My prior knowledge of the
Holocaust was very basic. All I knew about it was that many people had died and
that a man named Hitler seem to be the cause of it. I didn’t even know the true
definition of genocide before now. After completing this project I now feel as
though I have improved upon my knowledge of the Holocaust but I feel as though I
will never know everything about it. My topic for this project was death camps
and my topic was Auschwitz.
I had never known that Auschwitz was the largest concentration camp in
eastern Europe nor did I know of all the first that had happened there. By first
I mean the implication of identification numbers, the use of Zyklon B, and
medical experiments. Auschwitz was a huge compound that spread over forty five
square kilometers of land and consisted of three main camps and over forty five
subcamps. Auschwitz wasn’t always the concentration camp that it is known to be
today, before it was a Polish military base but when Germany annexed Poland the
German came in and started to convert it into the concentration camp we know
today. Upon entering Auschwitz there a phrase that hangs above the gates, Arbait
Match Frei meaning “Work will set you free”. That one phrase really struck a
nerve, I knew of the horrors that all those jewish people faced as they walked
through those gates but they did not. Those poor people really did think that
they would see freedom, that they would be able to see the outside world yet
again someday. That phrase was a sick and cruel joke played on each of the four
million men, women, and children that entered those gates.
Behind the barbed wired walls of Auschwitz many horrors took place, one of
them being the medical experiments that were being conducted. When reading
through a history book you may see mention of medical experiments but when doing
research you get to read of the horrors of those medical experiments. Doctor
Joseph Mengele seem to have the most fingers pointed at him for medical
experiments. Doctor Mengele was known as a calm man and a likeable person. Very
few people knew of the dark side this man possessed, neither did the children he
experimented on, the children often called Doctor Mengele “Uncle Mengele”.
Mengele took a deep interest in twins mainly because he could perform and
experiment on one and then compare the two to see the differences.
When making the website I knew that we had to include a musical piece and I
think the piece that choose was very significant. The title of the song is
“Ani’ma
Amin” which
is Hebrew for ‘I believe’. It is said that that is the song that the jews sang
as they were marched into the gas chambers. The jewish people would sing the
song as they perished slowly and near the end of the song it begins to fade out
and that’s when they die.
Doing this project honestly pulled some emotion from me, looking at all those
pictures and even reading through the first hand accounts from people made me
sad. Looking at all those sad people and reading about their suffering almost
made me cry and to knowing that children had to live through that makes me even
sadder.
Holocaust was very basic. All I knew about it was that many people had died and
that a man named Hitler seem to be the cause of it. I didn’t even know the true
definition of genocide before now. After completing this project I now feel as
though I have improved upon my knowledge of the Holocaust but I feel as though I
will never know everything about it. My topic for this project was death camps
and my topic was Auschwitz.
I had never known that Auschwitz was the largest concentration camp in
eastern Europe nor did I know of all the first that had happened there. By first
I mean the implication of identification numbers, the use of Zyklon B, and
medical experiments. Auschwitz was a huge compound that spread over forty five
square kilometers of land and consisted of three main camps and over forty five
subcamps. Auschwitz wasn’t always the concentration camp that it is known to be
today, before it was a Polish military base but when Germany annexed Poland the
German came in and started to convert it into the concentration camp we know
today. Upon entering Auschwitz there a phrase that hangs above the gates, Arbait
Match Frei meaning “Work will set you free”. That one phrase really struck a
nerve, I knew of the horrors that all those jewish people faced as they walked
through those gates but they did not. Those poor people really did think that
they would see freedom, that they would be able to see the outside world yet
again someday. That phrase was a sick and cruel joke played on each of the four
million men, women, and children that entered those gates.
Behind the barbed wired walls of Auschwitz many horrors took place, one of
them being the medical experiments that were being conducted. When reading
through a history book you may see mention of medical experiments but when doing
research you get to read of the horrors of those medical experiments. Doctor
Joseph Mengele seem to have the most fingers pointed at him for medical
experiments. Doctor Mengele was known as a calm man and a likeable person. Very
few people knew of the dark side this man possessed, neither did the children he
experimented on, the children often called Doctor Mengele “Uncle Mengele”.
Mengele took a deep interest in twins mainly because he could perform and
experiment on one and then compare the two to see the differences.
When making the website I knew that we had to include a musical piece and I
think the piece that choose was very significant. The title of the song is
“Ani’ma
Amin” which
is Hebrew for ‘I believe’. It is said that that is the song that the jews sang
as they were marched into the gas chambers. The jewish people would sing the
song as they perished slowly and near the end of the song it begins to fade out
and that’s when they die.
Doing this project honestly pulled some emotion from me, looking at all those
pictures and even reading through the first hand accounts from people made me
sad. Looking at all those sad people and reading about their suffering almost
made me cry and to knowing that children had to live through that makes me even
sadder.