The town of Terezin (Theresianstadt), originally built as a military forteress in the eighteenth century, was used by the Nazi regime as a 'transit' concentration camp for Jews deported from Germany and occupied countries. Over 150,000 prisoners, including eventually non-Jewish and political prisoners, were sent there. Many thousands died in Theresienstadt due to hardships and insanitary conditions, and of the 87,000 prisoners sent from there on transports, including many children, less than 4,000 were living in 1945. Although the regime took care to stage propaganda visits from the Red Cross and other organisations to display its supposed 'humanity', Theresienstadt was bascially a 'front' for the Nazi policy of genocide. The memorial stands in the Jewish cemetery, created outside the walls close to the crematorium erected by the Nazis, using the forced labour of the prisoners, to deal with the camp's enormous death rate.
The town of Terezin (Theresianstadt), originally built as a military forteress in the eighteenth century, was used by the Nazi regime as a 'transit' concentration camp for Jews deported from Germany and occupied countries. Over 150,000 prisoners, including eventually non-Jewish and political prisoners, were sent there. Many thousands died in Theresienstadt due to hardships and insanitary conditions, and of the 87,000 prisoners sent from there on transports, including many children, less than 4,000 were living in 1945. Although the regime took care to stage propaganda visits from the Red Cross and other organisations to display its supposed 'humanity', Theresienstadt was bascially a 'front' for the Nazi policy of genocide. The memorial stands in the Jewish cemetery, created outside the walls close to the crematorium erected by the Nazis, using the forced labour of the prisoners, to deal with the camp's enormous death rate.
Bio by: David Conway
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