Police State: The Concentration Camps

Question 1

What significant event led to the construction of the concentration camps ?

Answer 1

As soon as the Enabling Act had been passed the Nazis established the Concentration camps

Question 2

Who would concentration camps confine ?

Answer 2

Whoever the Nazis seemed to be political, ideological or racial opponents

Question 3

At first, what were concentrations camps set up for ?

Answer 3

For the detainment of political opponents such as communists, socialist, trade unionists and others who had left wing/ liberal political views

Question 4

By 1939 how many people had been arrested for political offenses ?

Answer 4

150,000

Question 5

Who ran the concentration camps ?

Answer 5

The SS and the SD

Question 6

Who had the authority to arrest and send people to concentration camps ?

Answer 6

Only the Gestapo

Question 7

What was the earliest concentration camp ?

Answer 7

In Dachau, near München/ Munich
Then others followed most notably Mauthausen and Buchenwald and Saschenhausen

Question 8

What were prisoners classified into and how was each class distinguished?

Answer 8

Different categories
Each was denoted by a different colored triangle which had to be worn

Question 9

What are some examples of the colors and what they denoted ?

Answer 9

Pink triangles: homosexuals
Red triangles: political prisoners

Question 10

Initially what was work like in the camps ?

Answer 10

Hard and pointless
Like
Breaking stones however Prisoners began to be forced to be quarry workers, construction workers, coal miners and armament factory workers

Question 11

How were camp inmates treated ?

Answer 11

Badly
Underfed and treated with brutality

If a concentration camp member was shot a family member would receive a note saying they had died of disease or tried to escape