9
The history of the Roma and Sinti in Auschwitz
The Nazis regarded them as a “hostile element” with a 'hereditary' propensity to commit crime and antisocial behaviour. From 1933, they and the Jews were persecuted on racist grounds, starting with registration, followed by a ban on specific occupations and mixed marriages, then compulsory labour, and finally, confinement in concentration camps.
After the outbreak of the Second World War, a decision was taken to resettle German Roma in occupied Poland. The German police authorities initiated the arrest and execution of Roma in the occupied territories, including the rear of the Eastern Front, where they were brutally killed alongside Jews by the Einsatzkommandos.
From 1943, following Heinrich Himmler's order, the Sinti and Roma mainly from Germany, Austria, the Czech Republic and Poland were deported to Auschwitz. In total, the Germans deported some 23,000 Roma to Auschwitz, two thousand of whom were murdered without registration in the camp. 21,000 were registered in the camp, of which 19,000 died of starvation and sickness, or were murdered in the gas chambers upon liquidation of the “Gypsy camp”.