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History See other History Articles Title: The Brothels in Auschwitz Fifteen minutes in Block no. 24 Houses of prostitution for the use of prisoners functioned under SS supervision in the German concentration camps for several years. Until recently, however, there was a reluctance to speak about them. “A prisoner functionary was assigned to stand downstairs,” says a former Auschwitz prisoner who was a client in the camp bordello. “You handed him a special coupon worth two camp marks. That’s how much it cost. After a cursory venereal-disease check, if everything was in order, the SS man on duty gave you the number of one of the rooms. You got a tag with the number on it and went upstairs. Each girl had her own room. Two marks was the price of a pack of cigarettes. “The rooms were furnished like in a normal home. A bed, a nightstand, curtains. The girls were very nicely dressed, in decent civilian clothes. Only if you’ve spent a couple of years behind barbed wire can you appreciate the impression such a sight made on us. What happened next? What do you think happened? You did it. Afterwards, an orderly disinfected your genitalia with some liquid, and you went back to your barrack.” Heinrich Himmler personally issued the orders setting up the bordellos in the camps in 1941. Access to these facilities was intended as a reward for good behavior and hard work. The SS also saw it as a way of preventing the spread of homosexuality among prisoners. In the end, they opened brothels in ten concentration camps on the territory of the Third Reich and occupied Poland. One of them was opened in Auschwitz in the summer of 1943. “It was located in Block no. 24. The first building on the left past the gate with the inscription Arbeit macht frei,” says Piotr CywiDski, director of the museum located at the site of the camp. “Between ten and twenty women worked there. There was even one woman who was in charge of the whole facility.” “A regular brothel in a German death camp?” “Do you find that strange? There was an SS man here who removed tattooed skin from prisoners and made it into lampshades,” said CywiDski. “That’s what I call strange. The people incarcerated in Auschwitz were red-blooded human beings and everything associated with human activity went on here.” A Conspiracy of Silence For decades, the subject of the camp bordellos was only whispered about. It was, of course, mentioned in the scholarly literature, and especially in prisoner memoirs. However, these facilities were written and spoken about with embarrassment, as if they were not a suitable subject for serious historians. Recently, however, the situation has begun to change. Several German historians have been researching the subject, and an exhibition devoted to the brothels has opened at the Ravensbrück site. “No other exhibition has ever enjoyed so much interest,” says Insa Eschenbach, who set it up. “The majority of people are completely surprised and shocked that such a thing occurred in the camps. The public turns out to have been completely unaware of it.” The German authorities also took pains to conceal the bordellos from public knowledge. A special directive issued by the SS strictly forbade showing the “special blocks” to German guests (civilian or military officials) touring the camps. “The worst thing is that this directive outlived the Third Reich,” says Eschenbach. “It remained in force for a long time after the war, and it was forbidden to show tourists the blocks that contained the brothels, or to tell about them. Why? Sex and the Holocaust are not subjects that go together.” Former prisoners are hardly surprised that long years of silence surrounded the issue of prostitution. “Who was supposed to talk about it? Who was supposed to complain publicly? The girls were ashamed of having worked there, and the former prisoners of having gone there,” says Wilhelm Brasse. “It would have compromised their status as martyrs.” Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
#1. To: X-15 (#0)
You mean life isn't a Howard Chaykin graphic novel?
Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.
I keep wondering - in the back of mind - how our boyz are getting laid in Afghanistan and Iraq. They're not supposed to be drinking alcohol either - yeah, right. Human nature is human nature.
Are you coming up with anything? We sent over plenty of uniform split tail, too, right? ;-)
"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”—Samuel Adams
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