The Pathology Building & Mortuary

Location of the Pathology Building and Cellar Mortuary

 

The corpse slide into the cellar mortuary

 From the other end

 

 The cellar mortuary, main room

 The smaller room in the cellar

One of the museum boards in the pathology building. Some of the text reads:

The Pathologie: Administration of Death

Storage, examination, abuse and disposal of the bodies of deceased prisoners

The brick pathology building with a large basement mortuary, was constructed in spring 1941. Previously, the bodies of deceased prisoners were stored in a wooden shed and in the cellars underneath barracks R I and R II of the sickbay. The growing number of inmates exposed to increasingly abominable conditions led to a rapidly rising death rate, especially after the outbreak of war in September 1939. The relevant SS administration body therefore approved construction of a mortuary and pathology department on 12 November 1940. On this day alone, eight prisoners died in Sachsenhausen concentration camp.

"The SS men never went down on their own to the cellar with the corpses, probably because they were scared. One of us always had to come along."

- Anonymous prisoner of Sachsenhausen recalls his work in the pathology department

(the tattoo skin nonsense happened at Sachsenhausen too:) 

Statement by Harry Naujoks (a German communist), former camp senior:

"In 1941 Dr. Lewe came to Sachsenhausen from the Buchenwald camp to take charge of the pathology department. Being camp senior, I was told that blocke seniors had to report inmates with unusual tattoos. This report was passed onto the roll call leader. Eventually, each of the tattooed inmates was ordered to come to the sickbay. Soon after we'd receive a death notice. Several times I went to the pathology department while Dr. Lewe wasn't there and in his room saw pieces of skin and body parts with these tattoos, which were kept in jars of alchol lining the walls. In the drawers too, prepared sections of skin were kept. I have held such sections of skin with my own hand."

Autopsy tables