| An aerial view of the former German Nazi Theresienstadt (Terezin) fortress ghetto and concentration camp at Terezin, Czechoslovakia. 33,521 people died at Theresienstadt and approximately 90,000 people were deported from Theresienstadt to other Nazi concentration and extermination camps. Gestapo Prison: Aerial view of the so-called “Little Fortress” of Terezín, located directly next to the “Great Fortress,” the actual city converted into a ghetto. On this site, which had already served as a detention center since the 19th century, the Nazis built a Gestapo prison in June 1940. It was a branch of the notorious Pancrac Prison in Prague. The Theresienstadt ghetto was established in the occupied part of Czechoslovakia by the German occupiers in November 1941. It was a collection and transit camp. The term “ghetto” or “Jewish residential district” concealed the purpose of the camp, because it should suggest a longer stay for prisoners. As early as 1955, H. G. Adler (July 2, 1910 – August 21, 1988), suggested that the term “ghetto” was exclusively a camouflage of the National Socialists for this special form of a concentration camp. The camp was part of the Nazi system for the planned extermination of the Jews; the “final solution to the Jewish question.” At 1st, the camp accepted just prisoners from Czechoslovakia, but soon people from almost all of Europe were deported there. In 1940, the Gestapo Theresienstadt Prison was established in the Small Fortress; in November 1941, a ghetto was established in the garrison town, initially for the Jewish population of the occupied country. After the Wannsee Conference, old or prominent Jews from Germany and other occupied European countries were deported to the Theresienstadtcamp from 1942. In Nazi propaganda in the German Reich, Theresienstadt was glorified as the “Altersghetto” and presented to various foreign visitors during a short period as an alleged “model Jewish settlement.” The evidence of the “old ghetto” fluctuated strongly: between the autumn of 1942 and the end of 1943, there were often more than 40,000 people housed there. Many inmates were murdered at Theresienstadt and deported to the large extermination camps like Auschwitz. In 1947, it was decided to convert the Small Fortress into a memorial to the victims of Nazi persecution. | |
| Image Filename | wwii0619.jpg |
| Image Size | 1.58 MB |
| Image Dimensions | 4783 x 3696 |
| Photographer | |
| Photographer Title | |
| Caption Author | Written or Adapted by Jason McDonald |
| Date Photographed | January 1, 1955 |
| Location | |
| City | Terezín |
| State or Province | Litoměřice |
| Country | Czechoslovakia |
| Archive | BPK-Fotoarchiv |
| Record Number | 30023111 |
| Status | Caption ©2026 MFA Productions LLC Please Do Not Duplicate or Distribute Without Permission; Image in the Public Domain |
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