All photographs copyright © Alan Jacobs.

Block 11

This is the courtyard of the camp jail, Block 11; a jail in the middle of a concentration and death camp! The cells were in the basement. Observe the concrete walls built around the cell windows to further isolate prisoners. Scrolling right, you see the street entrance to the courtyard and the boarded windows of Block 10, where Dr. Carl Clauberg conducted sterilization and other experiments on women prisoners. Scrolling to the right, notice two posts in the concrete walkway. On them were hooks with which to hang prisoners by their wrists bound behind their backs, thus dislocating shoulder joints. For a painting of the process experienced by the artist, Jan Komski see: [link].

Scroll a bit further to the right and you see the "Death Wall."

"From 1941-1943, the SS shot several thousand people at the Death Wall in the courtyard between Blocks No. 10 and 11. Those who died here were mostly Polish political prisoners, and above all leaders and members of the underground organization, people involved in planning escapes and aiding escapees, and those maintaining contacts with the outside world. Poles brought from outside the camp were also shot here. They included hostages arrested in reprisal for Polish resistance movement operations against the German occupation authorities."*

For a painting of the killing scene, and more information see: [link].

*Ref: http://www.auschwitz.org.pl/html/eng/zwiedzanie/blok_11_sciana_stracen.html