While reading through the survivor accounts that I gathered from the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial last summer, I found a unique report. Apparently at one time either the Danish government, the National Museum in Copenhagen, or the Freedom Museum in Copenhagen put out a survey to former concentration camp inmates.<\/p>\n
Axel Christian Hansen was one such inmate. Born in 1899, he was captured in Denmark as a political dissident on September 30, 1944. Sent first to Neuengamme, he was then sent to Porta Westfalica on October 3. His answers are terse, yet convey much; as do the questions left unanswered. Here are a few of the questions and his answers. The survey was conducted in Danish on an unspecified date, and translated into German in 1990.<\/p>\n
The first section deals with his transportation from Neuengamme (near Hamburg) to Porta Westfalica.<\/p>\n
Type of transportation:<\/em> Cattle car\/ How many in each car:<\/em> 50 men<\/p>\n Was there straw or carpet or other?<\/em> No<\/p>\n Did you receive any rations during the trip? bread-jam-meat?<\/em> No<\/p>\n How much?<\/em><\/p>\n Did you receive anything to drink?<\/em> No<\/p>\n How did you relieve yourself?<\/em> In the corner of the car.<\/p>\n Were there air raids?<\/em> Yes<\/p>\n Did you stay in the cattle car?<\/em> Yes<\/p>\n Was it locked?<\/em> Yes<\/p>\n Where were the guards?<\/em> In the first car.<\/p>\n Where there any dead or wounded?<\/em> No<\/p>\n Where there any escape attempts?<\/em> No<\/p>\n Was there any mistreatment?<\/em> No<\/p>\n Further comments regarding the transportation and description of exceptional experiences.<\/em><\/p>\n There was no time to sleep in the train car because there were too many of us. When we were shipped to Porta, we were given a little bit of water and a little bit to eat from a guard.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The second part deals with the arrival in Porta Westfalica.<\/p>\n What did you have remaining of your things upon arrival?<\/em> A belt.<\/p>\n Was your face or head shaved?<\/em> Yes<\/p>\n Was your body shaved?<\/em> Yes<\/p>\n Where you shaved in another way?<\/em> Yes, with a reverse mowhawk<\/p>\n How often did you get a reverse mowhawk (Autobahn)?<\/em> 3 times<\/p>\n When were you allowed to grow your hair?<\/em> Never<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Section three deals with daily life.<\/p>\n How often did you receive a change of clothes (approximate date received)?<\/em> The prisoner clothes were never changed.<\/p>\n What was exchanged?<\/em> Shirt and underpants were changed every third week.<\/p>\n Was there any opportunity to wash or receive washed clothing?<\/em> No<\/p>\n What kind of shoes?<\/em> Wooden shoes (clogs)<\/p>\n Condition of the shoes?<\/em> bad<\/p>\n List your other personal belongings (toothbrush, soap, tissue, toilet paper, etc, and how long you had them)<\/em><\/p>\n How many roll calls were there per day?<\/em> about 4-5<\/p>\n When?<\/em> Mornings, evenings, middle of the night<\/p>\n How long did they normally last?<\/em> from 1 to 3 hours<\/p>\n How long did the longest last?<\/em> 3 hours<\/p>\n <\/p>\n There is much more to be found in the document. It will be available in the document repository I am building with Omeka, where it can be translated and transcribed by anyone who wants.<\/p>\n Much about the camp life is known because of memoirs of the Danish political prisoners. Following are a couple of\u00a0books by Danish survivors:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" While reading through the survivor accounts that I gathered from the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial last summer, I found a unique report. Apparently at one time either the Danish government, the National Museum in Copenhagen, or the Freedom Museum in Copenhagen put out a survey to former concentration camp inmates. Axel Christian Hansen was one …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1791,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[41,42,43],"tags":[81,80,82,49],"class_list":["post-1787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dissertation","category-german","category-history","tag-denmark","tag-inmate","tag-political-prisoner","tag-translating"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/IMG_0819.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1787"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1787"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1794,"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1787\/revisions\/1794"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nazitunnels.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\u00a0passenger car\/automobile\/ship<\/del> – open<\/del>\/closed<\/p>\n