description
Object description
The dead at Ohrdruf Concentration Camp on 10 April 1945 lie in front of a hut, others are burnt black on a metal structure. A human leg lies in a water-filled pit, and naked bodies are stacked in a heap and sprinkled with white powder. US and British Army personnel take control of Werl prison, Germany, on 11 April 1945, count the prisoners and re-confine them. Dutch civilians share out the cargo of grain barges on the Mittellandkanal near Seelze (west of Hanover) on 11 April 1945. Liberated Ahlem Concentration Camp near Hanover, Germany, on 11 April 1945, the feeding and evacuation of survivors and the start of clearing of the many dead by local civilians under US Army direction on 11 April 1945.
Full description
OHRDORF HORRORS (sic) [Dope sheet title]. A group of about twenty bodies, naked in prison stripes and dark overcoats, lie where they fell in front of a large hut in Ohrdruf Concentration Camp, Germany, 10 April 1945. A pair of crutches lies beside one man. A dark pile of burnt material reveals itself to be carbonised bodies among metal rails and charcoaled wood; there are large heaps of spoil behind the pyre and bare-branched woodland beyond. A large, deep water-filled pit has a human leg protruding from the liquid mud, a pickaxe upright beside it. Naked bodies are neatly stacked and have been sprinkled with a white powder, they are seen again from the exterior of a hut through the open double doors. A squalid interior of a hut has straw filled sacks, a bucket, bowls and a stool scattered about.
Full description
GERMAN SLAVE LABOUR [Dope sheet title]. Scenes of Werl Prison, Germany, on 11 April 1945. Prisoners are gathered in the walled courtyard of a substantially built, brick and stucco prison complex with bars on the windows and with a watch tower in view, the outer wall is about fifteen feet high. They are being addressed by a US Army soldier, beyond the large group of prisoners, which includes several cooks, stands a collection of German prison officers. There are scaffolding poles and many stacked boxes in view. Prisoners look thin but not emaciated or with shaven heads, seem adequately fed and dressed, some have eyeglasses and dogtags round neck. A British officer questions a thin, elderly, male prisoner. The German prison guards throw their keys into a growing heap in the courtyard. The prisoners are counted by a US Army soldier, as they go into a building through a heavy door in a brick wall, with a pointed arch and protected by a robust grille. The German prison guards are shown in peaked, braided, caps.
Full description
GERMAN CONCENTRATION CAMP [Dope sheet title]. The Mittellandkanal Weser-Ems river near Seelze is seen on 11 April 1945, with large grain barges moored for unloading. An orderly, labour-intensive operation is under way with men and women carrying sacks down the gangplank to waiting transport of horse and hand carts. A woman ladles grain. Scenes at Ahlem Concentration Camp, near Hanover, Germany, on 11 April 1945, show inmates in stripes walking slowly behind high, electrified, many stranded, wire fencing. Huts with big block numbers painted on are seen behind them. A Red Cross mobile canteen hands out food to a queue of inmates. A body is removed from a hut and laid on the ground for the camera, before being placed in a small pit in front of which a civilian nurse dresses a thin boy's ankle. An inmate is being filmed in his bunk and begins to cry, another is shown carefully eating pasta. There are piles of discarded clothing or bedding in the compound being picked over by an inmate, a US Army sergeant of 84th Division (identified on dope sheet as Staff Sergeant Burstein of New York) consults a list watched by a boy inmate of eleven or twelve. A still cameraman is using what appears to be a polaroid (?) camera to photograph a relaxed and happy group of emaciated men in stripes leaning against a hut wall. Some inmates queue for soup, they blow on the hot soup and spoon it from the bowls carefully.
Physical description
35mm
