Zgoda labour camp - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Zgoda labour camp (ˈzɡɔda) was a concentration camp for Germans

Germans

The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....

, Silesians

Silesians

Silesians , are the inhabitants of Silesia in Poland, Germany and the Czech Republic. A small diaspora community also exists in Karnes County, Texas in the USA....

and Poles, set up in 1945 by the Soviet NKVD

NKVD

The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....

in Świętochłowice, Silesia

Silesia

Silesia is a historical region of Central Europe located mostly in Poland, with smaller parts also in the Czech Republic, and Germany.Silesia is rich in mineral and natural resources, and includes several important industrial areas. Silesia's largest city and historical capital is Wrocław...

. It was controlled by the communist secret police

Ministry of Public Security of Poland

The Ministry of Public Security of Poland was a Polish communist secret police, intelligence and counter-espionage service operating from 1945 to 1954 under Jakub Berman of the Politburo...

until its closure by the Stalinist authorities of Poland in November of the same year.

Between 1943 and January 1945 during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, the camp in Świętochłowice operated as German Nazi Arbeitslager

Arbeitslager

Arbeitslager is a German language word which means labor camp.The German government under Nazism used forced labor extensively, starting in the 1930s but most especially during World War II....

. It was a labour subcamp (Arbeitslager Eintrachtshütte) or the Eintrachthütte concentration camp

Eintrachthütte concentration camp

Eintrachthütte concentration camp was formerly a labour subcamp of the Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz, opened in Świętochłowice , Poland, in 1943, in operation until January 1945...

of the Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz

Auschwitz concentration camp

Concentration camp Auschwitz was a network of Nazi concentration and extermination camps built and operated by the Third Reich in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany during World War II...

. After the NKVD transfer of the facility to MBP

Ministry of Public Security of Poland

The Ministry of Public Security of Poland was a Polish communist secret police, intelligence and counter-espionage service operating from 1945 to 1954 under Jakub Berman of the Politburo...

, Jewish Colonel Salomon Morel

Salomon Morel

Salomon Morel was a Polish Communist official and an accused war criminal. After the end of World War II, he became the commander of the infamous Zgoda labour camp...

(age 26, with no relevant training) became the commander of the renamed Zgoda camp on 15 March 1945.

Zgoda Labour Camp operation

The Nazi German camp was liberated by the Soviets in December 1944, and evacuated before 23 January 1945. However, its infractructure was left intact and after a few weeks the camp was restored by the NKVD, disinfected and repopulated in February 1945 with Silesian prisoners from Katowice, Bielsko and Nysa. It continued to be used until November of the same year, under the jurisdiction of Ministry of Public Security of Poland

Ministry of Public Security of Poland

The Ministry of Public Security of Poland was a Polish communist secret police, intelligence and counter-espionage service operating from 1945 to 1954 under Jakub Berman of the Politburo...

. It was one of several camps of this type in Silesia (the central camp was the one in Jaworzno

Jaworzno

Jaworzno is a city in southern Poland, near Katowice. The east district of the Upper Silesian Metropolitan Union - metropolis with the population of 2 millions. Located in the Silesian Highlands, on the Przemsza river ....

).

Following World War II, the communist authorities of Poland decided that the Silesian volksdeutsche

Volksdeutsche

Volksdeutsche - "German in terms of people/folk" -, defined ethnically, is a historical term from the 20th century. The words volk and volkische conveyed in Nazi thinking the meanings of "folk" and "race" while adding the sense of superior civilization and blood...

from the German DVL groups I and II were to be considered ethnically German. They were believed to have willingly collaborated with the Nazi regime in Upper Silesia

Upper Silesia

Upper Silesia is the southeastern part of the historical and geographical region of Silesia. Since the 9th century, Upper Silesia has been part of Greater Moravia, the Duchy of Bohemia, the Piast Kingdom of Poland, again of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown and the Holy Roman Empire, as well as of...

during the war and were the subject of judiciary. People who signed or were compelled to sign the Nazi lists III and IV were freed from this procedure providing they swore an oath of loyalty to the Polish state. The decision to treat Silesian prisoners as Germans was motivated by prior dealings with volksdeutsche

Volksdeutsche

from the General Gouvernment, and did not take into account local conditions under which the population found themselves on DVL lists, often unwillingly. The policy was changed in 1946, and the criteria were no longer based on volksdeutsche list number, but on specific actions of individuals during Nazi occupation of Poland.

About 6,000 persons were imprisoned at the Zgoda camp. The first inmates were sent there by militia

Militia

The term militia is commonly used today to refer to a military force composed of ordinary citizens to provide defense, emergency law enforcement, or paramilitary service, in times of emergency without being paid a regular salary or committed to a fixed term of service. It is a polyseme with...

, security services and the Soviet NKVD

NKVD

. Some families took children with them to the camp, but such cases were marginal, and concerned a few mothers who did not want to leave their children alone. Statistics and witness statements speak of about 2 mothers with children below 1,5 years of age and perhaps 2 or 3 children 6 or 7 years old. This was a violation of a directive by Security Department that forbade admitting prisoners along with children below 13 years old, who were ordered to be handed over to state care instead.
Most camp inmates were over 40 years old. The majority consisted of Silesians from the Volksliste category I and II as well as ethnic Germans, with some ethnic Poles and at least 38 inmates of other nationalities. Women made up 17% of the camp prisoners in June 1945, but their number went down later. There was also a large group of people above 60 years old. Among the incarcerated were former Nazi Party members, including those with the rank of Ortsgruppenleiter

Ranks and insignia of the Nazi Party

Ranks and insignia of the Nazi Party were paramilitary titles used by the National Socialist German Workers Party between approximately 1928 and the fall of Nazi Germany in 1945...

, for instance several dozen Nazis from Prudnik

Prudnik

Prudnik is a town in Poland, located in the southern part of Opole Voivodeship. Its population numbers 26,400 inhabitants . It is the capital of Prudnik County.- Education :* * * II Liceum Ogólnokształcące w Prudniku...

and Głubczyce. Some inmates have been sentenced by the courts for criminal acts during Nazi occupation of Poland, one was sentenced for four years for oppressing Polish population during the war.

Death toll

Documented figures show that 1,855 prisoners lost their lives at Zgoda camp from February until November 1945. Most died during the typhus

Typhus

Epidemic typhus is a form of typhus so named because the disease often causes epidemics following wars and natural disasters...

epidemic

Epidemic

In epidemiology, an epidemic , occurs when new cases of a certain disease, in a given human population, and during a given period, substantially exceed what is expected based on recent experience...

, that reached its highest death toll in August, claiming 1,600 victims. No medical help was offered to prisoners, and no action taken, until the epidemic spread across the entire camp. The bodies of the dead were being piled up on carts at night and taken outside the camp to hastily dug out mass graves. Eventually, a medical team was sent in, which vaccinated the remaining population.

The inmates were systematically maltreated and torture

Torture

Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion...

d by the guards including by Morel himself, who used to make pyramids of beaten prisoners (up to six layers high) causing suffocation. The camp was one of the most cruel Stalinist detention facilities in Silesia where communist crimes were being committed against the Silesian prisoners under the command of only two men, Aleksy Krut and Salomon Morel

Salomon Morel

Salomon Morel was a Polish Communist official and an accused war criminal. After the end of World War II, he became the commander of the infamous Zgoda labour camp...

, running the camp alone from June 1945. Morel, a former member of the communist underground army Armia Ludowa

Armia Ludowa

Armia Ludowa was a communist partisan force set up by the Polish Workers' Party during World War II. Its aims were to support the military of the Soviet Union against German forces and aid the creation of a pro-Soviet communist government in Poland...

, claimed that his family perished during the Holocaust at the hands of the Nazis. He did not inform his superiors about the typhus epidemic until the news of the situation was reported by the local newspapers. He notified the local prosecutor, who in response ordered that no new prisoners be sent to the camp. For his negligence and for allowing the epidemic to take its toll, as well as for the failure to uphold his duties as commander of the camp, Morel was punished by a three-day house arrest and temporary reduction of pay by 50%. In his defence, Morel claimed that the camp was overcrowded and most of the inmates arrived already sick, and that the camp administration left him with no means to stop the disease. His statements however, were contradicted by official records. He was also reprimanded by the prosecutor for failing to send back to prison detainees who had arrest warrants issued against them, and instead keeping them in the camp.

The Zgoda camp was closed in November 1945 based on general order of the Minister of Security Stanisław Radkiewicz

Stanisław Radkiewicz

Stanisław Radkiewicz was a Polish communist activist with Soviet citizenship, member of the pre-war Communist Party of Poland and of the post-war Polish United Workers' Party...

, issued 15 September 1945. The paper instructed to resolve all cases of detention of persons without prosecutor sanctions issued upon them. According to Morel, the camp was no longer needed. Almost all the remaining prisoners were released. However, they first had to sign an oath, under the penalty of prison, to never disclose the events witnessed in the camp. For years, the history of the camp lived exclusively in the memories of its former prisoners and their families, carefully hidden for fear of repressions for revealing how the native people of Silesia were treated.

After Soviet occupation of Poland

Soviet occupation of Poland

Soviet occupation of Poland can refer to*Period from 1939 to 1941 - see Occupation of East Poland by Soviet Union*Period from 1945-1989 - see Northern Group of Forces...

ended, Morel left Poland for Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

in 1992. He was subsequently wanted by the Polish authorities for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Poland requested his extradition

Extradition

Extradition is the official process whereby one nation or state surrenders a suspected or convicted criminal to another nation or state. Between nation states, extradition is regulated by treaties...

twice and denied him his police pension. Morel died in Tel Aviv in February, 2007.

Zgoda Labour Camp operation

Death toll

Further reading