Lyla Lindsey
During World War II, the Nazis established several concentration camps in Austria. One of the most notorious of these was Mauthausen, located near the village of Mauthausen on the Danube River. Mauthausen was established in April 1938, shortly after Austria was annexed to Nazi Germany. The camp was built near an abandoned stone quarry, and prisoners were subjected to forced labour in the quarries, carrying heavy stone blocks up 186 steps, which became known as the Stairway of Death. Other concentration camps in Austria included Gusen, Gunskirchen, Melk, Ebensee, and Amstetten.
| Characteristics | Values |
|---|---|
| Name of Concentration Camp | Mauthausen |
| Year of Establishment | 1938 |
| Year of Liberation | 1945 |
| Location | Mauthausen, 12 miles southeast of Linz, Austria |
| Number of Prisoners | 190,000-200,000 |
| Number of Deaths | 90,000-120,000 |
| Type of Camp | Category III camp, special penal camp with a harsh regime |
| Prisoners' Characteristics | Criminals, "asocial elements" (including political prisoners, homosexuals, etc.), anti-Nazis, Jews, Soviet prisoners of war, etc. |
| Forced Labour | Yes, in quarries, munitions factories, mines, arms factories, and aircraft assembly plants |
| Liberation Date | 5 May 1945 |
| Liberating Army | United States Army |
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What You'll Learn
Mauthausen concentration camp
Mauthausen was a German Nazi concentration camp located on a hill above the market town of Mauthausen, about 12 miles (20 km) southeast of Linz in Upper Austria. It was one of the most notorious Nazi concentration camps and the main camp of a group with nearly 100 further subcamps located throughout Austria and southern Germany.
Mauthausen was established in April 1938, shortly after Austria was annexed to Nazi Germany. It started as a satellite of the Dachau concentration camp in Germany, but became an independent camp in the spring of 1939, operated by the SS (the Nazi paramilitary corps). The SS transferred the first prisoners from Dachau to Mauthausen in August 1938. During this phase, the prisoners, who were all Germans and Austrians and all men, had to build their own camp and set up operations in the nearby granite quarry. By the end of 1938, Mauthausen held nearly 1,000 prisoners, mostly convicted criminals, "asocials", political prisoners, and homosexuals. Three months into World War II in December 1939, the number had increased to over 2,600 prisoners, including religious conscientious objectors such as Jehovah's Witnesses.
Mauthausen and its subcamps included quarries, munitions factories, mines, arms factories, and plants assembling Me 262 fighter aircraft. The conditions at Mauthausen were even more severe than at most other Nazi concentration camps. The granite mined in the quarries was used to pave the streets of Vienna, but the Nazis also envisioned a complete reconstruction of major German towns, for which large quantities of granite were needed. The camp's production output exceeded that of five other large slave labour centres: Auschwitz-Birkenau, Flossenbürg, Gross-Rosen, Marburg, and Natzweiler-Struthof. The list of companies using slave labour from Mauthausen and its subcamps was long, and included both national corporations and small, local firms and communities.
In January 1941, Mauthausen was designated a category III concentration camp, indicating that it was a special penal camp with a harsh regimen. Inmates in the punishment detail were forced to carry heavy stone blocks up 186 steps from the camp quarry, which became known as the "Stairway of Death" or the "Stairs of Death". The SS started to construct a gas chamber and other installations at Mauthausen in 1941 for the systematic murder of large groups of people. During the second half of the war, prisoners, who now included women for the first time, were increasingly used as forced labourers in the arms industry.
By January 1945, the camps contained roughly 85,000 inmates. Towards the end of the war, the Mauthausen concentration camp became the destination for evacuations from camps near the front line. Tens of thousands of prisoners arrived on several large transports. Overcrowding, lack of food, and rampant disease led to mass death among the prisoners in the final months before liberation. On 5 May 1945, the US Army reached Gusen and Mauthausen. Some prisoners were in such a weakened state that many still died in the days and weeks after liberation. Of a total of around 190,000-200,000 people imprisoned in the Mauthausen concentration camp and its subcamps, at least 90,000-120,000 died.
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Gusen branch camp
The Gusen concentration camp was established as a branch of the Mauthausen concentration camp in 1940. Located in the Langenstein Municipality in Lower Austria, Gusen was designed to hold around 6,000 inmates, surpassing the capacity of its parent camp, Mauthausen. Initially, the camp mainly housed Polish and Spanish prisoners, forcing them to work in the quarries under gruelling conditions, resulting in countless deaths.
In 1941, the number of deaths in the Gusen camp was several times higher than in Mauthausen. As the use of concentration camp prisoners as forced labourers in the arms industry increased, Gusen became a hub for arms production, with large arms companies such as Steyr-Daimler-Puch AG and Messerschmitt GmbH moving their production to the camp. Despite the improved conditions for prisoners assigned to arms production, the overall living and working conditions in the camp remained catastrophic, with thousands of prisoners dying.
In March 1944, the Gusen camp was extended with the creation of 'Gusen II' to accommodate the growing number of prisoners needed for tunnel construction and aircraft production. At least 8,600 prisoners were murdered or died as a result of the harsh conditions in Gusen II. By the end of the war, around 71,000 people from across Europe, including Poland, the Soviet Union, France, Italy, and Spain, had been deported to Gusen, with approximately 36,000 of them perishing.
On May 5, 1945, the US Army liberated the Gusen concentration camp, along with the main Mauthausen camp. The liberation revealed the horrific conditions and atrocities that had taken place within the camp system. The Mauthausen Memorial, including Gusen, now serves as an international site of remembrance and political-historical education, preserving the memory of the victims and documenting the history of the camps.
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Subcamps of Mauthausen
Mauthausen, a notorious Nazi concentration camp located near the village of Mauthausen on the Danube River, had nearly 100 subcamps located throughout Austria and southern Germany. The subcamps were divided into several categories based on their primary function: Produktionslager for factory workers, Baulager for construction, Aufräumlager for cleaning up bombed towns, and Kleinlager (small camps) dedicated to serving the SS. The Mauthausen camp system became a destination for evacuations from camps near the front line towards the end of World War II, resulting in overcrowding, food shortages, and rampant disease that led to mass deaths.
The first subcamp of Mauthausen, Gusen, was established a few kilometres away from the main camp in May 1940. Gusen and its satellite camps, located in and around the village of St. Georgen/Gusen, held a significant number of prisoners, sometimes exceeding the population of the Mauthausen main camp. Gusen II, established in March 1944 as an improvised concentration camp, served as a Prisoner of War Labour Camp, mainly for Red Army officers.
The Mauthausen concentration camp complex included quarries, munitions factories, mines, arms factories, and even a plant assembling Me 262 fighter aircraft. The harsh conditions at Mauthausen and its subcamps resulted in a high death rate, with approximately half of the 190,000 inmates perishing. The staff at Mauthausen managed over 60 subcamps, including Melk, Ebensee, Amstetten, and Gunskirchen, in addition to the Gusen camps.
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Mauthausen's liberation
Mauthausen was one of the most brutal and severe Nazi concentration camps in World War II. Established in 1938, it was located near the village of Mauthausen, on the banks of the Danube River, about 12 miles southeast of Linz in Upper Austria. The camp was built near an abandoned stone quarry, and prisoners were forced to work in the quarries, carrying heavy stone blocks up a steep set of 186 steps known as the "Stairway of Death" or the "Stairs of Death".
During the war, the Nazis increasingly relied on forced labour from concentration camp prisoners for armaments production. Mauthausen became the main Nazi camp in Austria, with nearly 100 subcamps throughout Austria and southern Germany. The camp system was characterised by slave labour, malnutrition, overcrowding, disease, and constant abuse and beatings by guards.
In the final months of the war, Mauthausen absorbed survivors of the infamous death marches from evacuated extermination camps, including Auschwitz. Overcrowding, lack of food, and rampant disease led to mass deaths among the prisoners in the final months before liberation.
On May 5, 1945, the US Army's 11th Armored Division, part of General Patton's 3rd Army, arrived at Mauthausen. The SS had fled the camp shortly before, and the American troops were greeted by former prisoners, including a group of Spanish Antifascists. The liberation of Mauthausen marked the end of a horrific chapter in history, with an estimated 90,000 to 120,000 people dying out of the approximately 200,000 prisoners who passed through the camp and its subcamps.
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Mauthausen's establishment
Mauthausen was established in April 1938, shortly after the 'Anschluss' ('Annexation') of austrofascist Austria to the German Reich on 12 March 1938. Two weeks after the annexation, August Eigruber, the National Socialist Gauleiter (regional head) of Upper Austria, announced that his Gau would be responsible for building a concentration camp. The site chosen was the town of Mauthausen on the Danube, 12.5 miles southeast of Linz. The camp was built near an abandoned stone quarry, and the prisoners were forced to work in the granite quarries, carrying heavy stone blocks up 186 steps, which became known as the "Stairway of Death".
Mauthausen started as a satellite of the Dachau concentration camp, with the first prisoners being transferred from there on 8 August 1938. These prisoners, who were all men, had to build their own camp and set up operations in the quarry. During its first year, the camp received prisoners transferred from Dachau, mainly convicted criminals, but also "asocial elements", including political prisoners, homosexuals, and others. The camp later became a detention centre for anti-Nazis from all over Europe, including 10,000 Spanish Republicans.
In the spring of 1939, Mauthausen became an independent camp operated by the SS (the Nazi paramilitary corps) and acquired satellite camps of its own throughout Austria, all collectively called Mauthausen. The first commandant of the camp was SS Captain Albert Sauer, who presided over its establishment on 1 August 1938 and remained commandant until 17 February 1939. He was replaced by SS Colonel Franz Ziereis, who remained the commandant until the liberation of the camp in May 1945.
During World War II, Mauthausen and its subcamps became the destination for evacuations from camps near the front line. Tens of thousands of prisoners arrived on several large transports, leading to overcrowding, lack of food, and rampant disease, which caused mass death among the prisoners in the final months before liberation. In total, around 190,000 people were imprisoned in the Mauthausen concentration camp and its subcamps over seven years, with at least 90,000 deaths. Some sources put the number of deaths at 120,000, with about 38,000 of the dead being Jews.
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Frequently asked questions
Mauthausen was the main Nazi camp in Austria. It was built near an abandoned stone quarry, along the Danube River, about 12.5 miles southeast of Linz. It was established in April 1938, shortly after Austria was annexed to Nazi Germany. Mauthausen became one of the most notorious Nazi concentration camps.
The conditions at Mauthausen were even more severe than at most other Nazi concentration camps. Half of the 190,000 inmates died at Mauthausen or its subcamps. Inmates were subjected to forced labour, starvation, arbitrary treatment, and violence.
In addition to Mauthausen and its subcamps, other camps in Austria extended from Lochau in the west to Strasshof in the east. Mauthausen's subcamps included Gusen, Gunskirchen, Melk, Ebensee, and Amstetten.
