But with sponsorship from an aunt and uncle in New York, they released him after six months.

Not That I'm not happy this man survived but, Why would they release Him!? were these places not Death Camps?

This leaves a hole in the Common Narrative.

A few Jews and a few political prisoners escaped in the days prior to the war in such a way. Note, in the included excerpt above the war hadn't even started; he was released and out of Germany prior to Hitler's invasion of Poland. So, lucky for you, there is no hole in the "common narrative."

Last edited Fri Jun 6, 2014, 02:09 AM - Edit history (1)

Of course, thousands died in them as the war progressed since the prisoners were worked to death and often starved. The camps that were literally factories of death, like Auschwitz, with gas chambers and crematoria, didn't become fully operational until around 1942.

I'm not sure if Buchenwald installed gas chambers at some point, but I doubt they were operating in 1938 - 1939.

for political and propaganda purposes; and from 1933 on, when they had control of the government, numerous persons died in custody or in alleged security actions, as was, for example, the case with the purge of Rohm and his supporters in 1934

The rule of law essentially ended with grant of dictatorial powers by the Enabling Act after the Reichstag fire in 1933, and the first concentration camps were established almost immediately. Prisoners were at risk, when detained, since there were no guarantees of transparency or of any judicial intervention

But the doctrine that the state could exterminate certain people for "inferiority" seems to appear first in the murders of disabled people (including seriously injured WWI veterans) between 1939 and 1941, a policy not widely publicized. The first deliberate construction of facilities to exterminate the Jewish population and other "inferiors" dates to about 1941

They started out as labour/imprisonment camps, where people often died from the harsh conditions; but the real killing apparatus was introduced a bit later. And it was occasionally possible for someone to be bought out in the early days, as this man was, but not later on.

I am glad that he survived; I wish many more had.