Death Marches: Significant Role In The Annihilation Of The Jews

Adrienne Waters
English II
1st Period
3 April 2012
Death Marches The death marches played a significant role in the annihilation of the Jews and other prisoners. These marches occurred when the Nazis fled from concentration camps to get away from enemy soldiers. The Russians and the Allies were coming back to recover land as World War II was coming to a close. The Nazis, afraid that the soldiers would find what they had done, dug mass graves and destroyed evidence (Rosenbourg 1). Of course, they couldn’t get rid of all the prisoners so they forced them to travel to another location, desperately trying to outrun the Allies and the Russians (Craunkids 1). This was the start of one of the most horrific parts of the Holocaust, the death marches. There was a specific way the prisoners were organized to go on the death marches. Prisoners were to march into rows that were normally five across, and in one huge column. The SS guarded all sides of the column so they would be ready to shoot if anyone was too weak to go on (Rosenbourg 1). Typically, they would march for many long weeks only to be forced onto cramped cattle cars, still suffering from no food or water (Yadvashem 8). The prisoners were commonly shot in very large groups, wiping all of them out (Memorial Museum 4). In some cases, when the prisoners were close to the ocean, the SS would force
them into the water and shoot them on the spot (Memorial Museum 4). These tactics were used to contribute to the chaos of the death marches. The prisoners never knew where or how far away their destinations were (Craunkids 11).
The SS was actually marching them further into Poland or Germany where they would find even more crowded and disease-ridden concentration camps (Rosenbourg 2). In some instances, the SS would find that a camp had been liberated before they got there and they would have to change their route and keep on going (Rosenbourg 2). Normally, the evacuations would take place in the winter, making it even harder for the prisoners to survive (Craunkids 11). Being in the concentration camps was just as bad as walking for miles in the
marches. There were many different death marches that occurred in the Holocaust. During 1944-1945, Auschwitz and its satellite camps had 60,000 people being evacuated and boarded onto freight trains to be transported to camps further west. (Yadvashem 8) 15,000 prisoners were murdered on this death march. (Yadvashem 8) The Sutthof death march began when 50,000 prisoners were evacuated on January 25, 1945. On two different occasions a large number of these prisoners were forced into the Baltic Sea to be shot. (Memorial Museum 4) More than 25,000 prisoners died during this devastating evacuation of Sutthof. (Memorial Museum 5) Another famous death march didn’t even happen during the Holocaust, it happened in Japan. The American and Filipino troops had to surrender to the Japanese due to shortage in supplies and food. They were captured and forced to walk 70 miles to a Japanese camp and were killed if they didn’t follow orders (Craunkids 12). These horrific death marches were set up to kill innocent human beings as the Nazis ran from the enemy soldiers. The Allies and the Russians did manage to save an extremely small portion of the survivors after it all ended. The death marches was the conclusion to the Holocaust even though it came with a large price.
Works Cited
Rosenbourg, Jennifer. “Death Marches.” About.com 20th Century History. Web. 05 Mar. 2012
Death Marches. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 6 Jan. 2011. Web 15 Mar. 2012.
“Death Marches.” www.yadvashem.org.” Web. 05 Mar. 2012
“Death Marches of the Holocaust.” “Craunkids.” Web. 05 Mar. 2012