CONSTRUCTION OF SOBIBOR
MODEL OF THE SOBIBOR EXTERMINATION
CAMP
On display in the Los Angeles
Holocaust Museum
The Sobibor camp was located three miles from the Bug River in
a sparsely populated area in the eastern part of occupied Poland, near the
village of Sobibor, between the cities of Chelm and Wlodawa. The initial 30
acres of camp territory was later expanded to 145 acres.
Camp security was crucial to the death camp. At Sobibor it
included an excellent Iighting system in and around the camp which had an
independent electric aggregate, multiple barbed wire fences intertwined with
young pine branches to cancel the interior. Besides the main observation tower
in the middle of the camp, a series of smaller guard towers surrounded Sobibor.
Added to the security was a 15 meter-wide minefield around the perimeter.
The interior of the camp was divided into five main
sections: “Vorlager” or garrison area, and four inner sections called Lagers:
II, Ill, IV, and I. Separately partitioned with barbed wire fence these were, in essence, cages within cages. A brief description
reveals both their relationship to one another and their separate function.
The GARRISON AREA included the main entrance gates, the
extension rail from the main outside depot, and the railway platform where the
victims we taken off the trains. The Commandant’s villa “Swallows Nest”
stood opposite the platform and was flanked on the right by the guardhouse, and
on the left by the armory. The SS villa known as “The Happy Area”, as weII as
additional SS quarters, garage, mess hail and other buildings were built
nearby. The barracks of the Ukrainian guards we located Just to the north,
apposite the fence.
LAGER I was built directly west and behind the garrison
area. It was made escape proof by extra barbed wire fences and a deep trench
filled with water. The only opening was a gate leading into the garrison area.
This Lager was the living barracks for Jewish prisoners, and included a
prisoner’s kitchen. Each prisoner was given approximately twelve square feet of
sleeping space. The women prisoners slept in a separate barrack.
Jews employed in Lager I provided services for the Nazi
staff: tailors and shoemakers, shops for carpentry, mechanical and other
maintenance needs. After work, the Jewish prisoners from throughout the camp
(except Lager Ill) were assembled in Lager I for roll call and night lock-ups.
LAGER II was a larger section and included a variety of
essential “services” for both the killing process and the everyday operation of
the camp. Worked by 400 prisoners, including women, Lager II contained the
warehouses used for storing the articles taken from the deed victims, including
hair, clothes, food, gold and all other valuables. This Lager also housed the
man administration office.
It was at Lager II that the Jews were “greeted” and prepared
for their death. Here they undressed, women’s hair was shorn, clothing searched
and sorted, and documents destroyed in the nearby incinerator. The victim’s
final steps were taken on a sandy pathway 164 yards long and about 10 feet wide
framed by barbwire. Cynically called “Himmelfarthstrasse” (Heavenly Way), It
led directly to the gas chambers.
LAGER III was where the victims met their end. Located in
the northwestern part of the camp, there were only two ways to enter the camp
from Lager II. The camp staff and personnel entered through a small nondescript
gate. The entrance for the victims was also the place of their earthly exit: it
descended immediately into the gas chambers decorated with flowers and a Star
of David. The structures there included besides the gas chamber and the
open-air crematorium, a special gage like enclosure for the 150 Jewish
prisoners working there.
The camp was constantly rebuilt and expanded. The chambers,
no longer large enough to handle the large waves of victims, were in August
1942 demolished and a new massive building with about twice the number of
gassing units was built. A long corridor two yards wide led to the gas chambers
with the inscription “Bathhouse”. These new gas chambers were 4.40 yards by
4.40 yards and 2.42 yards high. The victims entered the gas chambers through
small doors; they exited through large swinging doors that led to 32
inch-high ramps, making it easily unload their bodies. Tightly packed, one
chamber held 450 to 500 people. The engine that generated the deadly carbon
monoxide was in a small shed adjacent to the gas chambers.
The Nazi staff was send from the discontinued (due to the
outcry of the church) Euthanasia program in Germany. It included the first
commandant of Sobibor, SS-Hauptsturmfuehrer Frantz Stangl, who later in August
1942 was replaced with SS-Hauptsturmfuehrer Frantz Reichleitner, and a group of
30 noncommissioned officers of which about half was always rotating on special
leave. A force of about 120 Ukrainians were always on guard duty.
The Jewish prisoners accounted for a total of close to 650
men, including about 100 women and 150 prisoners separated in lager Ill.