Chełmno extermination camp (German: Vernichtungslager Kulmhof) was the first extermination camp (death camp) opened by Nazi Germany. It was 50 kilometres (31 mi) north of the city of Łódź, Poland. In 1939, Nazi Germany had invaded Poland, and had annexed (took control of) parts of Poland.
The Nazis built Chełmno with the specific goal of carrying out ethnic cleansing through mass murder. The Nazis kept Chełmno open from December 8, 1941, as part of Operation Reinhard during the most deadly phase of the Holocaust, and again from June 23, 1944 to January 18, 1945 during the Soviet counter-offensive.
The Nazis murdered over 150,000 people at Chełmno,[1] including many Polish Jews from the Łódź Ghetto and the local people who lived in Reichsgau Wartheland (Warthegau).[2]
The Nazis killed at least 152,000 people at Chełmno.[1] Nazi officials were eventually charged with killing at least 180,000 victims.[4]
The Kulmhof Museum of Martyrdom (pl)says that around 200,000 people were killed at Chełmno.[5]
Most of the people killed at Chełmno were:
- Jews from west-central Poland;[2]
- Roma people from around Poland;
- Soviet prisoners of war; or
- Jews who had been forced to live in the Łódź Ghetto. These included Jews from Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia, Germany, Luxemburg, and Austria.
The Nazis killed these victims using gas vans. They forced the victims into large vans, and then pumped carbon monoxide into the vans to suffocate and kill the victims.[1]
Early on, the Nazis experimented at Chełmno. They developed methods which they used later during The Holocaust in Nazi-controlled Poland.[6]
Russian soldiers captured the town of Chełmno on January 17, 1945. By then, the Nazis had already destroyed evidence that the Chełmno camp ever existed. They left no prisoners behind.[7] One of the camp's survivors, who was fifteen years old at the time, said that only three Jewish males had escaped successfully from Chełmno.[8]
In 1961, the three best-known survivors testified about Chełmno at Adolf Eichmann's trial in Jerusalem. In 1962-1965, two survivors also testified at trials held in West Germany against people who worked at the camp.[8]
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