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DECISION OF CONSTRUCTION
The SS decides to construct a concentration camp near Oswiecim (Auschwitz). -
FIRST PRISONERS
The first prisoners arrive at Auschwitz. On May 20, 1940, a transport arrives of about 30 German inmates, categorized as "professional criminals." The SS had selected them from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp outside of Berlin. Less than a month later, on June 14, German authorities in occupied Poland deport 728 Polish prisoners from a prison in Tarnow to Auschwitz. This is the first of many transports of Poles to the Auschwitz camp. -
VISITORS
Reichsfuehrer SS and Chief of German Police Heinrich Himmler inspects Oswiecim (Auschwitz). Because nearby factories use prisoners for forced labor, Himmler is concerned about the prisoner capacity of the camp. On this visit, he orders both the expansion of Auschwitz I camp facilities to hold 30,000 prisoners and the building of a camp near Birkenau for an expected influx of 100,000 Soviet prisoners of war. -
1st GASSINGS
The first gassings of prisoners occur in Auschwitz I. Testing takes place in a makeshift gas chamber in the cellar of Block 11 in Auschwitz I. Zyklon B was the commercial name for crystalline hydrogen cyanide gas, manufactured by I.G. Farben and normally used as an insecticide. The "success" of these experiments will lead to the adoption of Zyklon B as the killing agent for the yet-to-be-constructed Auschwitz-Birkenau killing center. -
DEPORTATIONS
SS chief Heinrich Himmler informs Richard Gluecks, the Inspector of Concentration Camps, that 100,000 Jewish men and 50,000 Jewish women would be deported from Germany to Auschwitz as forced laborers. -
1st TRANSPORT OF JEWS
The first transport of Jews from Bytom (Beuthen) in German-annexed Upper Silesia arrives in Auschwitz I. The SS camp authorities kill all those on the transport immediately upon arrival with Zyklon B gas. -
MORE DEPORTATIONS
German SS and police authorities deported approximately 175,000 Jews to Auschwitz in 1942.