Het Concentratiekamp door Ds. J. Raalte te ermelo - In the Concentration Camp by J. Ralte in Ermelo - the story of a Dutch prisoner in the death camps, published by T. Wever. the Netherlands, 1945 - first edition.
A description of life in the Dachau and Buchenwald camps by former prisoner Raalte de Ermelo who stayed in Buchenwald and then in Dachau for over two years. A description of the circumstances that led to his arrest and his stay in the detention cell in Arnhem. The deportation to Dachau camp and the harsh conditions of the journey, the daily routine and the harsh reality in the camp, the crowding, the hunger, the filth, the forced labor, and the severe punishments that the Nazis inflicted on the prisoners (Ermelo describes in detail terrible punishments that the Nazis used in Dachau, including the notorious "tree punishment" in which the prisoner was tied by his hands behind his back to a tree and hung like that for hours, Jews who were buried alive, the use of rats for torture, and indescribably horrifying punishments), the constant fear ("We had a block leader who every morning when he arrived at the roll call went through the rows one by one and felt if you were hiding something under your shirt"). Raalte tells, among other things, the stories of his fellow prisoners, their struggle for survival, the illnesses and deaths of prisoners, and the role of faith in maintaining the hope and resilience of the prisoners. Among other things, he describes specific events of cruelty and inhumanity on the part of the SS commanders of the camps (he tells of a transport of Jews who arrived at Buchenwald who were executed upon arrival at the camp in a freezing ice bath, and severe tortures that the Jews underwent in the camp). In the second part of the book, he documents the events leading up to the liberation of the camp, the condition of the survivors and the first steps towards recovery from the horrors they experienced.
The book is accompanied by hard to view drawings of scenes of torture and death in the Dachau camp made by the prisoner Raphael Tijhuis who was with Raalte at the same time as a prisoner in the camp. He created the drawings in the camp itself during the days it was liberated by the Americans.
Extremely rare. Does not appear in the world cat library catalog.
84 p. Minor stains on some of the pages. Good condition
