Mauthausen Concentration Camp

Mauthausen

Before WWII the Jewish played an important role. They made up 4% of their population. At the end of April 1938, 300 prisoners were brought to Mauthausen to begin construction. It was placed near a quarry for granite and built next to the Danube River for easy import and export. At the end of the year Mauthausen was completed. By the year 1939 the population was decreased by 57,000. A man named by the name of Himmler leased Mauthausen concentration camp for 9,000 marks per year. The Deutsche Reichsbank lent Dest nine million marks interest free for the camp. March 1942, they created Sub-Camps for more prisoners. More and More concentration camps were built near Mauthausen for Jewish labor and to hold and execute prisoners. The main camps and its sub camps are surrounded by electrified wires, walls, watchtowers and guards. As these camps improved the Soviet Union advanced. Mauthausen is not a death camp like Auschwitz and Mazdanek. It was a Jewish and civilian camp if committed a crime. If you get sent to Mauthausen you are either forced to work or get killed. Between August 1938 to May 1945 a total of 197,464 prisoners came to or passed through Mauthausen. Prisoners that did not work, German doctors used them for experiments and tested medicine on them.       

Every prisoner that worked in the camp were relieved and replaced ever y three weeks. The Jews were forced to climb 186 steps in the quarry with great big granite blocks. The guards would bet money on Jews and see who would make it to the top first. On the way up some Jews would fall back and kill other Jews while falling. Jews wore the yellow triangles and the Spanish republicans wore blue triangles to separate each other. Prisoners worked Monday through Friday and got paid 50PF(pennies) depending on their proficiency . Saturdays they rest and Sundays they play football(soccer). They spend their money at the canteen they built for prisoners. they can buy cigarettes, beer and other items, it costs 20 cents a piece. In 1941, they chose Mauthausen as a class III camp. The camp was then turned into a punishment camp. The weak, sick and injured prisoners were put in death baths, where they put naked prisoners under a shower and turn full blast cold water with high pressure and bodies fall over in painful agony. The SS killed their prisoners by hanging, beating, shooting, gassing, hear injections, starving and freezing them. They took other prisoners and electrified them or let the dogs chew them up.