Monday, December 10, 2012

A Charge of Forgery Supported by Forgery: The Smearing of a Genuine Auschwitz Photo

Unsurprisingly, the process of industrial-scale genocide perpetrated in the Auschwitz death camp has been documented only by a few photographs taken on the spot. The exceptions include four photographs clandestinely taken by a few members of the Sonderkommando, the prisoners forced to dispose of the huge amount of corpses coming from the gas chambers. The photos were smuggled out of the camp in a tube of toothpaste, along with an accompanying letter. Out of the four photos, the best known is this one, showing the area of an open-air burning pit behind Crematorium V:

auschwitz_burningpit.jpg

The photo shows the members of the Sonderkommando doing their job around the cremation pit. Smoke rises from the pit, and plenty of corpses to be cremated lie all around.