Remscheid
03/03/1943
The picture shows the back of the departing deportation train. In the foreground, the municipal police officers and probably the criminal police officers who carried out the deportation in Remscheid can be seen. It is unclear whether there are bystanders on the platform in the background.
Image: Historisches Zentrum – Stadtarchiv Remscheid
Annotations
Historical context
Deportation von Remscheid nach Auschwitz am 03.03.1943
On March 3, 1942, more than 200 people from Remscheid, Solingen, and Wuppertal persecuted as Sinti and Roma were deported to the Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp. According to research done by the memorial & educational center Pferdestall in Remscheid, 87 people from the town were deported on that day. Arrests had already been made the day before. Some people were arrested at their workplaces or residences in Klausener Straße, Am Blaffertsberg and Gründerhammer. The people to be deported probably had to spend the night in the police prison at Uhlandstraße (in the building now used as the police station at Quimperplatz). The photos show them on their way to the station on March 3, 1943. After a six-day journey, the transport arrived at Auschwitz on March 9, 1942. Almost all the Sinti and Roma deported from Remscheid were murdered in the following two years.
About the image series
The original glass negatives of the four photographs that make up the series have been preserved in Stadtarchiv Remscheid. The pictures show a group of about 30-40 people being forced to walk through the town, including many children and infants. They have relatively little luggage with them as they walk along Freiheitsstraße heading for the train station. When they got there, they had to board converted general cargo cars. The pictures show at least five uniformed municipal police officers, two criminal police officers in civilian clothes and one municipal police officer in field uniform. One photo was taken as people were being forced to march along Freiheitsstraße, another one was taken in front of the train station, and two further photos were taken on the railway platform.
Photographer
Unknown, Police man
The inscription on the envelopes in which the negatives and prints of the photographs have been preserved in Stadtarchiv Remscheid, lists “police” as the entry under “aufg. von" (=aufgenommen von / taken by). The photographs have survived in a collection that covers typical administrative police duties, such as documenting accidents.
The choice of motifs also suggests that the photographer was directly involved in the deportation or maintained a relationship of trust with the police officers depicted. Picture 2 is a good example in this regard as it shows five municipal police officers and two criminal police officers in civilian clothes posing for the photo so as to document their "work". The organization and execution of the deportation lay in the hands of the Wuppertal criminal police and the local municipal police.
Provenance
The photographs were probably taken by a police photographer and have been preserved in Stadtarchiv Remscheid in the form of glass negatives, negatives and prints. These are kept in envelopes labeled “Handed over to the police” with an indication of the subject of each picture. The captions are worded euphemistically and in a racist language. It is most probable that the police gave the pictures these titles at the time.
Call number at source archive
52B/9
Title at source archive
„Abfahrt d. Zigeuner“ (Anm.: Der Titel wird an dieser Stelle wiedergegeben, um auf die Original-Beschriftung hinzuweisen. Der Begriff Z. ist eine Fremdbezeichnung, die von vielen Angehörigen der Minderheit der Sinti:zze und Rom:nja als diskriminierend abg
Acknowledgements
Thanks are due to Viola Meike, town archivist at Historisches Zentrum Remscheid, whose article provided the basis for describing the photographs.
We would also like to thank Andrea Blesius, Klaus Blumberg and Hans Heinz Schumacher (Gedenk- & Bildungsstätte Pferdestall Remscheid e.V.), who provided us with the results of their research.
Text and research by Katharina Menschick und Malte Grünkorn.
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