Auschwitz witnesses in the “Chronicles of Terror"
On January 27, 2018, the Witold Pilecki Center for Totalitarian Studies made available in its Testimony database “Chronicles of Terror”, over 1,000 testimonies submitted by survivors of the German Naziconcentration and extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. These testimonies - of Poles, Jews and persons of other nationalities - were collected shortly after the end of World War II for the needs of the two most important trials of members of the camp staff. The testimony database includes all testimonies given in the course of these trials in Polish.
Karol Kalinowski, Witold PIlecki Center for Totalitarian Studies
After the war, most of the German perpetrators from Auschwitz-Birkenau were not held accountable for their crimes. Only about 10% of SS men who worked as members of the camp staff faced trial. Of all the trials that were held in the People’s Republic of Poland, two were of great significance because they revealed several key facts about the history of KL Auschwitz. In March 1947, Rudolf Höss, the founder and first commandant of the camp was brought before the Supreme National Tribunal in Warsaw. The trial was observed by representatives of prisoners’ associations and many journalists from around the world. Höss was sentenced to death and publicly hanged on the premises of KL Auschwitz. In November and December 1947, the so-called first Auschwitz trial of 40 former members of the camp crew was held in Cracow.