Resources required

• Resource N: Sachsenhausen
• Resource O: Camp population
• Resource P: An inmate’s description
• Resource Q: Ill-treatment
• Resource R: Arrival at Sachsenhausen
• Resource S: Camp conditions
• Resource T: Sachsenhausen memorial

Rationale and learning intentions

Students will explore conditions in the Sachsenhausen camp from the testimonies of inmates and other evidence. They will then move on to examine the way in which the suffering of prisoners has been remembered since 1945. Finally they will begin to explore what each commemoration tells about the commemorators as well as the events and individuals being commemorated. A study in interpretations.

What kind of camp was Sachsenhausen?

Using the narrative in Resource N and the account by Odner in Resource O pupils should write a brief summary of the original purpose and evolution of Sachsenhausen Camp. These key dates should feature in the summary: 1936; 1938; 1941; 1943; 1945; 1961.

How were prisoners at Sachsenhausen treated?

Using Resources P, Q and R, students should identify ways in which inmates of Sachsenhausen were ill-treated at the hands of the SS. How far do James and Odner agree that some prisoners received very cruel treatment?

Suggest reasons why James and Odner disagree about the degree of unpleasantness involved in testing boots for the German armed Forces.

Were all prisoners treated the same?

What evidence can pupils find from Resources P, Q, R and S that James and Odner were treated in a different way to prisoners in the main Sachsenhausen camp? In what ways were James’ and Odner’s groups treated differently? Using their new knowledge of the racial beliefs of the SS how can pupils explain the different treatment given to different groups of prisoners?

Internet research suggestions: pupils could undertake their own research into the codes and beliefs of the SS. Subsequent discussion could go further into how these beliefs affected their treatment of prisoners. Pupils should also be encouraged, as with all sources, to look critically at the information as it is presented on the internet.

In the light of all the pupils have found from the resources and research: why were prisoners treated so cruelly?

How is the treatment of prisoners remembered today?

Look at Resource T. The column carries only red triangles representing the design carried on the camp uniform of political prisoners (mostly communists or trade unionists) held at Sachsenhausen. Other prisoners wore triangles of different colours. The column was erected in 1961 by the Communist government of East Germany and makes no representation of other groups that suffered in the camp.

Think carefully: why might a government choose to remember some victims but not others? What can the column tell us about the people who designed it?

Now design a memorial to represent the suffering of all the types of people who suffered in Sachsenhausen.