Dachau 17/5/15

Dachau was the model for the building of other concentration camps. It was the first.

We woke up to rain and after a brief and wet walk down to old town we decided to go to Dachau. It is very popular tour with many young students, it is a requirement for all Bavaria students to visit a concentration camp. There are 100. The cost of the S2 regional train includes the bus from the station to the camp. You enter the grounds through a gate that says "Work will set you Free". The barracks were bleak and cold and each one designed for 200 by the end of the war housed 2000 each. Toilets in one room sinks in another. So few for so many. There is a museum with pictures and stories of the people that were sent there. A 21 minute film is shown pulling no punches. Grotesque scene after scene of bodies in piles, half burned when the coal supply was limited or just died due to starvation. A wall where Russian soldiers were shot then buried in a mass grave. The memorials to the Unknown are areas where ashes were spread. it is very discouraging to see how easy it was and is for one to loose their humanity. The tour goes on through the crematorium, gas chamber, that was never used and the barracks where women were forced into prostitution. These barracks were replaced by four different religions monuments. Russian Orthodox, Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish. You leave near a memorial that says "Never again". .

 

The final note

 

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