B`ergen-Belsen was never officially given formal concentration camp status. In 1943 the Nazis created Bergen-Belsen for wounded
prisoners and ordered its conversion into a transit center. Belsen had been used for five different purposes: as a Russian POW camp,
as a convalescence camp, as a transit center, as an exchange camp, and as a center for interned American citizens.
The Nazis thought of grouping foreign Jews and use them for negotiation with American and Latin American officials. However, the SS
somehow sent any privileged group to Belsen and any person that might be useful in negotiations.
The camp was divided into two separated sections. Camp I was reserved for Russian POWs. Camp II , the Star Camp for privileged
Jews and foreigners, provided adequate food and good shelters. Disease was never a problem until the last month, when typhoid and
typhus epidemics and tuberculosis devastated the whole camp.
As Germany lost its conquered territories in summer of 1944, the Nazis evacuated some camps and sent the prisoners to Belsen.
Soon Belsen was overcrowded with evacuees. From January 1945, Belsen became a dumping ground for the survivors of the other
camps, and finally of Auschwitz. The condition changed dramatically.
With the overflow of new prisoners, camp administration broke down. The food supply was cut off and roll calls stopped. The starving,
sick inmates were on their own. They slept with in groups of twelve, forming small human skyscrapers. Those on the lowest level
almost touched the ground. Boards were set up at different levels over them so that others could sleep on top. Those on the highest
level had the ceiling on their heads. Corpses rotted in every corner of the camp. Rats attacked weak living inmates. Starving
prisoners were so desperate that they ate their dead acquaintances. Starvation caused more deaths than typhus.
On April 15, 1945, the British army liberated Belsen. However, it was unable to rescue the inmates. On that liberation day the British
found 10,000 unburied corpses and 40,000 sick and dying prisoners. Among the 40,000 living inmates, 28,000 died after the liberation.
The inmates were abandoned in Belsen by the Germans, left behind for death to come. The British and German army commanders
worried that the prisoners, ill with fatal disease, might infect British troops and German civilians. The British managed to remove the
typhus cases to Panzer School. They disinfected the survivors in an attempt to eliminate the typhus. Then they burned the barracks
to prevent the spread of typhus. The survivors watched the burning camp and prepared to struggle for a new life.
