, and hovering between life and death. They immediately began efforts to save those who could still be rescued. The photographs document scenes unknown to human history: cremation ovens, prisoners in terrible physical condition, photographs of mass graves filled with the bodies of victims, including children and infants, prisoners with expressions of joy on their faces as they met their liberators, prisoners explaining to Allied soldiers how the torture devices in the camp and the crematorium operated, American forces providing food and assistance to the prisoners, George Patton inspecting the facilities of the camp, and more. The photographs are accompanied by short captions describing the scale of the horrors, such as: “In the photograph appear complete bodies alongside burned corpses, can you believe your eyes?” At the opening of the booklet, Roger Minne writes under the title “Revenge”: “We think of all these deaths, of all those eyes filled with suffering turned toward the heavens… Let one cry full of blood rise from all throats. This is not an hour of forgiveness, nor an hour for tears. It is time for punishment… Revenge! We will avenge our dead…”. On April 15, days after the camp’s liberation, radio journalist Edward Murrow broadcast from Buchenwald, describing to listeners the horrors that met his eyes. His words became famous and ended with: “I pray you believe what I have told you about Buchenwald. I have reported what I saw and heard only in part. Most of what I saw, I cannot put into words…”
Buchenwald, one of the largest camps in Nazi Germany, had approximately 138 sub-camps. Around 65,000 people were murdered in Buchenwald, including those killed in death marches upon the announcement of the approaching Allied forces, shortly before the camp’s liberation, not counting the prisoners sent from Buchenwald to extermination camps or the T4 euthanasia program at Sonnenstein Castle and other locations. The treatment of Jews in the camp was the harshest of all. Jews were held in especially harsh conditions and suffered abuse, starvation, and medical experiments performed on their bodies. According to camp records, in 1941, a quarter of the Jewish prisoners had died, and by 1942, the death rate among Jewish prisoners exceeded 38%.
16 pages. Very good condition.
