Transports of prisoners with Olga Siemers and Rheinfels
The steam ships Olga Siemers and Rheinfels were used in April 1945 to transport concentration camp inmates from Neuengamme .
Ship descriptions
The Olga Siemers was a freighter of the shipping company GJ Siemers & Co. and was delivered by Nordseewerke in 1923 . It was 101 m long, 14.2 m wide, had a side height of 7 m and was measured at 3350 GRT . The drive power was 1450 hp. The ship reached a speed of 10 knots. In 1945 it was in the shipyard in Lübeck .
The Rheinfels of the DDG "Hansa" was built in 1939 by AG Weser , towed to Odense when the war began in 1941 , completed here and delivered in 1943 to the DDG "Hansa". She was 149.8 m long, 19.1 m wide, had a draft of 5.3 m and was measured with 7760 GRT. The triple expansion machine with four cylinders and an exhaust turbine developed 6,250 PSi and gave the ship a speed of 14 knots.
Neuengamme concentration camp commandant, Max Pauly after his arrest in 1945
Count Folke Bernadotte , as Vice President of the Swedish Red Cross, freed around 20,000 concentration camp prisoners in 1944/45
Transport of prisoners from Neuengamme concentration camp and satellite camp to Flensburg
Command authority over the Neuengamme concentration camp and its satellite camps was to be transferred to the Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF), Georg-Henning Graf von Bassewitz-Behr , on the instructions of Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler in the event of enemy forces advancing into the Reich territory for the North Sea area . The concentration camp commander SS-Sturmbannführer Max Pauly thus belonged to the staff of the HSSPF. In this case, state authority was transferred to the responsible Reich Defense Commissioners (usually the Gauleiter ), in this case from Hamburg to Karl Kaufmann . When enemy forces advanced, no concentration camp prisoner was to fall into enemy hands, and Karl Kaufmann did not want any concentration camp prisoners in Hamburg when the British soldiers arrived.
Neuengamme belonged to the last concentration camp main camp that was evacuated by the SS before the approaching Allies . In order to make room for the prisoners from the subcamps, weak, sick prisoners and those unable to march were singled out and deported to Bergen-Belsen or to a reception camp. On April 8, around 2,500 sick prisoners from Neuengamme concentration camp with SS guard were sent by train to Bergen-Belsen, accompanied by SS camp doctor Bruno Kitt . Bergen – Belsen was overcrowded and the transport was sent back.
From Neuengamme to Sandbostel
Via a detour he reached Hamburg and since Neuengamme had to be evacuated, the transport was sent by train via Bremervörde to Brillit to the Sandbostel reception camp . From Brillit the prisoners marched on foot, prisoners who were unable to march or who were seriously ill were transported in a wagon train that led from Brillit to the camp. So they reached the Stalag XB in Sandbostel, which the SS had taken over in 1944. About a quarter of the prisoner-of-war camp was to serve as a concentration camp reception camp, and here several barracks for the concentration camp inmates were cleared and separated from the prisoner of war camp with barbed wire. By the time they arrived in Sandbostel on April 18, almost 300 prisoners had died on the transport; an eyewitness reported that 350 were buried in the mass grave in Brillit. A few days later, further concentration camp prisoners from the Neuengammer satellite camp “Alter Banter Weg” in Wilhelmshaven arrived at the Stalag XB Sandbostel, who had been on a similar odyssey with many losses.
Hunger riot in Sandbostel
Conditions in the Sandbostel prisoner of war camp were catastrophic, worst in the Marlag area , which was originally intended for members of the navy of the opposing warships. This storage area was moved from Sandbostel to a former small air force training camp in Westertimke in July 1941. The Marlag camp, consisting of 23 barracks, was evacuated by order of the SS for the total of around 8,000 concentration camp prisoners who came to Sandbostel from April 12, 1945. SS-Obersturmführer Gerhard Möller and SS-Hauptsturmführer Schaper came to Sandbostel on one of the first transports, and they successively acted as leaders of the concentration camp.
As 700 US soldiers had to be accommodated as prisoners of war from Stalag XII A Limburg shortly beforehand, the beds, mattresses and blankets of these barracks had been cleared out and used for the new prisoners of war. That is why there was only bare floor in the barracks for the concentration camp prisoners in Marlag.
On the night of April 19-20, a hunger revolt broke out in the camp, which the SS brutally ended with several hundred dead. A large part of the SS guards fled in the confusion of the night. Quite a few had swapped their SS uniforms for Wehrmacht uniforms or civilian clothes. At that time there were 7,400 (according to another source on April 29, 6,800) concentration camp prisoners from Neuengamme in Sandbostel. On the morning of April 20, the prisoner-of-war representative (Colonel Marcel Albert) and Lieutenant Colonel Heinrich Westphal, who had been appointed as his successor by the Lühe camp commandant, had a conversation. In it, Westphal asked the prisoners of war for help in caring for the concentration camp prisoners, and Westphal handed over the entire camp command to the prisoners of war.
Via the Sandbostel reception camp to Stader Sand and here to Olga Siemers
The remaining SS men had the concentration camp prisoners who were still able to march to line up in the early morning of April 20 and left the Sandbostel camp with these prisoners. They drove the 400 or so concentration camp prisoners to the train station in Bremervörde under the guard of Sandbostel. Here they were loaded into wagons to take the train towards Stade . On departure there was a low-flying attack, killing many prisoners and some SS guards. From Stade the prisoners were driven in the direction of the Elbe to Stader Sand, where they had to climb onto two barges. They were driven to the steamer Olga Siemers lying in the roadstead and most of the prisoners were transported to the holds. Sick and injured people who could not go down the ladders into the holds were lying on deck and in the superstructure and bridge area.
On the Olga Siemers to Kiel and then to Flensburg
The anchor was lifted and they reached Kiel on April 25th through the Kiel Canal . The port of Kiel experienced a heavy bomb attack in the evening. During the onward journey towards Flensburg, the freighter always stayed close to the coast and ran onto a sandbank on April 26th. With no food for the prisoners, the ship was stuck for another four days until a tug came and hauled them free. They reached Flensburg on April 30th . This transport took around three weeks for the prisoners who marched off on April 8th. The prisoners who broke into Wilhelmshaven on April 5 took 25 days to get to Flensburg.
In Flensburg they were not informed about this prisoner transport, no military or civil service department felt responsible and knew what to do with them. Two typhus and one plague had been reported on board, so the ship was locked. On May 1st, two naval doctors came on board the Olga Siemers and after clearance the ship moved to the western side of the port and moored next to the shipyard . Here the prisoners were allowed to change into train wagons to take them to Lübeck. However, the train remained under guard for four to five days on the railroad track in the Flensburg-Weiche district. On May 2 and 4, further train transports with the last prisoners from Neuengamme arrived in Flensburg-Weiche.
In the meantime the SS guards had left their weapons behind and the Flensburg police took over the transports with the prisoners. The starving prisoners received makeshift care from the Red Cross . Some of the healthy inmates took the opportunity to escape. On May 2nd, the port captain , Corvette captain Hans Joachim von Ramm, who had been in office for a few days , was informed of the presence of the prisoners. He ordered them to be placed on the Rheinfels , which was in the port for repairs . The captain Meybohm protested without success.
From Olga Siemers to the Rheinfels
On May 4th, all Neuengammer prisoners went back to the harbor under police surveillance, they climbed onto tugs and barges that brought them to the Rheinfels , which was anchored in the roadstead . In addition, around 300 prisoners from the Stutthof concentration camp were brought to the Rheinfels with their SS guards . Since no straw was available, the inmates lay on the iron decks. Because of the poor supply, 10 to 12 prisoners died every day. The ship left with around 1,600 prisoners and 100 SS guards, some of them from the Stutthof transport, but did not get far due to a screw accident. They were still at anchor on May 8th when they heard of the armistice .
From the Rheinfels to the Homberg and to Malmö
On May 7th, the steamer Homberg in Flensburg was supplied with fuel from the Frieda tanker . Temporary toilets were installed on deck and the ship was equipped with provisions and goulash cannons . The bedding brought on board was confiscated by the Schichau steamer Elbing VIII . On May 10, under the supervision of the Allies von der Homberg, around 1200 prisoners were taken over from the Rheinfels and reached Malmö on May 11 as part of the Folke Bernadotte campaign with the Swedish Red Cross , where their wandering ended happily.
background
The Sandbostel camp was planned for prisoners in February 1926, built in 1932 by the Freiwilligen Arbeitsdienst Deutschland (FAD) and the Arbeitsdienst Niedersachsen eV and taken over in 1933 by the Reichsarbeitsdienst (RAD). In September 1939 it was converted into the prisoner-of-war team main camp X Sandbostel and from December 1939 Stalag XA, from April 1940 into Stalag XB, in order to lock enemy soldiers in it.
Due to the Hitler assassination on July 20, 1944, Heinrich Himmler (Reichsführer SS) was appointed commander of the replacement army and on October 1 also became commander of the prisoner-of-war system. The reorganization of the prisoner of war system took place with Reich Order No. 43. Under point 2, the Higher SS and Police Leaders (HSSPF) are appointed as "Higher Commander of Prisoners of War". On October 1, 1944, the SS, headed by Georg-Henning Graf von Bassewitz-Behr, took control of the Sandbostel camp. Therefore, when the Neuengamme was evacuated, the SS was able to bring concentration camp prisoners to Sandbostel.
literature
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Bernhard Strebel : The Ravensbrück concentration camp. History of a camp complex , with a foreword by Germaine Tillion, at the same time dissertation 2001 at the University of Hanover under the title The camp complex of the Ravensbrück concentration camp , Paderborn; Munich; Vienna; Zurich: Schöningh, 2003, ISBN 3-506-70123-1 ; Table of contents can be downloaded as a PDF document
- in French translation: Ravensbrück. Un complexe concentrationnaire (in the series Pour une histoire du XXe siècle ), Traduction de l'allemand par Odile Demange. Préface de Germaine Tillion, [Paris]: Fayard, 2005, ISBN 2-213-62423-2
- Katharina Hertz-Eichenrode (ed.): A concentration camp is evacuated ; Edition Temmen; ISBN 3-86108-764-2
- Several authors: Die Nordseewerke 1903-2003 ; Nordseewerke GmbH
- Andreas Ehresmann: "Das Stalag XB Sandbostel", 2015 Dölling and Galitz Verlag; ISBN 978-3-86218-074-5
Web links
- http://www.niederelbe.de/oste2011/auffang.htm “Two and a half weeks in April. The Sandbostel concentration camp reception camp "
- http://www.kz-gedenkstaette-neuengamme.de/geschichte/kz-aussenlager/aussenlagerliste/flensburg/
- http://www.kz-gedenkstaette-neuengamme.de/geschichte/kz-aussenlager/aussenlagerliste/sandbostel-auffanglager/
Individual evidence
- ↑ Andreas Ehresmann: Das Stalag XB Sandbostel , 2015, ISBN 978-3-86218-074-5, p. 205
- ↑ Das Stalag XB Sandbostel , 2015, ISBN 978-3-86218-074-5 , p. 204
- ↑ On the hunger revolt, see Andreas Ehresmann: Das Stalag XB Sandbostel , 2015, ISBN 978-3-86218-074-5 , p. 190
- ↑ a b http://www.kz-gedenkstaette-neuengamme.de/geschichte/kz-aussenlager/aussenlagerliste/sandbostel-auffanglager/
- ↑ Takeover of the prisoner-of-war system by the SS see Andreas Ehresmann: Das Stalag XB Sandbostel , 2015, ISBN 978-3-86218-074-5 , p. 40