Killing center personnel entertain an official visitor (far right) on the terrace in front of the mess hall inside Sobibor, summer 1943. Niemann (third from left) can be seen laughing. Three of the men, including the visitor, are looking at photographs. —United States Holocaust Memorial Museum collection, gift of Bildungswerk Stanislaw-Hantz
These photographs show that the Sobibor killing center was not entirely shrouded in secrecy. Guests were welcomed there, and local people came in to work and even socialize with the SS staff.
In their postwar testimonies, survivors of Sobibor often recount the social gatherings that occurred among the SS staff. Drunken parties were bonding rituals for the perpetrators. Stanislaw Szmajzner, one of the organizers and leaders of the 1943 Sobibor prisoner revolt/uprising, later wrote that “a [mess hall] was built for the officers. From now on they would eat and drink there, as well as entertain themselves . . . On these occasions they sang and drank until the early hours of the morning, and made terrible noise.”
Sobibor commandant Franz Reichleitner (looking at the camera), SS man Erich Bauer (with his arm around one of the female domestic workers), SS man Erich Schulze, and Johann Niemann. Bauer, who referred to himself as the “gas master” of Sobibor, was in charge of running the diesel engine that pumped carbon monoxide exhaust into the gas chambers. He was later tried and convicted in a German court after a chance encounter with two Sobibor survivors at a fairground in Berlin in 1949. Bauer died in Tegel prison in Germany in 1980. —United States Holocaust Memorial Museum collection, gift of Bildungswerk Stanislaw-Hantz
The newly constructed mess hall, nicknamed “The Merry Flea,” summer 1943. The terrace was a popular SS gathering spot during leisure hours. This location appears frequently in Niemann’s photographs. —United States Holocaust Memorial Museum collection, gift of Bildungswerk Stanislaw-Hantz
Survivor Selma Engel recounted how the SS men forced her and other new arrivals to dance to music played by fellow prisoners, lit by the distant glow of the fire from burning bodies: “They had to play the music and we had to dance . . . we had to dance when the fire was already burning, and you could smell them here . . . it really lit up the whole sky from that they were burning the bodies from the transport.”
Many of the photographs taken inside Sobibor depict the SS personnel drinking, making music, playing chess, and posing for the camera. They offer a glimpse into the compartmentalized mindset of many Nazi perpetrators. One series of candid snapshots depicts a daytime visit by a German border guard official. The SS men gather around a table on the terrace in front of the mess hall. They are relaxed and unarmed, striking poses and laughing. Some are looking at photos. We can also see women, from nearby villages, who cooked and cleaned for the Germans. It is summer and visibly hot. Half-empty beer mugs and crystal wine glasses are on the table. One of the SS men, his back turned to the camera, is raising an empty beer mug.
Nearly everything in these photos was built by the killing center inmates or stolen outright from the victims. The mess hall building in the background, nicknamed “The Merry Flea” by the SS, was constructed by Jewish slave laborers. The table and chairs were crafted by Jewish men inside one of the workshops of Camp I. The crystal glassware sitting on the table almost certainly was stolen from arriving victims.
The gathering is taking place only 300 yards from the killing area.