Ohrdruf was a German forced labor and concentration camp located near Ohrdruf, south of Gotha, in Thuringia, Germany. It was part of the Buchenwald concentration camp network.

Operation

Created in November 1944 near the town of Ohrdruf, south of Gotha, in Thuringia, Germany, Ohrdruf was initially a separate forced labour camp directly controlled by the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office (SS-WVHA) but then became a subcamp of the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar. It made use of huts originally built in 1940 for Wehrmacht troops using the Truppenübungsplatz nearby as well as other facilities. The camp, code-named Außenlager S III, consisted of a northern and a southern camp; later, a tent camp at Espenfeld and a camp at Crawinkel were added. The camp supplied forced labor in the form of concentration camp prisoners for a planned railway construction project for an immense communications center inside the basement of the Mühlberg castle in Ohrdruf. Inmates had to work to connect the castle to the main railroad line and to dig tunnels in the nearby mountains, which would be used as emergency shelter for the train that contained the "Führerhauptquartier". The proposed communication centre was never completed due to the rapid American advance.

By late 1944, around 10,000 prisoners were housed here; through March 1945, the total number sent here was around 20,000, mainly Russians, Poles, Hungarian Jews, some French, Czechs, Italians, Belgians, Greeks, Yugoslavians and Germans. Conditions were atrocious: in the huts there were no beds, "only blood-covered straw and lice". Despite the season, not all prisoners were housed in huts—some were accommodated in stables, tents and old bunkers. Work days were initially 10 to 11 hours long, then later 14 hours, involving strenuous physical labor building roads, railways and tunnels. In addition, inmates had to cope with long marches and musterings, total lack of sanitary equipment and medical facilities, and insufficient food and clothing.

In January 1945, the SS guards were reinforced by units from Auschwitz. A site near Ohrdruf code-named 'Olga' was designated as quarters for the Army High Command (OKH) during the final stages of the war and some elements of the OKH did move there in late February 1945.

It is still not clear exactly what projects the prisoners of Ohrdruf were working on. Besides the temporary quarters for the Reich leadership, the extensive tunneling and other works at Jonastal point to an armament factory of some kind. There is a theory, advanced by Rainer Karlsch that the facility was intended as (and used as) a testing site for a German nuclear bomb. Other possibilities are an improved V-2 rocket or long-range jet-powered bombers, but all of this is speculative.

Liberation

thumb|left|300px|US generals [[Dwight Eisenhower|Eisenhower, Bradley, Patton, and Eddy inspect a cremation pyre at the camp on April 12, 1945, after liberation.]]

Ohrdruf was liberated on April 4, 1945, by the 4th Armored Division, led by Brig. Gen. Joseph F. H. Cutrona, and the 89th Infantry Division commanded by Maj. Gen. Thomas D. Finley. It was the first Nazi concentration camp liberated by the U.S. Army.

When the soldiers of the 4th Armored Division entered the camp, they discovered piles of bodies, some covered with lime, and others partially incinerated on pyres. The ghastly nature of their discovery led General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe, to visit the camp on April 12, with Generals George S. Patton and Omar Bradley. After his visit, Eisenhower cabled General George C. Marshall, the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Washington, describing his trip to Ohrdruf: He said the smell was overpowering and unforgettable.

Today, the only structures remaining from the camp period are some of the munition bunkers that were also used to house prisoners.

  • In 2015 the first reports of the systematic genocide was the subject of the short documentary Ralph Rush: Concentration Camp Liberator directed by Daniel L. Bernardi with the collaboration of El Dorado Films and the Veteran Documentary Corps.

References

  • History of the 602nd Tank Destroyer Battalion – Description of the liberation by Raymond J. Young
  • United States Holocaust Memorial Museum – The 89th Infantry Division – Liberation of Ohrdruf – Video (April 1945 silent)