In late 1941, Auschwitz concentration camp was expanded to include a second site Auschwitz-Birkenau - also known as Auschwitz-II.^[1] The camp was located about three kilometres northwest of the Stammlager Auschwitz-I, near the village of Birkenau: the German name for the Polish village of Brzezinka. The decision to murder European Jews prompted modifications to the layout and purpose of this camp. Under the leadership of camp commander Rudolf Höss (1901-1947), the main objective of this camp became the extermination of Jews and the selection of people for labour.^[2]

Auschwitz-Birkenau was a vast 175-hectare site built by Russian POWs and forced labourers. After the first group of Russian POWs died almost entirely from starvation and exhaustion, the Nazis brought tens of thousands of Jews to Birkenau as slave workers to continue their work.^[3]

A separate women's camp was set up in Birkenau from early August 1942. In September 1944, the females who had been hiding in the Secret Annex also ended up there.

Gas chambers

In the spring of 1942, the construction of gas chambers began in two empty farmhouses to kill Jews immediately on arrival with the extremely toxic prussic acid gas Zyklon B. Despite the fact that the camp was still under construction, it soon took over most of the killing from Auschwitz I.^[4]

The first gas chamber at Birkenau, Bunker I, was probably commissioned in mid- or late May 1942. Bunker II was probably ready for use by late June or early July. After Bunker I and II, construction of crematoria and gas chambers II-V followed between March and June 1943. Thus Auschwitz-Birkenau became the centre of the Holocaust from 1943.^[4]

Selection

Upon arrival at Auschwitz-Birkenau, SS doctors selected the Jewish people who were fit for forced labour; the rest went directly to the gas chamber. Although the criteria could vary, usually children 15 and under and adults over 50 were selected for the gas chamber. Mothers with children under 15 and pregnant women were also sent directly to the gas chamber.^[5]

Auschwitz's best-known camp doctor who carried out the selections was Josef Mengele (1911-1979). In addition to selections for the gas chamber, Mengele also conducted medical experiments on prisoners - mostly women and twins - often with fatal results.^[6]

Those who were not selected for the gas chamber were assigned to forced labour and locked up in one of the camp's overcrowded huts. Hygienic conditions were poor and there was too little and poor food. Many prisoners died of exhaustion and from the many diseases that went around.

Evacuation

In the summer of 1944, as the Soviet army advanced from the east and approached the camps in occupied Poland, more and more prisoners were deported to camps in Germany as slave labour. At the same time, Nazi efforts began to erase traces of the Auschwitz massacre. From early November 1944, gassings no longer took place in Birkenau. Gas chambers and crematoria were dismantled and blown up. As the Soviet army moved even closer, the great evacuation transports from Auschwitz followed in January 1945, and 58,000 men and women were forced to go on so-called death marches.^[7]

Over 57,000 Jews from the Netherlands were murdered in Auschwitz. Only 970 Dutch Jews returned alive from the camp.