US forces liberate Buchenwald

Prisoners assigned to forced corpse disposal attacked SS guards and damaged Crematorium IV using explosives smuggled by women laborers. Hundreds were killed during and after the revolt. Their...

As Soviet forces advanced, SS guards forced tens of thousands of prisoners westward in winter conditions. Many died from exposure, exhaustion, starvation, or execution. The evacuations continued...

SS forces began a death march from Stutthof and its subcamps toward the west. Thousands of prisoners died during evacuations by land and sea. Jewish prisoners were among those subjected to the...

Soviet troops entered the Auschwitz camp complex and found about 7,000 surviving prisoners, many gravely ill. The SS had forced most prisoners on death marches westward; liberation exposed the scale...

US troops liberated Ohrdruf, a Buchenwald subcamp, and encountered evidence of mass death and prisoners murdered shortly before liberation. The visit by senior Allied officers helped bring public...

British troops liberated Bergen-Belsen and found tens of thousands of prisoners suffering from starvation and disease. Thousands died after liberation despite emergency relief, showing that freedom...

US forces entered Dachau and found thousands of prisoners, many gravely ill, and evidence of mass death. Liberation opened a period of medical emergency and survivor displacement rather than an...

Adolf Hitler died by suicide as the Red Army fought through Berlin. Nazi rule was collapsing, but killings, death marches, and camp evacuations continued in the war’s final days. The defeat of the...

US troops reached Mauthausen as the camp system disintegrated. Survivors faced severe illness and the loss of family and community; many could not safely return to their prewar homes.

Germany’s unconditional surrender took effect in Europe, ending the war there. About six million Jews had been murdered by Nazi Germany and its allies and collaborators; survivors faced family loss,...