War Series: Liberation of Dachau

History of the Liberation of Dachau

Part 2: April 30, 1945

In Part 1, I discussed the Nazi Concentration Camps and the initial movement of US Army divisions into Dachau.

Dachau: The Camp

As my father and the 42nd “Rainbow” Division moved into the Dachau Concentration Camp, of the 32,000 survivors still alive in the main camp, the largest groups included over 9,000 Polish and almost 4,000 Russians.

There were 1,200 Catholic priests, the largest contingent of the 1,600 clergymen imprisoned. There were now only 2,100 Jews. Most Jews in the Dachau system were in the sub-camps. Their numbers were continually being augmented, though they were used up faster and shipped out more frequently to the extermination camps.

At Dachau, there were thousands of inmates who were dying of a typhus epidemic that had been ravaging the camp since the previous fall. Between February and April, over 13,000 prisoners died. Even in the month after liberation, 4,500 would die of typhus, malnutrition, and other diseases.

It was a clear day when my father’s division moved into the camp to clear and capture the eastern section, which contained the inmates’ enclosure. Within a half-mile of the camp, a stench permeated the air like burning garbage and singed chicken feathers. My father had seen a lot of action and death for several months. But nothing could have prepared him emotionally…