World War II · Europe · March 1933 – April 1945
The Liberation of Dachau: The First Nazi Concentration Camp, 1933–1945
The first concentration camp of the Nazi state: a camp for political prisoners that became the model for all the others, the people of more than thirty nations held there, the murders and experiments, the subcamps and the death march, the day American soldiers arrived, the trials that followed, and how the place is remembered.
Dachau opened on 22 March 1933, less than two months after Hitler came to power, and it was liberated by American soldiers on 29 April 1945, eight days before Germany surrendered. In those twelve years more than 200,000 people from more than thirty countries were imprisoned there and in its subcamps, and about 41,500 of them died. This collection tells the history of the camp from its first day to the present, with the liberation at its center.
Key facts
What happened
Dachau began as a camp for the regime’s political opponents, set up in an old munitions works outside a Bavarian market town (Chapter 1). Under Theodor Eicke it became the training ground and model for the whole system of concentration camps (Chapter 2). Its prisoners came from every group the regime persecuted and, from 1939, from every country Germany occupied; among them were more than 2,700 clergy (Chapter 3). From 1941 it was a place of mass murder and medical experiments (Chapter 4), and from 1942 the center of a network of about 140 subcamps where prisoners worked for the armaments industry (Chapter 5).
In its last months the camp was overwhelmed by transports from the east and by typhus, and on 26 April 1945 the SS drove thousands of prisoners south on a death march (Chapter 6). On 29 April soldiers of the 45th and 42nd Infantry Divisions reached the camp and found the death train from Buchenwald (Chapter 7). Typhus went on killing after liberation, SS men were shot in reprisals, and American military courts tried the camp’s staff (Chapter 8). The survivors fought for twenty years to make the camp a memorial (Chapter 9).
Why it matters
Dachau was where the Nazi concentration camp was invented: the first camp, the longest-running, the school of the SS guards and the model for the others. It held the regime’s opponents from the first weeks, and its history touches almost every group the regime persecuted. For Americans it has a particular place: it was one of the camps whose liberation, photographed and filmed by the Army and reported by correspondents, showed the world in the spring of 1945 what the Nazi regime had done.
A note on the photographs
How to look at these pictures
Many photographs of the camp before 1945 were taken by the regime’s own photographers, for propaganda; their captions say so. The photographs taken at liberation include images of the dead. In this collection those are hidden behind a notice; select it if you wish to see them. Every photograph comes from a public archive or is freely licensed, and each links to its source.
How to use this collection
Read the nine chapters in order for the whole history, or start with the liberation in Chapter 7. Each chapter has photo galleries, maps or interactive features, and links to its sources. Below are the two maps, the groups of prisoners, a timeline, the numbers, the people, myths and facts, a quiz and answers to common questions.
The collection
9 chapters
Read in order for the full history, or start anywhere.
01March – December 1933The First Camp: Dachau in 1933A disused munitions works outside a Bavarian market town, Himmler’s announcement, the first prisoners on 22 March 1933, the first murders in April, and a prosecutor who tried to stop them.
021933 – 1939The Dachau Model: Eicke, the SS and the System of CampsTheodor Eicke’s rules of punishment, the guards he trained, the camp rebuilt by its prisoners in 1937–38, and how Dachau became the pattern for every concentration camp that followed.
031933 – 1945The Prisoners of DachauPolitical opponents, Jews after the November pogrom, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Sinti and Roma, homosexual men, people from across occupied Europe and more than 2,700 clergy in the priests’ barracks.
041941 – 1945Murder and Medicine: Hebertshausen, Hartheim and the ExperimentsSoviet prisoners of war shot at the SS firing range, the sick sent to be gassed at Hartheim, prisoners used for high-altitude, freezing, malaria and seawater experiments, and the crematorium built in 1942.
051940 – 1945Subcamps and Forced Labor: Allach, Kaufering and MühldorfAbout 140 subcamps across southern Bavaria and beyond, prisoners working for the armaments industry, and the Kaufering camps where Jewish prisoners built bunkers for jet-fighter production.
06Winter 1944 – 2 May 1945The Last Months: Typhus, Trains and the Death MarchOvercrowding and epidemic, transports from camps further east, the death train from Buchenwald, and the evacuation march of thousands of prisoners toward the Alps.
0729 – 30 April 194529 April 1945: The Liberation of DachauThe 45th and 42nd Infantry Divisions and the 20th Armored Division reach Dachau, find the death train, take the surrender of the camp and free about 32,000 prisoners.
08May 1945 – 1948After Liberation: Typhus, Reprisals and the Dachau TrialsArmy doctors fighting an epidemic, the shooting of SS guards and the inquiry that followed, the camp trial of November 1945, the Dachau trials of 1945–47 and the camp’s afterlife as an internment camp and refugee settlement.
091945 – todayMemory: The Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial SiteSurvivors who fought to preserve the camp, the memorial opened in 1965, Nandor Glid’s International Monument, the chapels and church, the stolen gate, and how Dachau is remembered today.Maps
Dachau on two maps
The first map shows Dachau among the camps of Central Europe, with the transports that linked them; the second shows the camp, its subcamps around Munich and the death march of April 1945. Select a place for details, or play the phases.
Interactive map 1 of 2 · Central Europe
Dachau and the camps of Central Europe, 1933–1945
Interactive map 2 of 2 · Dachau and Munich
Dachau, Munich and the death march, April – May 1945
Prisoners
Who was imprisoned
Political prisoners, Jews, clergy, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Sinti and Roma, homosexual men and people from across Europe. Filter by group.
Interactive · filter
Who was imprisoned at Dachau
Communists, Social Democrats and trade unionists: the first prisoners.
Chapter 1 →Opponents of the regime sent after the annexation of Austria.
Chapter 3 →Almost 11,000 brought in within days.
Chapter 3 →About 23,500 prisoners, mainly Jews from Hungary and Lithuania.
Chapter 5 →More than 2,700, most of them Polish Catholic priests.
Chapter 3 →Imprisoned for their refusal to serve the regime.
Chapter 3 →More than 4,000 shot at Hebertshausen.
Chapter 4 →By 1945 the great majority of the prisoners came from occupied Europe.
Chapter 3 →You decide
Decisions
Three chapters put you in the place of someone who had to decide what to do.
Command decision · you decide
Sign the indictment?
You are Josef Hartinger, deputy prosecutor in Munich, in the spring of 1933. Prisoners at the new camp at Dachau are dying, and the SS says they were shot escaping or killed themselves. The bodies say otherwise.
Numbers
By the numbers
Every figure carries its source. Where sources differ, the chapters say so.
Registered prisoners, 26 April 1945
Murder outside the daily toll
The Kaufering camps, 1944–45
People
Prisoners, perpetrators, liberators and witnesses
Select a name for the chapter where they appear.
Wrote the rules and trained the guards of the “Dachau model.” Killed in Russia in 1943.
Photo: Heinrich Hoffmann · CC BY-SA 3.0 de · Wikimedia CommonsThe chief defendant in the Dachau camp trial; hanged at Landsberg on 29 May 1946.
Photo: Member of War Crimes Branch: Origin: Dr. Victor L. Wegard · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsSurvived the priests’ barracks and became archbishop of Prague and a cardinal.
Photo: Photographer unknown · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsSent to Dachau on the first Austrian transport; chancellor of Austria after the war.
Photo: Viennpixelart · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia CommonsHeld for years as a special prisoner and murdered at Dachau on 9 April 1945.
Photo: Vikhawk · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia CommonsDeported to Dachau from France; survived the camps.
Photo: Photographer unknown · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsConducted the seawater experiments in 1944; convicted at the Nuremberg Doctors’ Trial.
Photo: USHMM, courtesy of Hedwig Wachenheimer Epstein · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsOne of the Nisei soldiers who reached the survivors of the death march in May 1945.
Photo: U.S. Army · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsAccepted the surrender of the camp on 29 April 1945.
Photo: US Army, circa 1944-1945, reprinted at US Army in World… · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsA Polish priest and survivor reads a camp medical record to the chief prosecutor of the Dachau trial.
Photo: Photographer unknown · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsTestified at the camp trial and founded the Catholic chapel at the memorial site.
Photo: Gasiewicz · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsMyth or fact
What people get wrong
Myth or fact · open each card
Five things people get wrong
Dachau was a death camp like Auschwitz.
It was a concentration camp. Tens of thousands died there, and thousands were murdered, but it was not built for systematic mass gassing. See Chapter 4.
Nobody in the town knew.
Most prisoners were Jews.
Jews were persecuted with special cruelty, and in 1944–45 tens of thousands were held in the subcamps, but most prisoners over the twelve years were political prisoners and people from occupied countries, above all Poles. See Chapter 3.
Liberation ended the suffering.
Typhus and starvation kept killing for weeks after 29 April 1945. See Chapter 8.
Only one division liberated Dachau.
The 45th and 42nd Infantry Divisions both reached the camp on 29 April, with the 20th Armored Division nearby. See Chapter 7.
Gallery · 12 photographs · select to enlarge
Dachau in photographs
Then and now
Dachau then and now
Drag the slider to compare.
Quiz
Test yourself
Nine questions. Every answer is explained in the chapters.
Score: answer a question to begin.
1. When did the first prisoners arrive at Dachau?
On 22 March 1933, less than two months after Hitler became chancellor. See Chapter 1.
2. Who tried to prosecute the SS for the first murders at Dachau?
His indictments were buried, but his files survived. See Chapter 1.
3. What was the “Dachau model”?
Developed under Theodor Eicke. See Chapter 2.
4. Which group made up most of the more than 2,700 clergy held at Dachau?
See Chapter 3.
5. Where were more than 4,000 Soviet prisoners of war shot?
October 1941 to summer 1942. See Chapter 4.
6. What were the Kaufering prisoners forced to build?
See Chapter 5.
7. Who found the last column of the death march near Waakirchen?
On 2 May 1945. See Chapter 6.
8. Which divisions reached Dachau on 29 April 1945?
With the 20th Armored Division nearby. See Chapter 7.
9. Who sculpted the International Monument at Dachau?
Unveiled in 1968. See Chapter 9.
FAQ
Questions and answers
What was Dachau?
How many people died at Dachau?
How many prisoners were held at Dachau?
More than 200,000 people from more than thirty countries between 1933 and 1945. On 26 April 1945, 67,665 prisoners were registered in the main camp and its subcamps. See Chapter 3.
Was Dachau an extermination camp?
No. It was a concentration camp, where tens of thousands died of hunger, disease, overwork and violence, and thousands were murdered by shooting, hanging and other means. Prisoners selected as unfit were sent to be gassed at Hartheim in Austria. See Chapter 4.
Was the gas chamber at Dachau used?
A gas chamber was built in Barrack X in 1942–43. The memorial site finds no reliable evidence that it was used for mass murder, though it may have been used to kill individuals or small groups. See Chapter 4.
Who liberated Dachau?
Units of the U.S. Seventh Army on 29 April 1945: the 45th Infantry Division, whose 157th Infantry Regiment came first upon the death train, and the 42nd Infantry Division, whose Brig. Gen. Henning Linden accepted the surrender, with the 20th Armored Division nearby. See Chapter 7.
How many prisoners were freed at Dachau?
About 32,000 prisoners were in the main camp at liberation; thousands more were freed in the subcamps and on the death march in the following days. See Chapter 7.
What was the Dachau death train?
What happened to the SS guards at Dachau?
Some were shot by American soldiers and prisoners during the liberation, an episode the Army investigated but did not prosecute. Others were captured and tried; in the Dachau camp trial of 1945, 36 defendants were sentenced to death. See Chapter 8.
What were the Dachau trials?
American military trials held at the former camp from 1945 to 1947: 489 trials, of the staff of Dachau, Mauthausen, Flossenbürg, Buchenwald and other camps, of the Malmedy massacre and of crimes against Allied airmen. See Chapter 8.
Who were the Nisei soldiers at Dachau?
Japanese American soldiers of the 522nd Field Artillery Battalion, whose families were held in internment camps in the United States. In the last days of the war they reached survivors of the Dachau subcamps and the death march. See Chapter 6.
Can you visit Dachau today?
Yes. The Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site, opened in 1965, is free to enter and can be reached from Munich by suburban train and bus. See Chapter 9.
Sources
Sources and further reading
The memorial site and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum first; summaries are used only where noted.
- Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site (KZ-Gedenkstätte Dachau) — the memorial site’s history of the camp, its exhibitions and its figure of 41,500 dead
- Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site, "The Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site, 1945 – today" — the camp after liberation, the internment camp and the Dachau trials, Dachau-East, the memorial of 1965, the chapels, the International Monument and the stolen gate
- United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia, "Dachau" — the opening in March 1933, Kristallnacht, the Soviet prisoners of war, the subcamps, the figures for 26 April 1945, the evacuation and the liberation
- Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site, "SS shooting range Hebertshausen" — the shooting of more than 4,000 Soviet prisoners of war, October 1941 to summer 1942
- Europäische Holocaustgedenkstätte Stiftung, "Concentration camp prisoners" (Landsberg–Kaufering) — about 23,500 prisoners in the Kaufering camps and more than 6,500 dead known by name
- The National WWII Museum, "The Last Days of the Dachau Concentration Camp" — the evacuations, the death train and the arrival of the Americans
- 45th Infantry Division resources (ibiblio), "522nd Field Artillery Battalion" — the Nisei artillerymen and the Dachau death march
- Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site, virtual tour: the International Monument — Nandor Glid’s monument of 1968
- German History in Documents and Images, "Memorial Site at the Dachau Concentration Camp (1968)" — the memorial and the International Monument
- Wikipedia, "Dachau concentration camp" — a summary with references; used for the commandants, the clergy figures and the camp trial
- Wikipedia, "Dachau liberation reprisals" — a summary of the shootings of SS guards and the Whitaker inquiry, with references
- Wikipedia, "Dachau trials" — a summary of the American military trials held at Dachau, 1945–47
- Wikipedia, "Priest Barracks of Dachau Concentration Camp" — a summary of the clergy imprisoned at Dachau
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