Auschvitz - Birkenau

We decided in the end that it would wrong to come here and not go to auschvitz. It was a long hot day at auschvitz, and birkenau, but I'm glad we went, even though we've seen the pictures and know the basics it just really underlines the deliberate planning of such horrors. Auschvitz was designed first as a slave labour camp, then birkenau, next to it, for mass extinction. Between 1941 and 1944 over 1,000,000 people were gassed or worked to death there. Some 75% of the people arriving didn't even get away from the trains before being herded into the gas chambers. Only men and women without children who were fit for work were taken into the camp, the rest, including all the children , were stripped of clothes and belongings and gassed.

Today between 10,000 and 12,000 people a day make the journey to see for themselves.Read more