A gas chamber is an execution facility whereby a deadly poisonous gas is introduced into a
hermetically sealed room. Carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrogen cyanide (HCN) were the typical
agents used in the Nazi gas chambers. The carbon monoxide was piped from gas cylinders
(
euthanasia killing centres: located in separate rooms besides
the gas chambers, gas trailer(s): located at the tractor) or produced from
vehicle petrol engines
*. The hydrogen cyanide was delivered by the
Degesch Company
under the label "Zyklon B", whiteish-blue crystals in sealed cans, originally used as an insecticide
for delousing clothes. "Zyklon B" evaporated immediately upon exposure to the air when poured into a room.
It was scientifically established that hydrocyanic acid is 6 times more toxic than chlorine, 34 times more than
carbon monoxide, and 750 times more than chloroform. One milligram per kilogram of body weight is
sufficient to bring about death.
The first Nazi gas chambers for human beings were introduced as part of the Nazi
euthanasia programme, called "
Aktion T4", the operation for eliminating physically and
mentally handicapped people in Germany and Poland. At that time, the preferred gas was carbon
monoxide. In Germany this was provided via gas cylinders, in Poland mainly by the exhaust fumes of motors.
The first Nazi mass killings of non-German subjects utilising gas occured in
October 1939 at
Fort VII in Poznan,
where patients from the mental home in
Owinska were murdered in a small
gas chamber at
Fort VII. This was followed by the
use of
gas vans and gas trailer(s) at other mental homes in Poland.
These killings were committed by the
SS-Sonderkommando
Lange.
From
January 1940, gas chambers were used at six euthanasia killing centres
in Germany and Austria
(
Hartheim) after
Viktor
Brack, chief of the euthanasia programme, had decided to use carbon monoxide to murder the patients of mental
homes in those countries.
Later, after having decided to carry out the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question", the use of gas vans and
stationary gas chambers was introduced in the occupied countries of the East, largely in order to avoid the mental
problems SS men had encountered while shooting people, mainly Jews. At least 15 gas vans were delivered to the
Einsatzgruppen.
After some experiments with the use of "Zyklon B" gas as a killing agent in
August 1941,
the first mass gassing at
Auschwitz occurred on
2/3 September 1941. It took place
in the cellar of
Block 11 at the
Auschwitz Stammlager.
A short time later, in
early fall 1941, a first gassing in the gas
chamber of Crematoria I (also at the
Auschwitz Stammlager)
was carried out.
In
November 1941, the extermination camp at
Chelmno was established, where gas vans were used to kill the Jews of
Lodz and its surroundings.
In
March 1942, stationary gas chambers were introduced at the extermination camp
Belzec. After several
experiments with gas cylinders and exhaust fumes the SS decided to use a large motor for producing the carbon
monoxide gas for three primitive gas chambers. The
Belzec gas chambers became the
prototype for the larger gas chambers at the
Aktion Reinhard extermination camps
Sobibor (
May 1942) and
Treblinka (
July 1942).
The peak of gas chamber killings was reached at
Treblinka, where 10 gas chambers
were in simultaneous use.
Here 2,500 people could be gassed within one hour. The victims were forced to enter the gas chambers naked and
with raised arms so that the room could contain a maximum number of bodies. Babies were thrown on top of the
crowd. This method was well-conceived, because the poison gas produced a quicker, deadlier effect if as little
air as possible was in a chamber. Therefore the "ultimate" gas chambers were constructed to be as low as
possible (about 2 m from floor to ceiling).
To avoid panic, a lot of Nazi gas chambers were camouflaged as bath rooms. Signs were installed, with inscriptions
directing the victims toward their final place. In the gas chambers themselves, fake plumbing was added and fake
showers installed in the ceilings. Even pieces of soap were handed out sometimes (at
Auschwitz and
Chelmno), before
the victims entered the gas chambers.
Mobile gas chambers [gas vans and gas trailer(s)] as well as stationary gas chambers had to be cleaned after the
gassings by Jewish special commands, the
Sonderkommandos. These people had to pull out the corpses which were
completely entwined, and soiled with blood and excrement. For this purpose larger doors (2 m wide, similar to garage
doors) were installed in the outer walls of the
Aktion Reinhard gas chambers, while the entrance doors through
which the victims entered the gas chambers, usually measured only about 1 m in width. The gas chambers had a slanting
floor, sloping downward toward the large outer doors in order to make the cleaning easier and quicker, since the next
victims were already waiting.
Most of the gas chambers in the euthanasia killing centres remained intact after the war. All buildings of the
Aktion Reinhard camps were dismantled. The
Auschwitz-Birkenau gas chambers
were blown up by the SS in an attempt to conceal their purpose. Gas chambers are still be seen at some other
concentration camps.
* Petrol engines (a statement by
Peter Witte (German historian):
Rudolf Reder, the only known survivor of the extermination camp
Belzec, carried
(according to his own statement made
1944 to the Special Commission for Investigation
of German Crimes, first published in
Krakow 1946) 4-5
cans of petrol (
kanistry benzyny)
every day to the motor room of the gas chambers. There the
maszyna / motor pedzony benzyna
(a motor, run by petrol) was located. His testimony was supported by the Polish electrician
Kasimierz
Czerniak, who helped to establishing the motor room in
1942; he described a petrol motor of
approximately 200 or more PS, from which exhaust fumes were led away over ground pipes
(
18 Nov 1945). Confusion with a diesel engine is out of the question because diesel fuel is called
olej napedowy in Polish.
The theory of a diesel motor in the
Belzec gas chambers is
based on the testimony of
Kurt Gerstein
(
1945) who had (according to his own statement) not seen the motor but just heard it. Therefore the
diesel motor became part (without further references) of the historiography of the death camp.
The case of
Sobibor is even more indisputable.
In this case even three former
Gasmeister
(“Gasmasters” /
Erich Bauer, Erich Fuchs, and
Franz Hödl), who must have really have known the
facts, since they all killed with the same motor, confirmed in court that it was definitely a petrol
motor.
Bauer and
Fuchs,
having been professional motor mechanics, simply quarrelled during the
trial about whether it was a
Renault motor or a heavy Russian tank motor (probably a tank motor
or a tractor motor) having at least 200 PS. They also disputed whether the method of ignition was
a starter or an impact magnet, which diesel motors obviously do not have, being self-igniting (the
famous Russian T 34 tank originally had a petrol motor, the diesel version was introduced later, and
was rarer).
At all Aktion Reinhard camps diesel engines were used in motor rooms but they were much smaller
(testified: 15 PS motors / 220 Volt / 20 Ampere) and were used as generators and for lighting purposes.
Perhaps this may have been the source of confusion regarding the real use of the petrol motors.
For the extermination camp
Chelmno and the gas vans
there the same applies: unquestionably petrol motors.
Walter Burmeister, gas van driver at
Chelmno, mentioned mid-heavy
Renault lorries with an
Otto-Motor. Camp chief
Walter Piller
described the killing process with “gasses which
were produced by petrol motors”. Polish mechanics, who were personally ordered to repair a
gas van, precisely described exactly the huge petrol motor and its consumption: “The motor
of this car uses 75 litres of petrol per 100 km, that is, twice the consumption of normal motors.”
© ARC 2005
