Tag #137925 - Interview #78465 (Egon Lovith)

We arrived in Turkheim in Germany. It was nighttime and there was barking, great clamor, screaming, shouting, not much light and a pine forest right by us. We were on foot. We passed a concentration camp. ‘Raus, raus, schnell!’ [Out, out, fast] and I got some hits and kicks. The concentration camp seemed to be empty and we didn’t see any prisoners. It turned out to be a new concentration camp. I still remember the smell of resin. The barracks only had a roof slightly above the ground and we had to go down under because they were made in the ground. In each one of them was a miserably small stove and a small window on the ground level from where the only light came in. They weren’t big barracks. The beds, that were planks of wood, were lined up along the two sides of the barracks. I think about 30 of us were on one side and there were 50 or 60 of us altogether in one barrack. Altogether there were about 200-240 of us, forced laborers, in the camp. The guards had their barracks there as well. The Germans appointed Greek Jewish prisoners as our guards and they beat us really badly, treated us very roughly. In the camp there was also a big kitchen, the Revier – the first aid place – and the offices. There was a barrack where the Germans only collected clothing. I think there were about eight to ten barracks altogether. The camp was the labor subcamp of the Dachau concentration camp. At first, there were only men but later they also brought women.