Eva Ackermann - December 6, 1982
Annihilation in Landsberg
What was it you said the other prisoners when you asked....
Pardon me.
You said that they said you when you asked if you were going to survive, if you were going to go home....
Yeah. Well, they said uh, they were kind of laughing in uh, uh, in a funny kind of way that uh, you'd laugh at someone who was being uh, naive about, who doesn't understand the circumstances. Uh, they said uh, "Oh, you not going to go home, you're going to go the H Kommando," that was the Himmel Kommando. Himmel is the sky of course and I suppose they were even kind that they wasn't a hell that they uh, but they figured as long as you're going, it doesn't really matter. And, uh....
How long were you in Landsberg?
In Landsberg, I mentioned before, it was uh, the end of April. And something else that uh, terribly uh, that uh, stays with me and it was very painful to see how like once a month they would uh, gather these remnants of human beings, if you will uh, that they put them up in a big truck and they just stashed them up against each other. And you can't imagine the sight and the sound. They took them into a Vernightungslager, it was called.
Annihilation camp?
It was, it--yes. It was like they weeded out the people every month.
Living people?
Living people, but uh, remnants of uh, the--they were uh, actually people who were corpses already except they didn't lay down. They were still standing up. The sight of them uh, the nose running, the--there was the--eyes were running. There was--they didn't have any form of life except that--and that crying that uh, that pitiful crying that uh, I can still hear because it was, it was just--I guess we just walked away. Uh, after awhile, somehow you know it's a funny thing, after awhile you get used to everything because we got used to that too, to that sight. Now it's more prominent in my mind because uh, I don't know, maybe I'm more compassionate, I have more understanding of things and it was easier, easier to walk away from it, but it was, it was a terrible, terrible sight to see uh, for them it was uh, of course much better to be taken somewhere and I don't know to be stashed in a pile.
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