Administration as a Crime – The SS Office “Inspektion der Konzentrationslager”
The exhibition about the SS office “Inspection of the Concentration Camps” provides information about one of the most important places of perpetrators of National Socialism, which is still largely unknown today. The focus is the shockingly efficient bureaucratic apparatus of the concentration camp inspection, which is based on extensive forms.
From 1938 to 1945, the so-called T-building on what is now Heinrich-Grüber-Platz in Oranienburg, in the immediate vicinity of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, was the headquarters of the “Inspection of Concentration Camps”, which managed and controlled the concentration camp system from here. Ultimately, around 100 SS members determined the living conditions in the camps, organized labor exploitation, ordered punitive measures and mistreatment of prisoners and coordinated murder campaigns. At the same time, they provided training, pay and equipment for the camp staff. For this purpose, the concentration camp inspection developed a bureaucratic apparatus with responsibilities, processes and a specially created form system. This device and the men who operated it are the focus of the new permanent exhibition.
The centerpiece of the exhibition is a multi-touch table where visitors can view and decipher different documents. These are cover letters that were written in this building or forms that were designed here for use in the concentration camps. The characteristics, from file numbers to stamps to notes and signatures, are made recognizable, explained and contextualized.
Location: Office of the Brandenburg Memorials Foundation, T-building (tax office), Heinrich-Grüber-Platz 3, 16515 Oranienburg
Opening hours: Mon, Thu, Fri 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., Tue 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 a.m., 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. and on request
