KZ GUSEN MEMORIAL COMMITTEE
within ARBEITSKREIS FUER HEIMAT-, DENKMAL- UND GESCHICHTSPFLEGE (AHDG)
and Local-International Platform ST. GEORGEN/GUSEN, Austria
KZ Mauthausen-GUSEN Info-Pages
KZ Gusen I Concentration Camp
at Langenstein
Foundation
Prior to the foundation of KZ Gusen I, prisoners
of the Mauthausen-Wienergraben Camp were marched
daily approximately four kilometers to the stone quarries at Gusen.
Since an average of one hundred and fifty prisoners died a month in the winter of 1938-39
from this grueling march, it was decided in December 1939
to establish another camp at Gusen, Austria.
Hence, some four hundred German and Austrian prisoners of KZ Mauthausen-Wienergraben
marched every day from Mauthausen-Wienergraben to construct Gusen I. Three prisoners´ barracks,
a few SS barracks and an electric fence were built by March 1940.
Because the Mauthausen Central Camp was under construction at this time, as well, both camps
(Mauthausen and Gusen) were administered by SS-Standartenfuehrer Franz Ziereis from one central
command in the Wienergraben Valley. But in March 1940, SS-Hauptsturmfuehrer Karl Chmielewski
came from KZ Sachsenhausen to KZ Gusen, where he remained in command until 1943.
The first group of inmates were primarily priests and offenders of the NAZI regime from Germany and Austria
(like Dr. Johann Gruber).
Exposed to the heaviest work in the stone quarries of KASTENHOF and GUSEN
and in the construction of KZ Gusen I, they died quickly. "Lager" Gusen
became one of the first in the Third Reich to exterminate people.
Extermination of the Polish
With the German invasion of Poland, the Gestapo used
KZ Gusen I to exterminate a large group of Polish intellectuals
in the stone quarries of Gusen and on the construction sites. The first group
of 480 Polish inmates was sent to Gusen on March 9, 1940. Within
a year, Gusen grew from some 800 inmates to some 4,000
by the spring of 1941. Some 1,522 died in 1940 due to the
heavy work in the stone quarries of Gusen and the brick-production
plant at Lungitz. In late 1941 the next
group of inmates to be exterminated at KZ Gusen by hard work
were Soviet prisoners of war. This group of inmates was
also the first to be gassed at KZ Gusen
in 1942.
The crematorium was also
set into operation on January 29, 1941 at KZ Gusen.
During this period KZ Gusen also got its own death register.
Prior to this, the victims had to be registered by the
municipality of St. Georgen/Gusen to which the territory
belonged.
KZ Gusen developed more rapidly
than Mauthausen Camp
In late 1941, KZ Gusen´s size, with 8,500 inmates, surpassed the neighboring
Mauthausen "Central" Camp´s by one thousand inmates.
In fact, excepting 1943, the Gusen Camp(s) had more inmates than the camp
at Mauthausen.
On January 1, 1941 both camps at Gusen and Mauthausen became
the only Category III camps in the Third Reich - a term meaning
"camp of no return" to Gestapo officials all over the Reich.
Being sent to KZ Gusen was, in fact, a death sentence until autumn 1943.
Biggest Stone Crusher in Europe
Due to the abundance of Polish labor, KZ Gusen and its stone production
developed so rapidly that DEST decided to build what was to become Europe´s
biggest stone crusher at this site.
The heavy construction work was done by thousands of Spanish Prisoners
sent to KZ Gusen in 1941 after the fascist defeat
of the Republican Spaniards in France.
By the time the stone crusher went into operation in 1941, approximately two thousand
of these Spaniards had died in its construction.
The ruins of that stone crusher can still be seen. It is also worth noting that the
architects who designed the KZ Gusen Memorial
in 1962 took this ruin to shape parts of the memorial.
KZ Gusen Railway Station
On March 3, 1941, the SS also began a new railway line
between the station at St. Georgen/Gusen, KZ Gusen, and the giant stone crusher.
The "Schleppbahnbruecke" Bridge, which still exists,
was cast in concrete by KZ Gusen prisoners in one day and one
night on September 15, 1941.
KZ Gusen Archeological Museum
In early 1942, during the construction of the railway line, the SS
found a grave yard from the Bronze Age. Once aware of this,
Commander Chmielewski ordered the railway command
(Kommando Schleppbahn-Bau) to halt any further construction work
and ordered a special command of imprisoned priests under the guidance of
Dr. Johann (Papa) Gruber to make an archeological excavation
of the area. Later on, Chmielewski also ordered an
archeological museum built within KZ Gusen to show
these findings to high ranking visitors from such places as Berlin.
By maintaining this museum, Chmieleski also tried to further
his SS career by getting the attention of RFSS Heinrich Himmler.
After the archeological excavations were finished, construction
of the railway line continued, and the railway began operation
on March 23, 1943. So, another instrument of the industrial
exploitation of inmates was finished early this year. Eventually,
some twenty-five locomotives were used to keep the giant
KZ Gusen complex running.
KZ Gusen Harbor Project
Plans for a Danube steam ship harbor at KZ Gusen were completed,
the barracks already finished and trees removed along the planned harbor site
when Minister Speer cancelled the project during a personal visit
in March of 1943.
KZ Gusen Brothel
In June 1941, when RFSS Himmler visited the KZ Mauthausen and the KZ Gusen camp
he gave order to establish a brothel for certain groups of privileged inmates
inside both concentration camps. So, the KZ Gusen brothel building that still
exists as a private house today went into operation with eight to ten German
prostitutes from KZ Ravensbrueck in autumn 1942.
In fact this brothel was limited to privileged German, Austrian, Polish
or Spanish inmate officials (Kapos) and several privileged inmates of
the armament production commands.
Each of these functionaries had to pay RM 2 per visit. RM 0,50 was
given to the prostitute and RM 1,50 to the SS-WVHW at Berlin.
KZ Gusen War Production
Perhaps due to Speer´s intervention, DEST began to transform production
from stones to armament products in spring 1943 at Flossenbuerg, Mauthausen and Gusen.
So, a new set of some eighteen baracks was put into operation for that purpose at KZ Gusen,
and the commands were called "GEORGEN-MUEHLE I, II, III and IV"
for STEYR-DAIMLER-PUCH AG, a leading arms production company
of former Old Austria and later Nazi Germany.
At first they began to manufacture parts for aircraft engines
and machine guns with prisoners from KZ Gusen.
In 1943 DEST also started building fuselages for the Me 109 fighter plane
as a subcontractor of Messerschmitt GmbH at KZ Gusen. For this purpose,
DEST also invested four big, hangar-like barracks north-east of KZ Gusen.
DEST produced some twenty fuselages per month for Messerschmitt at KZ Gusen.
These armament projects brought some improvement in the "living" conditions
within KZ Gusen, but the situation changed rapidly, when
"Sonderstab Kammler" discovered KZ Gusen as a location
for German underground plants in late 1943.
KZ Gusen Underground Installations
First, tunnels were dug directly north of KZ Gusen to bomb proof the
machine gun production there. Later, this system, with some 12,000 square meters,
was code named "KELLERBAU" (you can
find the names of inmates in late 1944 here).
Almost simultaneously, another, even larger underground plant (U-Verlagerung) was dug at nearby St. Georgen/Gusen with some
50,000 square meters of bomb-proof production area. This largest project of DEST
was code named B8 BERGKRISTALL-ESCHE 2 later on and
became one of the most horrible concentration camp sites in WWII history.
The first group of BERGKRISTALL workers were 272 KZ Gusen
inmates officially sent to "Bergkristall-Bau" (Bergkristall Construction)
on January 2, 1944.
KZ Gusen II - The Hell of Hells
These excavations consumed so many lives that the SS ordered more inmates
for KZ Gusen. When the Gestapo delivered these inmates from all over Europe and other camps,
KZ Gusen quickly became overcrowded. So, the SS established a new satellite of KZ Gusen
named KZ Gusen II.
From this time on, the earlier, older installations
at Gusen were called KZ Gusen I.
By the end of the war, some
- 25,000 prisoners worked at KZ Gusen I, II and III
- 12,000 prisoners at KZ Gusen I (GEORGENMUEHLE and stone quarry)
- 12,500 prisoners at KZ Gusen II (BERGKRISTALL)
- 274 prisoners at KZ Gusen III (Lungitz; Logistics and "Bakery")
The Liberation
All three KZ Gusen camps and the Mauthausen camp were liberated
on May 5, 1945 by S/Sgt. Albert J. Kosiek and his twenty-three men
of 41st Recon Squad, 11th Ard Div, 3rd US Army. Kosiek´s platoon was haulted
by the Swiss Red Cross Delegate Louis Haefliger, who asked Kosiek to prevent the murder
of 25,000 KZ Gusen inmates. The SS planned to blast all of them up with high-explosives in the
KZ Gusen I and II tunnels.
Number of Victims
All in all some 37,000 people died at KZ Gusen I, II and III.
This is
- several thousand people more than at the KZ Mauthausen Central Camp,
- nearly one third of all the victims that died in the forty-nine concentration camps all over "Austrian" territory
The Forgotten KZ Gusen Victims
All the terrain was privatized in the late 50s
and private houses were built where so many people had suffered
and died.
To prevent the removal of the KZ Gusen I and II
crematorium ovens, a group of former Italian and French
KZ Gusen inmates bought them in order to erect the
KZ Gusen Memorial that reminds us today to the 40,000 victims
of KZ Gusen I, II and III.
Along with the Local-International Commemoration on May 3, 1997,
this memorial was given to the Republic of Austria by some of
those KZ Gusen survivors. This official transfer also inspired
this overview of history of KZ Gusen I, II and III
by means of this web site, created on May 3, 1997.
Information credit:
- Bernadac Christian, Le Neuvieme Cercle - Gusen I, Editions France Empire, Paris 1975
- Bernadac Christian, Les Sorciers du Ciel - L´Organisation Gruber (about Dr. Johannes Gruber), France Empire, Paris 1969
- Carpi Aldo, Diario di Gusen, Torino 1993
- Dobosiewicz Stanislaw, Mauthausen-Gusen oboz zaglady, Wydawnictwo Ministerstwa Obrony Narodowej, Warszawa 1979
- Dobosiewicz Stanislaw, Mauthausen-Gusen w obronie zycia i ludzkiej godnosci, Dom Wydawniczy Bellona, Warszawa 2000
- Lenz Johannes Maria, Christus in Dachau - Priester in Gusen, Libri Catholici, Wien
- Marsalek Hans, Die Geschichte des Konzentrationslagers Mauthausen(-Gusen!)
- Marsalek, Konzentrationslager Gusen - Ein Nebenlager des KZ Mauthausen
- Rief Silvia, Wir schmieden das Schwert - Alltagserfahrungen eines Rüstungsarbeiters
im Zweiten Weltkrieg, Steyr-Daimler-Puch AG, Werk Letten und Konzentrationslager
Gusen, Wien 1996, Univ., Dipl.-Arbeit
- Vitry Stephanie, Les Morts de Gusen, Maitrise d´histoire,
Universite de Paris I, Panteon-Sorbonne, 1994
For more literature look to Further Reading
Back to Index
For additional information, comments or suggestions, please contact:
KZ GUSEN Memorial Committee
Most recent updates of this page were made on
2006-03-07 by Rudolf A. HAUNSCHMIED,
Martha GAMMER, Siegi WITZANY-DURDA and
Jan-Ruth MILLS