Overview

The collection of facilities known today as "Auschwitz" is located in and around the town of Oswiecim, in southeastern Poland. 

I spent a week walking the grounds of Auschwitz-I, Auschwitz-II/Birkenau, and the Buna Werke. 

The area can be reached by driving west on A4 from Krakow, and taking 933 south to Oswiecim.

(click map to enlarge)

There are two well-known facilities here. Auschwitz-I is the original or 'main' Auschwitz camp. Auschwitz-II or Birkenau was the main killing center in the area, and is many times larger than Auschwitz-I. See the map below for their relative locations.

(click map to enlarge)

• A - Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (site of Auschwitz I). The visitor reception center is located in the building adjacent to the parking lot:
• B - Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (site of Auschwitz II-Birkenau)
• C - Railroad station; adjacent Globe Hotel
• D - International Youth Meeting House
• E - PKS bus stop
• F - Dialogue and Prayer Center
• P - Parking

Also in the area is the Buna Werke. This was a huge manufacturing plant run by I. G. Farben, and the remains of it still exist today. This is also where the Mono or Auschwitz-III work camp was located.

These are a few of the dozens of camps and sub-camps that made up the constellation of Auschwitz facilities, all administered centrally from Auschwitz-I, and for which the main extermination center was Auschwitz-II/Birkenau.

Much is still preserved in these now quiet backwaters of southeastern Poland.

These places are very real.

Words here fail, and likely these pictures will too, but some are provided below. 

I strongly recommend a physical visit to anyone interested in learning more about this critical time in world history.

Auschwitz-I

Auschwitz-I or the "main camp" was the first prisoner camp used by the Germans in the Oswiecim area, and was built around an earlier Polish army compound. 

Birkenau/Auschwitz-II was a considerably larger camp, and contained purpose-built combined gassing-cremation facilities. At Birkenau many hundreds of thousands of people were systematically killed. 

In addition to barracks and a makeshift gassing-cremation facility, Auschwitz-I contained the administrative offices which controlled the main and (numerous) satellite camps in the Auschwitz constellation.

	Flying over the farming area of Poland that contained Auschwitz, en-route to Krakow airport.
	In Oswiecim, the sign for Auschwitz-I. Auschwitz-I is now largely preserved as a museum.
	Visitors entrance to Auschwitz-I museum today. This building was constructed by the camp inmates late in the war to act as a central 'reception center'.
	The main gate to Auschwitz-I. The sign reads arbeit macht frei, or work makes freedom.
	View from roof of gatehouse, circa late 1945. Main gate, double electric fence, and kitchen in foreground; barracks in background.
	Auschwitz-I main gate. All prisoners marched in and out of the camp under this gate; a prisoner orchestra played music a few meters to the right.
	Auschwitz-I barracks. Double electric fence runs around perimeter.
	View along double electric fence at Auschwitz-I. Camp reception center on right, kitchen on left.
	Empty tin of Zyklon-B gas 'crystals'. A specially modified --to remove odor-- fumigation gas produced by Degesch GmbH, this substance was used in great quantities at Auschwitz-I and especially Auschwitz-II/Birkenau to kill people.
	Zyklon-B gas 'crystals'. Deadly cyanic acid was soaked into these bits of diatomaceous earth. Such 'crystals' were taken out of their tins by SS wearing gas masks, and dropped through small openings into sealed rooms of trapped prisoners, allowing the gas to escape, killing all within.
	Room in Block 11 of Auschwitz-I where the Gestapo held 'court' hearings on the ultimate fate of many prisoners.
	Wall of Death. Execution wall (center, rear) located between blocks 10 and 11. Note windows on women's block (10), on the left, were boarded over in an effort (unsuccessful) to stop viewing.
	Crematorium I, Auschwitz-I. This partially subterranean building was the first killing center at Auschwitz, and housed an ad hoc gassing chamber along with several cremation ovens. This facility was partially reconstructed from post-war ruins. The evidence of reconstruction was recently used as an excuse by so-called 'revisionists' to raise spurious questions as to the Nazi's use of the building. A 1941 blueprint by the original German contractors can be seen here.
	Roof of Crematorium I. Note small access lids, through which Zyklon-B crystals were dropped.
	Gassing chamber in Crematorium I, Auschwitz-I.
	Double-muzzle brick cremation ovens in Crematorium-I. Note rails for moving trolleys efficiently.
	Metal slide for placing bodies into oven.
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