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The Secrets of German Concentration Camps Reviled
“No, No I won’t go!” yelled twenty-year-old Maria. She was running from someone but she didn’t know who; all she knew was someone was chasing her. Then she woke up. That is how it went every night, but tonight she was awakened not by her mind, but by someone pounding on her door. Sighing she got out of bed, put on a robe and went to answer the door.
“Yes, can I help you?”
“We have reason to believe that you have been harboring Jews and taking more ration cards for you and your family than needed.”
“I’m sorry but I know nothing of this.”
“We need to search your home.”
“I told you that I know nothing of this.”
“LET US PASS!” yelled the head Gestapo agent.
The Gestapo agents pushed Maria out of the way and searched her parent’s house anyway.
The Gestapo walked through the house and destroyed everything of value, even Maria’s mother’s fine china that had been given to her mother on her wedding day. Once the Gestapo finished they took Maria and put her in a truck full of other people and started to drive away. As they drove away Maria looked at her house through tear-filled eyes and wondered if she will ever see her family again.
Maria was a tall, blond-haired and blue- eyed. She was raised in the Netherlands by her dad after her mother had died when Maria was three years old. She had a brother named Will, and a sister named Anne. Since Maria was the baby in the family her sister acted like a mother even though they were only about three years apart.
Maria was shaken awake many hours later by the woman sitting next to her.
“Where are we? What’s going on?” asked Maria, trying to wake up.
“We stopped somewhere in Germany. What happened? You look like a mess.”
“Well…my family was accused of harboring Jews and taking extra ration cards.”
“Were you doing these things?”
“Not that I know of, but I just got back from studying and my family went out of town to do something, so I wouldn’t know.”
“Sei zwei ganz!” yelled a German guard.
“What did he say?
“He said ‘You two quiet.’”
“Get out of the truck quietly and stand here until you get further instructions,” said another German guard.
There was some murmuring going around the truck before a guard told them to be quiet. Everyone got out of the truck and was separated by gender. The men went one way and the women the other. As they walked, some of the women said they thought they heard the word Ravensbrück mentioned among the guards. Everyone was scared for they knew that as soon as they went through the gates of Ravensbrück they probably wouldn’t come out. Ravensbrück was a famous women's concentration camp the women who was with Maria were scared. They knew if they went to Ravensbrück they might not come out. Actually going to Ravensbrück was just a rumor started by some of the guards to get them all scared. They went to a camp for men, women and children. This type of camp wasn’t the fun summer camp type, it was a work camp.
Once they got there Maria was scared that she would not make it out alive because she was accused of a crime that she knew nothing about. She was almost positive that the guards would kill her as soon as they got a chance, but they didn’t. Once Maria had looked around at all the people, she was shocked at how skinny the people there were, but being the strong Christian she was, she prayed every second she was there. She prayed against the evil that was going on in some of the Nazi’s minds, she prayed for her family and hoped that they were safe. She prayed that she would get out alive, and she prayed for all the people in the camp who were unfairly judged (which was about all of them). Maria spent most of her spare time telling the women in her barracks about God and what He did in the Bible. In doing this Maria brought many people to Christ and her faith grew every day she was there.
Every day Maria saw people go into a room and come out dead. No on knew what happened in there. The only thing they knew was if you went in you would never come out alive.
Maria was in the camp for a total of about a year and a half. She was thrown in on June 1944 and was discharged in December 1945 six months after the war ended. She was just as skinny as the people that she saw when she first arrived. All of her family was overjoyed when they heard that she was coming home. They immediately made her favorite food for her to eat.
She later wrote in her journal about her time in the camp: I tried to go to sleep wondering if I would wake up in the morning. The pain in my stomach hurts from hunger that I couldn’t fill. I would lay awake wondering if I would make it through the night just to die in the morning. I saw friends I made in the barrack die right in front of me from hunger. I saw people go into death chambers and their agonizing screams in the death chambers echoed in my ears. Wherever I would walk I would see bodies with their bones showing lying in a tangled heap left to rot. I didn’t know when I would get freed if I will get freed at all. I heard and saw children crying from hunger and the loss of a parent instead of cheerful laughing and playing as children should do. I knew that if I die nobody in my family would know where was I buried or when I died. I never knew what day it was or how long I’d been there with cramped beds that were meant for four to five people, not ten to thirty people, rotting bodies where ever you would go. No food or water for days at a time, and when there was food I didn’t know if I would get any. I hoped and prayed that I would get out of this hell on earth alive.
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