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Prisoner Letter from the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp
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“Please let me know how you meant it in your letter before the last with the greatest humiliation
of a woman through a man. I do not understand that well.”
Autograph letter signed, Janke, one page, with information and address leaf on the verso, 5¼” x 7¾”, Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, Oranienburg, Germany, July 15, 1944. In German, with translation.
This letter from a 48-year-old Czechoslovakian prisoner at Sachsenhausen apparently to his wife reflects his concern about his relationship with her—perhaps damage that his imprisonment at the hands of the Nazis not only created but now also limits his ability to repair. In obvious pain, he writes: “Dear Helen! I thank you for your letter of the 28th of June and for the packages of June 23, June 30, and July 4. . . . Please let me know how you meant it in your letter before the last with the greatest humiliation of a woman through a man. I do not understand that well. In reading your letter I walked with you through our entire place. I thought of each little place which reminded me of any happy, content, and beautiful experience. I do not think about the discontented ones.”
He continues by asking what became of a certain business and by sending thanks and greetings to family and friends. He closes by saying: “Kisses to you all, Janke.”
The prisoner wrote this letter five days before the attempted assassination of Adolf Hitler on July 20, 1944. The letter was apparently being processed in the concentration camp mail when the bomb blast occurred and was postmarked in Oranienburg, some 35 kilometers north of Berlin, on July 22. Had Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg and his German Army co-conspirators succeeded, perhaps this particular Nazi victim could have been freed. One wonders whether he survived the war or, if he did, whether his marriage likewise survived.
This letter is written on an inmate letter sheet bearing these printed rules and warnings:
The day of release cannot be given yet. Visits to the camp are forbidden. Inquiries are useless.
Extract of the camp regulations:
Each detainee may write or receive two letters or postcards per month. Incoming letters may not have more than 4 pages of 15 lines each and they must be written in a clear and readable form. Remittances of money are allowed only by postal order whose coupon may only contain the first and last name, birth date, number of the detainee, but no communications of any sort. Money and photos or picture enclosures in letters are forbidden. Postal sendings that do not comply with these regulations will be denied [admittance]. Poorly organized or hard to read letters will be destroyed. Everything can be bought in the camp. National Socialist newspapers are permitted but must be ordered within the concentration camp by the detainee himself. Food packages may be received at any time and in any amount.
The Camp Commander
On the back, the prisoner notes what appears to be a Germanized form of his name, “Zoubek,” and also his date of birth, prisoner number, and other camp identifying information. His wife, whom he addresses with the Czechoslavakian spelling, “Zoubkorć,” lives in Bohemia, which today is the western half of the Czech Republic. The prisoner’s German is good but has mistakes characteristic of Czechoslovakian speakers of German.
The Sachsenhausen concentration camp, which was located at Oranienburg, some 35 kilometers north of Berlin, opened in August 1936 and closed on April 22, 1945. Some 200,000 prisoners passed through it during its nine years of operation. Although it was not created as an extermination camp, it was the site of many executions, mostly of Soviet prisoners of war. The construction of a gas chamber and cremation ovens in early 1943 facilitated the execution of more prisoners. Altogether, some 30,000 inmates died there from exhaustion, disease, malnutrition, or pneumonia.
This letter is in fine condition. It is stamped with a red German 12 pfennig stamp bearing Hitler’s likeness. There is a tear at the bottom, affecting a bit of the text, where the letter was glued when it was sealed, and there is scattered foxing. Otherwise there is but a normal mailing fold.
Unframed.
This item is sold.
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