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All Czechia Terezín Theresienstadt (Terezín Concentration Camp)
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Theresienstadt (Terezín Concentration Camp)

Created as a "model concentration camp" to hide Nazi atrocities from the international community, this former camp-ghetto now holds a museum and memorial honoring the lives lost within.

Terezín, Czechia

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Kris Best
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‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ - the entrance to camp in the Terezin fortress   gypsyblue / Atlas Obscura User
Memorial in the Terezin/Theresienstadt camp   gypsyblue / Atlas Obscura User
Memorial site at the Terezin camp   gypsyblue / Atlas Obscura User
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Showers in the Terezin prison block   gypsyblue / Atlas Obscura User
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About

Just a few kilometers from the Elbe river, Terezín (Theresienstadt) was originally established by the Habsburgs as an Austro-Hungarian military encampment. In the late 1930s, the Nazis set up the city of Terezín as a "model concentration camp" to show off to the outside world, attempting to prove that the Jewish people imprisoned there enjoyed humane conditions. The reality, of course, was much different.

The Theresienstadt "camp-ghetto" existed for a little over three years, from November 1941 to May 1945. It primarily served as a transit camp for Czech Jews whom the Germans eventually deported to other camps in eastern Europe, as well as a ghetto-labor camp. 

Germany's publicly stated purpose for deporting Jews was to resettle them in the east, where they would be compelled into forced labor. Many who were too old or otherwise incapable of physical labor were sent to Theresienstadt, which was sometimes described as a "spa town" in Nazi propaganda, where elderly German Jews could "retire" in safety.

Approximately 140,000 Jewish people were brought to Theresienstadt. Nearly 90,000 of them were deported to points further east. An estimated 33,000 died in Terezín, mostly from disease or starvation.

Located in the center of Terezín, the Terezín Ghetto Museum provides an overview of the role that Theresienstadt played in Nazi propaganda, and how the real residents suffered. Across the Ohre River in the original Austro-Hungarian fortress, the Terezín historical site continues with a tour of the prison facilities and a moving memorial to all those who died on its grounds.

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Nazis World War Ii Memorials Propaganda Holocaust Military

Know Before You Go

Accessible by bus from Prague (to Terezin), or by train from Prague to Bohušovice nad Ohří or to Litoměřice (about 45min walk from each train station). It's also possible to arrive by bike as a short detour from the Elbe-Prague bike route.

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gypsyblue

Published

May 19, 2021

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  • https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/theresienstadt
  • https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/theresienstadt
  • http://www.terezin.org/the-history-of-terezin
Theresienstadt (Terezín Concentration Camp)
304 Principova alej
Terezín, 411 55
Czechia
50.513799, 14.164886
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