Holocaust Flashcards

Flashcards about the Holocaust

Elie Wiesel

Holocaust survivor and author of Night.

Oprah Winfrey

American TV host who accompanied Elie Wiesel to Auschwitz in a documentary.

Dr. Josef Mengele

Nazi doctor known for horrific experiments on prisoners, especially twins.

SS (Schutzstaffel)

Hitler’s private army, ran the concentration camps.

Sonderkommando

Jewish prisoners forced to dispose of gas chamber victims.

Auschwitz

Largest Nazi concentration and extermination camp, where over 1 million died.

Buna

Slave labor factory within Auschwitz III.

Birkenau

Site of most of the mass killings at Auschwitz; location of gas chambers and crematoria.

September 1, 1939

Date Nazi Germany invaded Poland, starting WWII.

1942

Year Allies likely knew about the camps but didn’t act.

1944

Year when 8,500 Hungarian Jews were deported to Auschwitz daily.

January 28, 1945

Date Elie Wiesel’s father died shortly before liberation.

January 27, 1945

Date of the Liberation of Auschwitz.

Cattle cars

Used to transport ~100 people crammed with no food, water, or bathrooms to concentration camps.

Selection process

Process conducted by Dr. Mengele and others to decide who lived and died upon arrival at the camps.

Gas chambers

Chambers used to kill people via suffocation using Zyklon B gas.

"Arbeit Macht Frei"

Sign at Auschwitz entrance meaning “Work makes you free” (cruel irony).