The Satel­lite KZ Walldorf

The fol­lo­wing texts form part of the History Nature Trail which has been built around the grounds of the for­mer KZ Außen­la­ger in Walldorf.

Ous­ting, For­get­ting, Reminding

End of March 1945, US-American mili­tary units came to Wall­dorf. The war was over. The Social Demo­crat mayor Adam Jour­dan, who had been dri­ven out of office in 1933, was reinstated.

“Nor­male life” began again for the popu­la­tion. This “nor­ma­lity” of the post-war Ger­man society inclu­ded an enor­mous thirst for action — reconstruc­tion, demo­li­tion and und buil­ding anew. Thousands of dis­pla­ced per­sons and refu­gees came into the towns and com­mu­nities. The return of the sol­diers was expec­ted wist­fully — fathers, bro­thers, husbands.

But this “nor­ma­lity” also inclu­ded the fact that not much time was spent thin­king about the 12 year long ‘nazi­fi­ca­tion’ of state and society. Until the late seven­ties, no atten­tion was given to the signi­fi­cance of the many hund­reds of satel­lite KZ’s that had exis­ted throug­hout the ‘Reich’.
The grounds of the camp were re-forested in the fif­ties. The know­ledge about the his­to­ri­cal mea­ning of the place vanished.

Inqui­ries of For­eig­ner Tra­c­ing Ser­vices direc­ted to all town halls during the late for­ties and fif­ties were respon­ded to, but were not scru­ti­ni­zed any fur­ther. So in 1951 in Wall­dorf it was sta­ted that such a camp had exis­ted here, under admi­nis­tra­tion of the SS. The Jewish women impri­soned there were eva­cua­ted via an air­port owned rail­way track on Novem­ber 24, 1944. It was sta­ted that no one knew who these women were and where they had been brought to, since the camp did not belong directly to the com­mu­nal area of admi­nis­tra­tion. Thus, the case see­med to be clo­sed. The grounds of the camp were re-forested in the fif­ties. The know­ledge about the his­to­ri­cal mea­ning of the place vanis­hed.
About 1970 Zsuz­s­anna Far­kas, a for­mer inmate of the camp, came to Town Hall and asked com­mu­nal employees for the loca­tion of a memo­rial stone for the for­mer KZ. Nobody was able to give an ans­wer. The Town Hall employees assu­med that Mrs. Far­kas had con­fu­sed pla­ces. They knew not­hing. The had never heard about it. This chan­ged only a few years later. In 1972, during a study trip, three young men from Mörfelden-Walldorf dis­co­vered a map showing all satel­lite KZ’s in the Buchen­wald KZ memo­rial place. They were bewil­de­red to read the name of their own home town there: Walldorf.

So they star­ted inves­ti­ga­ting on their own. Federal Archive files even­tually pro­vi­ded the con­fir­ma­tion: Here, in this piece of wood­lands, a satel­lite camp of the KZ Natz­wei­ler had exis­ted from August to Novem­ber / Decem­ber 1944. 1.700 young Jewish women from Hun­gary had been put up in shacks. They were sup­po­sed to build the first con­crete covered run­way of Frank­furt air­port. This buil­ding pro­ject was “vital for war­fare” accor­ding to Ger­man “Luft­waffe”. In town no one was really exci­ted about this new know­ledge. In the seven­ties, many felt that the work the young men had done was “fou­ling the own nest”.

City Coun­cil mem­bers dis­cus­sed in length whe­ther a memo­rial stone should be erec­ted at the site, and if yes, with which inscrip­tion. In March 1980 the stone was inau­gu­ra­ted and pre­sen­ted to the public during a digni­fied cere­mony. Wit­hin the frame­work of the muni­ci­pal cul­tu­ral pro­gram “Mee­ting Hun­gary” the museum again took up inves­ti­ga­ti­ons regar­ding the camp in 1996: a mul­ti­tude of new files, par­ti­cu­larly pro­to­cols of wit­ness accounts given by women pre­viously impri­soned here could be viewed and made acces­si­ble to the public wit­hin the scope of an exhi­bi­tion. A Hun­ga­rian Jewish woman living in Wall­dorf heard about this pro­ject. Her fri­end (Mar­git Hor­váth) had been impri­soned here in the camp in 1944. We had inten­sive talks and inter­views with her. The 12th class stu­dents of Ber­tha von Sutt­ner School used this as an oppor­tu­nity to con­ti­nue inves­ti­ga­ting on their own. They went to Hun­gary and met ano­ther sur­vi­vor of the Wall­dorf KZ in Pápa. Deeply moved they retur­ned to Mörfelden-Walldorf.

They were doing a lot — also with regard to the con­struc­tion com­pany these women had been forced to work for in 1944. Equally, City Coun­cil the press, the museum, and more and more (a gro­wing num­ber of?) people of our town got invol­ved. The result of this work done by most dif­fe­rent people and groups is the “His­to­ric Nature Trail” inau­gu­ra­ted in Novem­ber 2000. We wish to thank all those who have par­ti­ci­pa­ted in this work. Inten­sive occupa­tion with the history of this satel­lite KZ is now a mat­ter of course for our population…

“In an age when we wan­ted to be young and beau­ti­ful, we were arres­ted and depor­ted…” Ibo­lya says (born 1921)

After mili­tary defeats at the Eas­tern front in 1942/43, the Hun­ga­rian govern­ment had tried to dis­en­gage from its to date ally Ger­many. Hun­gary took up secret diplo­ma­tic con­ta­cts with the Wes­tern allies. Talks were held regar­ding a pos­si­ble sepa­rate peace. In order to prevent this, Ger­man tro­ops mar­ched into Hun­gary on March 19, 1944. The for­mer ally Hun­gary had pur­sued an anti-Semitic policy as well. The Hun­ga­rian so cal­led 3rd Law on Jews, pas­sed in 1941, resem­bled the Nurem­berg racial laws of 1935. But the Hun­ga­rian govern­ment had not com­plied with the Ger­man request to adopt the pro­gram of the so cal­led “final solu­tion”. This star­ted only with the day of the inva­sion of the Ger­man Wehr­macht. At that time, about 800.000 Jews lived in Hun­gary. The NS-leadership had pre­pa­red ever­y­thing in a gene­ral staff fashion. April 4, 1944: Dis­play­ing the yel­low star beco­mes com­pul­sory in Hun­gary. Begin­ning mid April 1944, the Jewish popu­la­tion had to live in ghet­toes. Alre­ady from May 15, 1944 the depor­ta­tion trains star­ted rol­ling towards Auschwitz.

“We were unloa­ded at a small rail­way sta­tion near Frank­furt. It was noon time, we were exhaus­ted and had no water …” Sze­ren remembers.

During the roll call of August 19/20, 1944 in Ausch­witz, 1.700 young Jewish women aged 14 to 45 were selec­ted for a work assi­gn­ment at Frank­furt air­port. Since the begin­ning of the war the air­port was under the aut­ho­rity of the Ger­man air force. For the new jet figh­ter plane (Me 262) a con­crete covered run­way was necessary. the buil­ding pro­ject was labe­led “import­ant for war­fare”. The “Orga­ni­sa­tion Todt” filed an app­li­ca­tion for the necessary work force with the SS main office for eco­no­mi­cal admi­nis­tra­tion on August 10, 1944 — that meant: KZ inma­tes. The camp con­sis­ted of six shacks for the inma­tes and a guard bar­rack — con­struc­tio­nally, ever­y­thing was in a com­pa­ra­tively new and good shape. There was a bar­bed wire fence all around the camp. After a three day ride during which the women had barely recei­ved anything to eat or drink, they had to march from the rail­way sta­tion through the forest into the camp. One of the 1.700 women alre­ady died on this day of arri­val: Jolan Frei­feld; she was just 40 years old. The for­mer camp com­man­dant com­men­ted on the death of Jolan Frei­feld during an inter­ro­ga­t­ion in 1978:

“Today, I can not say any­more if the inmate was alre­ady dead upon arri­val, or died right after that. Even if the expla­na­tion on the docu­men­ta­tion is con­tra­dic­ting its­elf, I can­not say anything dif­fe­rent today. The cause of death “car­diac and blood cir­cu­la­tion insuf­fi­ci­ency” sta­ted by mys­elf must have been com­ing about because her fel­low inma­tes had tal­ked about such a diagnosis …”

Vera was only 13 years old in 1944. She says:

“Since I was too young, I was sepa­ra­ted from my mother (in Ausch­witz) and came into Block 12 in Camp B. II. C. My mother came to Block 3. But I took the risk any went to my mother.… We were selec­ted several times. On August 19, my mother and were sor­ted out into the sepa­ra­ted group coun­ting 1,700 per­sons which was adja­cently “wag­go­ned in”. On August 22, 1944 our train arri­ved in Frankfurt/Main an. We were rus­hed — totally exhaus­ted — on a very hot day, we were all thirsty and had no water. I can remem­ber that we had to walk on foot to the camp; the way see­med to very long to me. Me thinks that one of us was shot on the way”.

Con­tem­porary Wit­nes­ses Reporting: Please click on the photographs