Attempts were made to clean up the camp by burying bodies and implementing a form of quarantine to prevent the further spread of disease among the weakened population. Aiding the living was a major task. By the end of 16 April, 27 water carts had been provided, along with enough food for an evening meal, all delivered by VIII Corps. But it was not simply a case of handing out the food. In fact, the Army rations had a negative effect on the weakened prisoners - their malnourished bodies could not cope as the food was so much richer than what they were used to.
Limited amounts of milk, sugar and water were given, either by medical volunteers from Britain who had arrived on 29 April, or by those internees strong enough to feed themselves and others.
Despite these efforts, a further 14, people died after the camp's liberation. The surviving internees were stabilised, deloused and moved to the nearby tank training barracks at Bergen-Hohne, which became a Displaced Persons DP camp.
The Round House there, which would become so significant for the British after the war, was used as a hospital. In Bergen-Hohne, the internees were registered, medically treated, clothed and prepared for repatriation.
Within four weeks, 28, people had been moved. Throughout this time, the Army also had to organise the burial of those prisoners who had died of disease or starvation — 15, in total. The Hungarians and SS guards still on the site, along with other German prisoners of war, were made to help. Civilians, including the local council of the city of Celle, were also forced to visit the camp and see it for themselves.
On 21 May , once the last prisoners had been moved and the last casualty buried, the camp accommodation huts were burned to the ground. Outside the camp, the British put up signs in English and German to mark the scale of what had been done.
One of the signs was soon stolen. Yet back in Britain, and even among some sections of the Army, there was doubt that what had been reported from Belsen was true. It was just too far beyond comprehension. Some claimed it was only propaganda, and fake news. This motivated many soldiers to visit and see it for themselves.
Belsen was not a death camp like those the Red Army discovered on their advance from the east. Rather than an organised system of murder, it was designed to cause death by neglect.
But the scale of the atrocity still horrified those who saw it. Sergeant Owen Smart recalled:. I knew nothing of what had been going on. They had been taken away, or the remains of them. That was awful Word of Belsen quickly spread around the wider Army. As well as appearing in the national press and passing as gossip, it featured in 'Soldier' magazine.
It was the first concentration camp encountered by the British and instantly influenced attitudes towards the local Germans. While many soldiers had expressed sympathy for the plight of ordinary Germans as they moved through their shattered towns and cities, Belsen led to a hardening of feeling.
There was great suspicion that the locals in towns like Bergen, only a few kilometres from Belsen, must have known what was happening there, despite their protestations to the contrary. At a time when British soldiers were increasingly coming into contact with local Germans, it undoubtedly affected interaction.
The British began investigating what had happened at Belsen immediately after the liberation of the camp. It tried 44 men and women who had worked at Belsen. Eleven of the defendants were sentenced to death, including commandant Josef Kramer, head female guard Elisabeth Volkenrath, and camp doctor Fritz Klein. They were executed in Hamelin in December More than a hundred international journalists had reported on the trial and broadcast the evidence to the wider world. Personnel serving in the British occupation zone were able to watch the trial from the public gallery.
After the war, the British were faced with the task of administering and rebuilding their occupation zone. As part of this, they maintained a military presence at Bergen-Hohne, on the doorstep of the Belsen camp. It lasted for the next 70 years.
Liberation did not mean an end to the suffering of the prisoners. In the days following the arrival of the British Army more than 13, people died as a result of their treatment at the hands of the Nazis.
More than 70, prisoners, the majority of whom were Jewish, were murdered at Bergen-Belsen. Following the liberation of Bergen-Belsen, the camp buildings were burnt to the ground to stop the spread of disease. This camp was in operation until Explore our other dates to remember. Anne Frank was sent to Bergen-Belsen with her sister, where they both died of Typhus.
Read her story here. The "residence camp" was in operation from April until April , and was composed of four subcamps: the "special camp" Sonderlager , the "neutrals camp" Neutralenlager , the "star camp" Sternlager , and the "Hungarian camp" Ungarnlager. The "prisoners' camp," also in operation from April until April , consisted of the initial "prisoner's camp," the "recuperation camp" Erholungslager , the "tent camp" Zeltlager , the "small women's camp" Kleines Frauenlager , and the "large women's camp" Grosses Frauenlager.
Over the course of its existence, the Bergen-Belsen camp complex held Jews, prisoners of war, political prisoners, Roma Gypsies , "asocials," criminals, Jehovah's Witnesses, and homosexuals. As Allied and Soviet forces advanced into Germany in late and early , Bergen-Belsen became a collection camp for thousands of Jewish prisoners evacuated from camps closer to the front.
The arrival of thousands of new prisoners, many of them survivors of forced evacuations on foot, overwhelmed the meager resources of the camp. With an increasing number of transports of female prisoners, the SS dissolved the northern portion of the camp complex, which was still in use as a POW camp, and established the so-called "large women's camp" Grosses Frauenlager in its place in January At the end of July there were around 7, prisoners interned in the Bergen-Belsen camp complex.
At the beginning of December , this number had increased to around 15,, and in February the number of prisoners was 22, As prisoners evacuated from the east continued to arrive, the camp population soared to over 60, by April 15, From late , food rations throughout Bergen-Belsen continued to shrink. By early , prisoners would sometimes go without food for days; fresh water was also in short supply. Sanitation was incredibly inadequate, with few latrines and water faucets for the tens of thousands of prisoners interned in Bergen-Belsen at this time.
Overcrowding, poor sanitary conditions, and the lack of adequate food, water, and shelter led to an outbreak of diseases such as typhus, tuberculosis, typhoid fever, and dysentery, causing an ever increasing number of deaths. In the first few months of , tens of thousands of prisoners died. On April 15, , British forces liberated Bergen-Belsen. The British found around sixty thousand prisoners in the camp, most of them seriously ill. Thousands of corpses lay unburied on the camp grounds.
Between May and April 15, , between 36, and 37, prisoners died in Bergen-Belsen. More than 13, former prisoners, too ill to recover, died after liberation. After evacuating Bergen-Belsen, British forces burned down the whole camp to prevent the spread of typhus. During its existence, approximately 50, persons died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp complex including Anne Frank and her sister Margot.
Both died in the camp in February or March Most of the victims were Jews. After liberation, British occupation authorities established a displaced persons camp that housed more than 12, survivors. It was located in a German military school barracks near the original concentration camp site, and functioned until The number of SS functionaries in Bergen-Belsen varied over the course of the camp's existence.
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