In Auschwitz the prisoners struggled daily for their biological survival. The women who fought this battle were of all ages, from different types of political and social backgrounds, as well as being from a variety of countries. However, the females were all connected by common denominators which shaped their lives during their stay at the camp.
Target For Persecution - Religion
One of the most obvious categories that all women present in Auschwitz can be placed into is that of a victim. However, this does not only refer to the physical victimization from the Nazi officials. Though females of other religions were openly prosecuted, the largest religious group affected by the Holocaust was the Jews. In Sima Vaisman’s memoir she remembers asking one of the guards a question, to which the SS women replied “Aren’t you Jewish? You forgot that you have no right to live!”.
Target For Persecution - False Hope
Using ones religion to single out a group of women was how the Nazis turned something positive in ones life, into something so negative. However, mockery of a person’s religious choice was not the only way the Nazis toyed with the lives of their victims. So many promises dangled in front of prisoner’s eyes had ended in misery and death. An example of this is when soon to be prisoners were told before departure that they were going to a labour camp were family would not be separated. Upon their arrival at Auschwitz, they soon realized the lies.
Target For Persecution - Conformity
Another way women who entered Auschwitz became victims was through their loss of individuality. This was accomplished by the Nazis through a series of events that women experienced upon arrival at the camp. This process included the women having to strip, be searched, tattooed (so it was easier to keep track of them), then their jewellery and other possessions were taken from them, and finally their heads were shaved. As women partially define themselves by their looks this was a very effective process of taking that away from them.
Inmate Behaviour
Though the loss of ones self was hard for the prisoners it was the daily encounter with other forms of cruelty that made their time at Auschwitz even more unbearable for its victims. Cruelty in the concentration camps took on many forms. Though this includes the traditional instances of brutality from SS personnel against female prisoners, there are also instances of cruelty between the inmates. During the intense and frighten time of arrival at the camp one might assume that women would ban together and help easy the anxiety of new arrivals. This did not always occur, as Sima suggests in her book, those who had been at the camp since it first opened told new arrivals that the buildings were made of the ashes from those incinerated. This behaviour could have been a result of a number of things, but Sima hints at the fact that these prisoners believed that the new arrivals had profited from life while they had been locked up.
Acts of cruelty towards fellow inmates were counter balanced with acts of love that also occurred between prisoners. During her stay at the concentration camp one woman recalls her birthday and how the women who lived in her barracks pooled their resources and gave her presents. Though they may not have resembled extravagant gifts she may have received had she been out of such a place, they were things that seemed to take on more important meanings. Her presents consisted of articles such as a bar of chocolate, a comb, hardly used toothbrush, cigarettes and more.
Mutual Familiarity
All female prisoners faced a daily battle against cruelty, but most were able to find different forms of love and hope to combat the negativity. The Holocaust spanned many years and affected a great area of land and individuals, but one thing connected them all, the thought that one day the world would know everything and that it would take revenge for the suffering.
Source
Vaisman, Sima. A Jewish Doctor in Auschwitz. (New Jersey: Melville House Publishing) 2005.
Jessica Sprunt - Jessica obtained her BA from the University of Toronto with a double major in history and near and middle eastern civilization. During her ...
