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Establishment of the Camp

Prisoners lined up in rows of four stand amid tall trees. Next to them lie building materials and a wheelbarrow. In the background, SS guards stand in front of their personnel carriers.
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The first 149 prisoners from Sachsenhausen concentration camp arrive at Ettersberg by truck, July 15, 1937. Photo: Weimar Criminal Police.
Under the supervision of SS guards, prisoners dig amid tall trees.
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Inmates are forced to build barracks for more prisoners, July 1937. Photo: Weimar Criminal Police.
Häfltinge in the midst of tall trees erect foundations of bricks. SS men stand guarding the fresh masonry.
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Inmates working on the foundations of a barrack, 1937. Photo: Erkennungsdienst der SS.

In the summer of 1937, the SS initiated the building of the Buchenwald Concentration Camp on Ettersberg Mountain outside the city limits of Weimar. It served as a replacement for the smaller central German camps of Lichtenburg, Sachsenburg, and Bad Sulza. A new camp, designed for long-term use, was needed for the planned racist reconstitution of German society. Buchenwald alone was designed for 8,000 male inmates. The first arrived at the Ettersberg construction site on July 15, 1937. By the end of the year, their number had reached over 2,500. Among them were members of the resistance, previous convicts, Jehovah's Witnesses, and a few individuals persecuted for their homosexuality. The inmates had to perform heavy labour to build the camp themselves. The first camp commander, Karl Otto Koch, was infamous for his brutality. From the very beginning, the camp was associated with the city of Weimar in a variety of ways.


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