Sonderkommando Uprising at Auschwitz

Prisoners of the Sonderkommando stage an uprising at Auschwitz-Birkenau.

The Nazi system of mass murder forced Sonderkommando prisoners to work near the gas chambers and crematoria. Members of these units lived under constant threat of being killed themselves.

On 7 October 1944, some prisoners revolted and damaged one of the crematoria. Participants attempted to resist the guards and escape from the camp.

The uprising was suppressed and many of its participants were killed. The episode demonstrates that organised resistance existed even under extraordinarily brutal conditions.

The event has particular importance in Holocaust history and should be understood through survivor testimony, camp archives and historical research.

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