| Original caption: “Russian slave laborer liberated by Third Armored Division points out former Nazi guard who brutally beat prisoners.” Zdének Syrovátka (May 29, 1907 – 1974), a recently liberated Czech political prisoner, identifies a member of the Schutzstaffel (SS) from Konzentrationslager Außenlager-Wansleben (“External Concentration Camp Wanslebeb”), a Buchenwald subcamp. Born in Großhammer, forcibly incorporated into Germany under the Munich agreement on November 24, 1938, (today Velké Hamry, Czech Republic), Syrovátka was a civil servant arrested by the Gestapo. Camp records listed him suffering from nervousness, memory loss, and gapped teeth. He survived an examination by SS-Oberführer Doctor Hans Holfelder (April 22, 1891 – December 15, 1944) whose staff vaccinated him for tuberculosis, just before he arrived at Buchenwald on May 12, 1944. he worked in the Buchenwald wood yard and was sent to the Wansleben subcamp in June 1944. From mid-1944, the SS set up a production facility for war materials near Wansleben am See. The site consisted of 2 disused shafts of the Vereinigte Ernsthall potash mine. Since the underground mines were bomb-proof, production facilities for the armaments industry were built here. Prisoners of war were used as forced laborers here under inhumane conditions. The exact number of forced laborers is not known, but it is probably in the thousands. Many of them died as a result of the treatment in the camp or were murdered. The dead – around 200 a month – were burned in the camp’s own crematorium. On April 11-12, 1945, shortly before the arrival of the Allies, the remaining 2,000 forced laborers were sent on a death march back to Buchenwald; exhausted prisoners were shot as they dropped out. When the 1st United States Army photographers arrived at the camp on April 14, they directed their attention towards the former inmates – the survivors as well as the dead. Hardly any notice was taken of the imprisoned SS men. Technician 4th Grade Harold M. Roberts (June 13, 1918 – November 19, 2001) of the 165th Signal Photographic Company arrived with the 1st American soldiers of the Unites States Army 3rd Armored Division, and photographed the arrests of the SS. The fate of the SS guard is unknown. On April 11, 1947, 2 years after the liberation of the camp, the Buchenwald Trial began in Dachau, primarily against members of the former command staff. Military photographers of the Signal Corps documented the proceedings. Officers of the United States Army investigation authority had already begun showing photographs to former inmates shortly after the camp’s liberation. The latter were to identify their tormentors in pictures found in the SS garrison. By early 1947, altogether 793 persons bearing a connection to the crimes committed at the Buchenwald concentration camp and its subcamps were being held by the Allies, primarily members of the SS but also civilians and inmate Kapos. Of these persons, ultimately 31 of the most heavily incriminated perpetrators were selected for trial. Their indictments were drawn up and their photos taken: 1 frontal and 1 profile view in each case. The trial was held before a military tribunal on the grounds of the former Dachau concentration camp. In a pictorial documentation comprising 120 photographs, the Signal Corps recorded the hearings of both the witnesses and the defendants. As is clearly reflected in the photographs, there was a great amount of tension among all involved, an indication of the explosiveness of the crimes being tried. The trial ended on August 14, 1947, with a pronouncement of judgement: 22 defendants were sentenced to death, 5 to life imprisonment, 4 received prison terms of between 30 years. Petitions for clemency were submitted from all sectors of the German population. The SS perpetrator 1 had known as a neighbor or father appeared much more credible than the testimony of survivors. By 1951, 9 of the death sentences had been executed. All other convicted persons were granted amnesty by the mid-1950s. Syrovátka’s Buchenwald prisoner uniform was part of an art installation by Ohannes Tapyuli (born March 15, 1944) that combined photographs, artifacts, and artwork in a collage exhibited at Buchenwald in 1995. | |
| Image Filename | wwii0549.jpg |
| Image Size | 768.28 KB |
| Image Dimensions | 2928 x 2255 |
| Photographer | Harold M. Roberts |
| Photographer Title | United States Army Signal Corps |
| Caption Author | Written or Adapted by Jason McDonald |
| Date Photographed | April 14, 1945 |
| Location | Konzentrationslager Buchenwald |
| City | Weimar |
| State or Province | Thuringia |
| Country | Germany |
| Archive | National Archives and Records Administration |
| Record Number | NWDNS-111-SC-203466 |
| Status | Caption ©2026 MFA Productions LLC Please Do Not Duplicate or Distribute Without Permission; Image in the Public Domain |
Author of the World War II Multimedia Database