Prisoners Building the Camp
Buchenwald Concentration Camp was built by the prisoners themselves. The prisoners worked long, hard, hot days during the summer of 1937 to complete the camp. When the prisoners were not working on the camp they were transporting rocks from the quarries to the camp. However, the SS men thought they would be a little creative and tie at least a dozen prisoners up to a wagon and have them drag it, full of rocks, up to the camp.While pulling the wagon the SS officers called them “Singing Horses”. Unfortunately those that could not perform the work and, or just looked too tired or out of shape to the SS officers were killed. When the camp was completed the result was the largest camp ever, created on German land. On July 28, 1937 Heinrich Himmler named the camp Buchenwald. The camp was made just for men at first that had a political or a higher class background. However, later on Buchenwald was divided into three sections; one section was the “large camp” which was used for the prisoners that had some superiority. Then there was the “small camp” where prisoners were in a seclusion type of atmosphere. Lastly there was the “tent camp” which was used for the prisoners from Poland, after Germany invaded the country in 1939. These were just the parts of the camp for the prisoners there were also places that housed the SS officers. Along with the “administration compound” and of course the factories where the prisoners spent a lot of their time.