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| Hadamar |
At Hadamar (near
Koblenz), a correctional institution for released
prisoners was founded in
1883. In
1906 the
facilities in Hadamar were instituted as a mental home.
From
November 1940 until January 1941 sickrooms were converted into quarters
for personnel and administration staff of the new Hadamar
euthanasia killing centre of the
T4 organization.
A gas chamber and crematorium with two ovens were installed in the
cellar.
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| Gas Chamber Cellar |
At Hadamar the extermination procedure was nearly the same as in other euthanasia killing centres:
-
undressing and handing over of the valuables (rings, watches etc.) to the
personnel,
-registration,
-
a superficial inspection of the victims, to see which plausible
cause of death the Hadamar administration could pass on to the
relatives,
-
taking photos of the persons,
-
taking the doomed persons to the gas chamber and gassing,
-
cremation of the corpses in the institute's ovens,
-filling the urns with ash, (it was unimportant to the staff from which particular corpse the ash came),
-dispatching urn and death certificate to the relatives.
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| Gas Chamber Annex |
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| Gas Chamber |
Large grey buses, carrying victims from nearby mental homes to Hadamar, arrived daily.
From the bus garage the victims had to go through the so called "sluice" (a narrow fenced-in path) to the
extermination building. The Hadamar "sluice" became model for the "sluices" or "tubes", later used in the
extermination camps of
Aktion Reinhard. Approximately 100 victims were killed every day, lasting
until
August 1941.
By
24 August 1941 the killing at Hadamar was stopped on
Hitler's orders. The installations in the cellar were dismantled and other
rooms converted back to sickrooms. The surplus staff were ordered to the East to use their "knowledge" at the
newly established extermination camps.
© ARC 2005
