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Auschwitz liberated

Film | Digitized | Accession Number: 1988.184.1 | RG Number: RG-60.0038 | Film ID: 6

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    Auschwitz liberated

    Overview

    Description
    This film was taken by a Soviet military film crew upon liberating Auschwitz in January 1945. CUs, children, showing numbers on their arms. The girl in the center of the frame not wearing a uniform but a regular jacket is Sarah Racimora. The boy to her right is Rene (Guttman) Slotkin. HAS, procession of children evacuating the camp, barbed wire. CUs, charred heads and remains of bodies in ovens. CUs, cans of gas and other chemicals. Corpses, including one woman with an embryo beside her. Piles of false teeth, razors, eyeglasses, and clothing. Soviet soldiers hold up some children's clothing. Piles of clothing, shoes, brushes, razor brushes, suitcases from various countries. Bodies in deep trench. Women weep beside grave. A band plays the funeral march. Choir boys follow the band. Many coffins are carried to large grave as hundreds attend ceremony. Priests and flagbearers. Women weep as the mass grave is covered. Doctors examine some of the survivors: an emaciated youth, children with bad feet, all evidence of brutality. The girl with mangled feet is Gertrude "Trudy" Mangel Spira. The Nazis forced her to stand in the snow barefeet for 13 hours as punishment for not doing her job as expected; Nazi doctors then amputated three of the toes in right foot as a medical experiment on pain in the human body. Still photographs of formerly healthy children are integrated in contrast to the ill conditions developed in the camp. More sick children, including Ruth Rosenbaum at 00:23:31, examined by Soviet doctors. Three men without shirts, woman. Medical board reviews sick child. Still photos of Nazis, including portraits of Richard Baer, Camp Commandant, and Karl Hoecker, Adjutant to Baer. Rolling credits at end: "Die drei Vereinten Nationen werden die Schuldigen bestimmt finden, selbst am grande der Welt und Ihren an klaegern ausliefern, um sie den Verdienten Strafe zuzufuehren. Roosevelt, Stalin, Churchill. Aus dem Deklaration der drei Maechter."
    Duration
    00:11:50
    Date
    Event:  January-February 1945
    Production:  1945
    Locale
    Auschwitz, Poland
    Credit
    Accessed at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives & Records Administration
    Contributor
    Camera Operator: M. Oschurkow
    Camera Operator: Alexander Vorontsov
    Camera Operator: N. Bykow
    Camera Operator: Kenan Kutub-Sade
    Camera Operator: A. Pawlow
    Subject: Ruth Rosenbaum
    Subject: Sarah Racimora
    Biography
    Ruth Rosenbaum was born on May 25, 1934 in Cluj, Hungary. She and her twin sister Judith were subjects of Mengele's experiments. They were both liberated in Auschwitz and their mother Rosalia, who also survived Auschwitz, found them in the camp; their father perished. Ruth died of pneumonia 10 days after liberation and shorty after she was filmed here. Her twin Judith currently lives in Israel.
    Sarah Racimora was born in Radom in 1940. She was smuggled into Pionki, deported to Auschwitz in August 1944, and liberated in Auschwitz at the age of 4.

    Physical Details

    Language
    German
    Genre/Form
    Documentary.
    B&W / Color
    Black & White
    Image Quality
    Fair
    Time Code
    00:14:16:23 to 00:26:07:12
    Film Format
    • Master
    • Master 6 Video: One Inch - NTSC
      Master 6 Video: One Inch - NTSC
      Master 6 Video: One Inch - NTSC
      Master 6 Video: One Inch - NTSC
    • Preservation
    • Preservation 6 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large
      Preservation 6 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large
      Preservation 6 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large
      Preservation 6 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large

    Rights & Restrictions

    Conditions on Access
    You do not require further permission from the Museum to access this archival media.
    Copyright
    Public Domain
    Conditions on Use
    To the best of the Museum's knowledge, this material is in the public domain. You do not require further permission from the Museum to reproduce or use this material.

    Keywords & Subjects

    Administrative Notes

    Film Provenance
    The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum purchased the collection from various sources in 1988. Footage was obtained as research for the United States Holocaust Memorial Campaign's promotional video called "A Campaign to Remember" by David Haspel & Associates.
    Note
    Reel 4 of NARA #238.5. "Filmdokumente" on the German concentration camps, made under Russian auspices with narration in German. See also Story 27, Film ID 5 for duplicate (although shorter) footage. See also Story 2769, Film ID 167 for duplicate footage of the entire film -- "Oswiecem" ["Auschwitz"] -- in English.

    Ruth Rosenbaum is seen at 00:23:31

    The Soviet film about the liberation of Auschwitz was shot over a period of several months beginning on January 27, 1945, the day of liberation. It consists of both staged and unrehearsed footage of Auschwitz survivors (adults and children) taken in the first hours and days of their liberation, as well as scenes of their evacuation, which took place weeks or months later. The film includes the first inspection of the camp by Soviet war crimes investigators, as well as the initial medical examination of the survivors by Soviet physicians. It also records the public burial ceremony that took place on February 28, 1945 for Auschwitz victims who died just before and after the liberation. The order to make the film was issued by Mikhael Oschurkow, head of the photography unit, and was carried out by Alexander Voronzow and others in his group. Eighteen minutes of the film was introduced as evidence at the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg. Another segment of the film disappeared for forty years before resurfacing in Moscow in 1986. [Source: Alexander Voronzow interview, Chronos-Films, The Liberation of Auschwitz, 1986]

    USHMM replaced the online streaming video with a new, higher resolution digital file produced for the VHH project. The 16mm film source from NARA was scanned by the Austrian Filmmuseum in 2021.
    Copied From
    35mm; b/w
    Film Source
    David Haspel & Associates
    File Number
    Legacy Database File: 1394
    Source Archive Number: 111 ADC 8557
    Record last modified:
    2024-02-21 07:54:38
    This page:
    https:​/​/collections.ushmm.org​/search​/catalog​/irn1000784

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