Salzgitter-Drütte subcamp

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Memorial event at the former Salzgitter-Drütte satellite camp in 2010

The Salzgitter-Drütte concentration camp subcamp , also known colloquially as the Drütte concentration camp , was one of the many subcamps of the Neuengamme concentration camp . It was located on the premises of the Hermann-Göring-Werke in Drütte , a district of Salzgitter .

Camp and prisoners

250 concentration camp prisoners set up the satellite camp on October 13, 1942 in the storage rooms under Hochstrasse. Another 500 or so men were employed in the construction of Hall 10. The number of concentration camp prisoners rose to over 2,700 men by mid-1944. Due to higher production numbers, the satellite camp had around 3,150 concentration camp prisoners in September 1944. Drütte was numerically the largest satellite camp of Neuengamme concentration camp. The prisoners had to manufacture bullet and grenade cases, a monthly production volume of 500,000 metal cases was planned. A large group of inmates was deployed in the so-called "Aktion 88". They produced the grenades for the 8.8 cm anti-aircraft guns and for the 8.8 cm anti-tank guns . Conversations during work were punished with lashes with the stick and the smallest mistake in production was punished with execution. Most of them were political prisoners and were under 20 years of age. Despite their youth, they had to work hard and were deployed in three shifts. They were exposed to heat and toxic fumes without proper protection and protective clothing. About ten percent of the prisoners were ill and unable to work under these conditions. There was hardly any mention of medical care, the sick camp had 60 beds and was always overcrowded, sometimes two prisoners had to share a sick bed. Not until 1943 was there a doctor, and from May 1942 until the end of the camp there was only one paramedic who was a tailor. Prisoners who could no longer be used were brought back to the main camp in Neuengamme. There is evidence that 682 prisoners died in this concentration camp from illness, executions and accidents, and this was deliberately brought about.

When the Drütte subcamp was evacuated on April 7, 1945 before the approaching British soldiers, the prisoners were transported to Celle together with the women from the Salzgitter-Bad concentration camp . In Celle , the train, which was carrying around 4,000 prisoners, was attacked by American bombers on April 8th. Since the prisoners were not allowed to leave the railroad cars, more than half of the prisoners were killed in this attack. Of the approximately 1,300 prisoners who fled from the bombs and in the resulting chaos, 1,100 were captured again and 200 escaped prisoners were killed by the SS and police, the Wehrmacht , the Volkssturm , the local Hitler Youth and Celler during the so-called massacre of Celle Citizens killed. More than 500 marching prisoners arrived on April 10, 1945 after forced marches in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp . The remaining 600, many of whom had been injured in the bombing and could not march, were housed in the barracks of the Heidekaserne in Celle. There they liberated British troops on April 12, 1945.

Camp commanders

The first camp commandant in the Salzgitter-Drütte subcamp was SS-Hauptsturmführer Hermann Florstedt together with SS-Obersturmführer Anton Thumann , who was followed by SS-Hauptsturmführer Heinrich Forster from late 1942 to mid-1943 . Then SS-Obersturmführer Arnold Strippel was camp manager and then Herbert Rautenberg. SS-Obersturmführer Karl Wiedemann headed the camp until April 1945 , his deputy was SS-Obersturmführer Peter Wiehage , who was also responsible for the Salzgitter-Watenstedt concentration camp near Leinde .

Hermann Florstedt was arrested on October 20, 1943 because of the corruption affair of the Buchenwald SS guard and executed by the SS on April 15, 1945.

Anton Thumann was arrested after the end of the war and charged on March 18, 1946 at the Neuengamme main trial in the Curiohaus for participating in crimes in the Neuengamme concentration camp. On May 3, 1946, Thumann was sentenced to death by hanging and executed in Hamelin on October 8, 1946.

It is known of the camp commandant Arnold Strippel that he went into hiding after the end of the war and was recognized in downtown Frankfurt by a former Buchenwald prisoner, whom he had condemned to hang trees, in mid-December 1948 and then arrested. After he was sentenced to several life sentences in prison, the sentence was retrospectively reduced considerably in a retrial. After his release from prison on April 21, 1969, he received compensation of DM 121,500 in 1970. This compensation made waves and kept the parliamentarians in the Bundestag busy. After all, each concentration camp prisoner was only given 5 DM per day in prison, but it stayed that way. Strippel died on May 1, 1994 in Frankfurt am Main.

memorial

The Urban History Working Group V. has been working together with IG Metall and the works council of the then Stahlwerke Peine-Salzgitter AG since 1985 for the construction of a memorial in the parts of the building where the prisoners were housed. This initiative led in 1992 to an agreement between the management board and works council of Peine-Salzgitter AG, according to which four accommodation rooms under the Hochstraße could be set up as a memorial. These rooms were expanded to become a memorial and are sponsored by the Urban History Working Group. The memorial was opened on April 11, 1994 and can be visited without registration on the second Saturday of each month.

literature

  • Wolfgang Benz , Barbara Distel (ed.): The place of terror . History of the National Socialist Concentration Camps. Volume 5: Hinzert, Auschwitz, Neuengamme. CH Beck, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-406-52965-8 , p. 510 ff., Books.google.de
  • Sabine Bredow (Red.): “Work” - National Socialism in Salzgitter. A lesson booklet from the Drütte Concentration Camp Memorial and Documentation Center. Published by the Stadtgeschichte e. V. Urban History Working Group , Salzgitter 1996., ISBN 3-926944-05-6 .
  • Gerd Wysocki: work for the war. Mechanisms of rule in the armaments industry of the “Third Reich”. Labor, social policy and state police repression in the Reichswerke "Hermann Göring" in the Salzgitter area 1937/38 to 1945. Steinweg-Verlag, Braunschweig 1992, ISBN 3-925151-51-6 .
  • Gudrun Pischke: Europe works for the Reichswerke . The National Socialist camp system in Salzgitter. Ed .: Archive of the City of Salzgitter (=  Salzgitter Research . Volume 2 ). 1995, ISSN  0941-0864 , B. The people V. Prisoners and inmates, p. 272-281 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Federal Ministry of Justice : Directory of the concentration camps and their external commands in accordance with Section 42 (2) BEG No. 316 Drütte


Coordinates: 52 ° 9 ′ 29.9 ″  N , 10 ° 25 ′ 6.5 ″  E