Today, April 11, three days before Passover 5774, is the seventieth anniversary of the American Third Army officially liberating Buchenwald.
On the first two nights of Passover, Jewish families gather to read the Haggadah .. a story of liberation beginning with the tales of Moses and continuing to today’s stories of liberation .. from slavery, imperialism, and intolerance. After eating the seder meal, we say “Next Year in Jerusalem” as a universal statement of the rights of all people to their own beliefs, cultures and homelands.
The evening of March 28th, 1945 was the beginning of the last Passover celebrated by the inmates of Buchenwald. I do not know if any one recorded the last seder held in the camp but my family will commemorate that seder Monday night when we read the Schwartz family Haggadah. The date has special meaning for us because my father, Robert Schwartz, led the first US Army medics to enter the camp and give care on April 9, 1945.
There was a phone call to the camp a few days before the allies arrived. As American forces approached, the Germans had begun to evacuate the camp. About a third of these prisoners died from exhaustion en route or were shot by their SS guards. .
The Gestapo wanted their colleagues in Buchenwald to blow up what was left and called to say explosives had been sent. The Gestapo in Weimar did not know that the explosives they were sending to Buchenwald were not useful. The camp had been liberated a few days before when starved and emaciated inmates stormed the watchtowers, seizing control/ This revolt was led by a clandestine organization within the camp. The leaders of the resistance, Hermann Brill , Werner Hilpert , Ernst Thape and Walter Wolf are now deceased.
A prisoner answered the phone and informed headquarters that explosives would not be needed, as the camp had already been blown up, which, of course, was not true.
The camp was also unknown to the allies. The American troops were searching the Buch forest because of the nearby Nordemende camp where slave labor was used to build Germany’s rockets. The Buchenwald camp was discovered when Americans found newly free inmates fleeing through the forest, though Buch. These troops, including my father’s medical company, entered the camp, gave care and were later ordered to leave so General Patton could lead the official liberation.
What my father and his men found were emaciated people, dyeing of starvation, dysentery, and torture. There were no gas chambers, but hundreds, sometimes thousands, died monthly from disease, malnutrition, beatings, and executions. Doctors performed medical experiments on inmates, testing the effects of viral infections and vaccines. Among the camp’s most gruesome characters was Ilse Koch, wife of the camp commandant, who was infamous for her sadism. She often beat prisoners with a riding crop, and collected lampshades, book covers, and gloves made from the skin of camp victims.
When Robert Schwartz arrived, there were still 20,000 inmates in the camp, 4,000 of them Jews. Before then 56,000 people had been murdered in the Buchenwald camp system.
Next Monday night, we will spill a few drops of wine as we recite the names of each camp:
AUSCHWITZ — BABI YAR — MAIDANEK — TREBLINKA — BUCHENWALD — TEREZIN — WARSAW — VILNA — BERGEN-BELSEN — DACHAU — LVOV
Cursed is he who says “Revenge. Vengeance for the blood of a small child, Satan has not yet created.”
Chaim Nachman Bialik, 1873-1934
י״ב בְּנִיסָן תשע״ד
Dear Mr Schwartz:
I am planning to write the definative story of Buchenwald’s liberation, as my grandfather, Paul Bodot, was one of the first to enter the camp when it was liberated on the evening of 11 April 1945.
As such, I have a great interest in assuring the historical record is accurete, and I have some comments on your essay “BUCHENWALD 34: Anniversary of the liberation”.
I suspect the date you mention (9 April) about your father’s arrival at Buchenwald must be an error. No US troops were even aware of the camp’s existence on 9April.
Also, the story about the prisoner answering the phone is commonly found on the internet, and usually contains (as does your commentary) the phrase “which, of course, was not true.” Do you have any source for this story other than reading it on the Internet?
Your comment that troops “were later ordered to leave so General Patton could lead the official liberation” does not match any other version of Patton’s visit that can be found. Indeed, several sources indicate that the Americn troops were surprized at the general’s unannounced visit.
By the way, isn’t 2014 the 69th (not the 70th) anniversary of the liberation?
Please help to keep the record accurate. There is enough misinformation and indeed deliberate deceit about the Buchenwald camp that all honest writers should keep to the facts that they know to be true, and provide sources when providing titbits that may be new to the general public.
Thanking you for sharing your remembrances of this sad event from our families’ past.
Paul,
It is wonderful to hear from you.
The dates I refer to come from two sources, the date inscribed on the back of my father’s pictures and a conversation I have had with another US soldier who discovered the camp. I think it is clear that Americans were in the camp several days before Patton’s official entry.
I do not now if the anecdote about the phone call is apocryphal. However, I am certain ab9ut the self liberation as well as ab9ut stories of the “kibbutz” later created by some of the inmates.
I wold love to talk and will sens you an email immediately.
Paul Bodot now appears to be some sort of troll. I tried corresponding with him but instead he became defamatory, even accusing me of being a holocaust denier. I also suggest we talk, but he said he could not do that because he is in France and “intercontinental” calls are expensive. I offered to call him or use Skype but again got called a holocaust denier.
This was very offensive to me and I now assume “Paul Bodot” is a malicious imposter, using the name of one of the people who did enter the n camps on 11 April. Sadly, this is all too like some of the other behavior from my brother in law, William Quick, who I believe has used psuedonyms in the past to hack into our comments system.
I am doubly sad because of the cruelty of this hoax. There is nothing I want more than to see my Dad’s Buchenwald materials places in the public domain where people who really care about his story can use it to add to the small good side of Buchenwald.
If my guess is wrong I apologize and again invite “Paul” to speak with me via phone or Skype.
Mr Schwartz has impugned me. What I actually said was ‘you imply you are unwilling to change the inaccuracies you have posted, so you are a writer indeed of Holocaust fiction Weather of not I am real or not (and I assure you I am very much my grandfather’s grandson) you must clarify that this is 69 anniversary, not 70, and that no United States military troops were at Buchenwald before 9April 1945 and General Patton did not order to leave the military troops so he could lead the liberation.
I will not deal with another angry writer of Holocaust fiction whos only goal is to fight with his family over the family treasures. I have talked with to many like you already.’
Again, whoever this person is, he is a troll.
I offered to talk with him, instead he maintains he is “his grandfather’s grandson.” I assume he does not mean that to be a pun. As for the issue with William Quick, who I assume is actually his grandfather’s grandson, or Hugh Schwartz, who I assume is actually his grandfather’s grandson, the issue with these people is simple … they are refusing to allow my father’s materials to be professionally preserved, digitized, and made available to real academics.
As for whether there were Americans in the camp before Patton’s invasion and as ot whether my father lied to me about his experiences or Patton’s orders, I do not know. If Mr Bodot were not just a troll, he would join me in the effort to get the materials to the survivors so they can tell us.
As for whether an event in 1945 is or is not a 70 the anniversary, I can understand the confusion. I count the year of an event as we do in the Gregorian Calendar. This year is claimed as the 2015’th anniversary of the birth of the Christian deity, Jesus. My counting goes back to my education ion a Latin School where that sort of numbering (e.g. in the fifth year of the reign of Hadrian) was normal. Of course that is a poor excuse so, when I have time I will go back and change the text to meet with more conventi9nal numbering.
In the meantime, the offer remains open to Mr. Bodot. He has my cell number and can call anytime he wants.
Over a week ago, Mr. Schwartz promised to correct one of the several errors in this essay, but he has failed to do so.
If he has any documentation of the outlandish claim that “my father, Robert Schwartz, led the first US Army medics to enter the camp and give care on April 9, 1945” he ought to share it with the world. Otherwise it is just more Holocaust fiction, as is the repetition by him of the story of the prisoner taking a telefone call from the Gestapo.
Mr. Bodot appears to be an imposter. I have asked him several times to contact me so I can verify his identity. He has said he can not do this because he lives in France and the phone call would be too expensive. I offered to place the call or use Skype but he then said he wqould not talk with me as he considers me a holocaust denier.
I looked up the IP used by Mr. Bodot and found that his email originates with an American ISP on the East Coast. I also searched for Paul Bodot using a service that searched all American states but could not find anyone by that name.
The name Paul Bodot does exist. He was a Frenchman who entered the camp with General Patton. It appears that Paul Bodot is the some person, presumably the same troll who has previously appeared here as Paul Raymond and other pseudonyms, and has broken federal law by hacking THE-Ave.US.
Mr. Bodot is now dishonoring not only the memory of my father but the memory of monsieur Bodot.