On January 27, 1945, Soviet troops liberated Auschwitz and the 7,000 starving victims trapped inside — then uncovered macabre warehouses filled with the personal belongings of countless dead prisoners.
Warning: This article contains graphic descriptions and/or images of violent, disturbing, or otherwise potentially distressing events.
The infamous gate at Auschwitz, taken shortly after Soviet troops liberated the camp in January 1945.AFP via Getty Images Survivors at Auschwitz watch as Soviet troops approach. Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images Concentration camp detainees stand behind barbed wire during the liberation of Auschwitz. API/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images "We saw emaciated, tortured, impoverished people,” Soviet soldier Ivan Martynushkin remembered. Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images Martynushkin added: "It was hard to watch them. I remember their faces, especially their eyes which betrayed their ordeal." Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images Because Nazi troops had hastily evacuated Auschwitz as the Soviets approached, only children, the gravely ill, and those who'd managed to hide remained at the camp. Auschwitz Memorial An estimated 200,000 children were murdered at Auschwitz during World War II.Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images Ten-year-old twins Eva and Miriam Mozes, in the front of the frame holding hands, remembered that the day Auschwitz was liberated started out strangely quiet. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Women in barracks at Auschwitz shortly after the camp was liberated.Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images In all, between 7,000 and 9,000 people remained at Auschwitz by the time the Soviets arrived.AFP via Getty Images Here, children show the tattoos they received upon arrival at Auschwitz. Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images Soviet soldiers of the First Ukrainian Front with liberated prisoners at Auschwitz."They apparently figured out who we were and began to welcome us," Martynushkin remembered, "to signal that they knew who we were and that we shouldn’t be afraid of them — that there were no guards or Germans behind the barbed wire. Only prisoners."
Sovfoto/Universal Images Group via Getty Images Prisoners leave Auschwitz after the liberation.Wojtek Laski/Getty Images Some prisoners had escaped being forced on a death march by hiding amongst the dead bodies.Auschwitz Memorial Men at Auschwitz greet their liberators.United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Prisoners beneath the infamous "Arbeit Macht Frei" ("Work Sets You Free") sign at Auschwitz. Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images Soviet troops came across horrific sights when they arrived at Auschwitz, including bodies lying out in the open. Six hundred people had been shot by the Nazis and left unburied.Auschwitz Memorial The bodies of women and children found during the liberation of Auschwitz.“My memories from there have stayed with me all my life," Aleksander Vorontsov, who was part of a film crew who captured some of the horror the troops found at Auschwitz, remembered. "All of that was the most moving and horrific thing that I filmed during the war."
Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images Troops also came across haunting reminders of the 1.1 million people who'd been murdered at Auschwitz, including 44,000 pairs of shoes.Roger Viollet via Getty Images Soviet soldiers also found 88 pounds of eyeglasses...Auschwitz Memorial ...piles of suitcases taken from victims....Auschwitz Memorial ...hundreds of thousands of men's and women's garments...Auschwitz Memorial ...and almost eight tons of human hair. Prisoners at Auschwitz had their hair shaved when they first arrived at the camp. Votava/Imagno/Getty Images An empty barrack after the liberation of Auschwitz.Hulton Archive/Getty Images A crematorium at Auschwitz. Bodies were brought from the gas chamber below and burned. Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images Many of those who had managed to survive Auschwitz were gravely ill and had been left behind by the Nazis to die. Votava/Imagno/Getty Images An emaciated Auschwitz survivor.Votava/Imagno/Getty Images A Red Army doctor examines an Auschwitz survivor after Soviet troops liberated the camp.Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images A 15-year-old Russian boy named Ivan Dudnik is rescued after the liberation of Auschwitz. He was captured and sent to the camp by the Nazis, and he went insane from the horrors he witnessed there.Sovfoto/Universal Images Group via Getty Images A survivor after the liberation of Auschwitz. Auschwitz Memorial German civilians look upon the bodies of Jewish prisoners after the liberation of Auschwitz. Allied troops brought them into cities to prove that stories about the camp were not propaganda. Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images A former Auschwitz prisoner displays their tattoo. Hulton Archive/Getty Images Auschwitz after liberation. Today, the infamous concentration camp is a museum and memorial.Auschwitz Memorial
33 Photos Of The Liberation Of Auschwitz, The Nazi Concentration Camp Where More Than A Million People Were Killed View GalleryAs World War II drew to a close in January 1945, a group of Soviet scouts stumbled upon a strange camp in the Polish city of Oświęcim, which the Germans called Auschwitz. The liberation of Auschwitz was not part of the soldiers' plan, but it would soon stand as one of the most defining events of the Second World War.
Established by the Germans in 1940, Auschwitz quickly became the deadliest Nazi concentration camp. According to HISTORY, 1.1 million of the 1.3 million people sent to Auschwitz — a full 85 percent — died there. Hundreds of thousands of people were shot, gassed, hanged, and starved to death.
Stanislaw Mucha/German Federal Archives via Wikimedia CommonsThe entrance of Auschwitz, where an estimated 1.1 million people were killed by the Nazis during World War II.
Thousands more died in the camp's final days when Nazi soldiers tried to cover up their crimes and move some 60,000 prisoners to the German-held city of Wodzislaw. An estimated 15,000 people died during the bitterly cold death march, many of them shot by German soldiers as they struggled to keep up.
Back at the camp, however, the Soviet soldiers who entered Auschwitz on Jan. 27, 1945, found those that the Nazis had left behind: the gravely ill, children, and people who had managed to hide from the guards.
"Only the highest-ranking officers of the General Staff had perhaps heard of the camp," Soviet soldier Ivan Martynushkin explained to the Times of Israel, noting that he and his fellow soldiers were surprised to find people standing behind the barbed wire. "We knew nothing."
They discovered that the camp still held as many as 9,000 people, as well as gruesome evidence of the more than one million who had died. Soldiers found 370,000 men's suits, 837,000 women's garments, and almost eight tons of human hair. According to HISTORY, they also came across 44,000 pairs of shoes and 88 pounds of eyeglasses.
But though horrifying, the liberation of Auschwitz was also joyful.
"We could tell from their eyes that they were happy to be saved from this hell," Martynushkin said. "Happy that now they weren't threatened by death in a crematorium. Happy to be freed."
Ten-year-old Eva Mozes, who had been sent to Auschwitz the year before with her twin sister, recalled that the Red Army soldiers gave out "hugs, cookies, and chocolate," according to HISTORY.
"We were not only starved for food," she said, "but we were starved for human kindness."
And Paula Lebovics, who was 11 years old during the liberation of Auschwitz, remembered being overwhelmed by the Soviets' kindness. Recalling that one soldier approached her with tears streaming down his face and an offer of food, she told the USC Shoah Foundation that she thought, "You mean somebody out there cares about me?"
Ian Gavan/Getty ImagesPaula Lebovics, second from the left, stands with other Holocaust survivors and points at photos of them as children taking during the Auschwitz liberation.
Stories from Auschwitz were initially overshadowed by the liberation of the first major Nazi concentration camp, Majdanek. But as Auschwitz survivors came forward with their stories and the full horror of the death camp dawned on the world, Auschwitz became known as World War II's most notorious Nazi concentration camp.
After the war, the site was turned into a museum and memorial. It seeks to honor and remember those who died there, but also to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive as a warning for future generations.
"People should look at this place and think about our moral responsibility," Pawel Sawicki, a guide at the Auschwitz museum, told NPR. "This is not an anthropological discovery of 'Oh, people 75 years ago were able to do something like this,' and we are surprised. They [still] are able to do it. They did it before. And people still hate each other."
After looking through these images of the liberation of Auschwitz, discover these heartbreaking photos of the Holocaust. Or, peruse these facts about World War II.
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