"WITNESSES FROM THE PIT OF HELL”. HISTORY OF THE AUSCHWITZ SONDERKOMMANDO
The book presents the result of many years of research by Dr. Bartosik from the Museum Research Center on the archival documentation preserved in the Memorial Archives. The compiled material constitutes the most complete reconstruction of the history of the Sonderkommando created to date. A thorough search made it possible to fill in many gaps in its history.
The study consists of an extensive historical overview, a choice of source materials, a calendar of events in the Sonderkommando, a bibliography, and a name index. The essential part of the volume is an over 100-page analysis of the history of Sonderkommando based mainly on documents created in various departments of the administration of the German Nazi concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz. Dr. Bartosik reached documents hitherto unknown or overlooked by historians dealing with the history of the Sonderkommando due to their allegedly low research value.
The author found much information in entirely unexpected places. One example is the first document published in the book, dating from April 1942, which is a record card for materials taken from a warehouse for workgroups employed at Birkenau. It contains an order for cement and lime intended for the Sonderkommando. Another interesting example is the record cards from the camp arrest in Block 11, which show the names of hitherto unknown inmates of this workgroup. Analysis of orders of the Auschwitz camp commandant's office also proved important: one contains a commendation for SS men who caught two escapees from the Sonderkommando nearby the camp.
The finding of the name "Sonderkommando" on some documents not directly related to the extermination process showed that a surprisingly large amount of data on the subject survived in the SS documentation. At the same time, that made it possible to find details of many aspects related to the fate of this group of prisoners. Where it was impossible to reconstruct specific facts, Bartosik used prisoners' accounts written down secretly in the camp and post-war testimonies.
About 1,800–2,000 prisoners were forced to work in the Sonderkommando during the camp's operation. Approximately 50–60 of them survived.
The book "Witnesses from the Pit of Hell" is available at the Memorial and in our online bookstore.
"Witnesses from the Pit of Hell" is a monographic study of the history of the Sonderkommando at Auschwitz by Dr. Igor Bartosik. This so-called special group of prisoners, consisting mainly of Jews deported to the camp, was forced by the Germans to burn the corpses of victims of mass extermination.
Paweł Sawicki