Fort Breendonk

Fort Breendonk is a fortification built in 1906 as part of the second ring of defenses (the Réduit national) around the city of  Antwerp (Belgium). Originally one in a chain of fortresses constructed to defend Belgium against a German attack, Breendonk was near the town of the same name, about 12 miles southwest of Antwerp. It was covered by a five meter thick layer of soil (for defense against bombings) and a water-filled moat, and measured 656 by 984 feet. The fort was used as a prison camp by the German occupiers during World War II. Nowadays, the site is a national memorial (Nationaal Gedenkteken Fort van Breendonk in Dutch), and can be visited.

World War I
Belgium was invaded in August 1914 by the German army after refusing its request of unhindered passage to northern France.

The invasion began on August 4, 1914. Eager to reach Paris as soon as possible, the German army concentrated all its efforts towards the south, ignoring Antwerp.

Continued Belgian resistance from the north forced German command to attack Antwerp. On September 9, General Beseler was ordered to attack Antwerp. Siege artillery was sent north, having precipitated the fall of Namur and Maubeuge.

Fort Breendonk was first attacked on October 1, 1914 by howitzers located 5 to 6 kilometers out of range of the fort's own guns. The Germans breached Belgian lines in Lier. The German army could attack Antwerp avoiding Fort Breendonk. On October 9 Fort Breendonk surrendered, after the fall of Antwerp.

World War II
The German army invaded and occupied Belgium in 1940. Fort Breendonk was obsolete and was no answer to mechanized warfare. The fort was briefly the headquarters of the Belgian command during the first weeks following the invasion, but was abandoned in the face of German advances.

The Nazis transformed Fort Breendonk into a prison camp. On September 20, 1940, the first prisoners arrived. Initially prisoners were petty criminals, people deemed anti-social, or trespassers of the new race laws. Later on, resistance fighters, political prisoners and innocent hostages were detained as well. Another section was used as a transit camp for Jews being sent to death camps such as Auschwitz.

German as well as Flemish SS units guarded this camp. 185 prisoners were executed, and many others were transported to concentration camps. The execution poles and gallows are still there, as is a gruesome SS torture chamber. Contrary to popular belief there were never any gas chambers at Fort Breendonk.

Fewer than 4,000 prisoners in total were confined in Breendonk during its existence. Most of the non-Jewish prisoners were leftist members of the Belgian resistance or were held as hostages by the Germans. Several hundred people were murdered in the camp through torture, executions, and harsh conditions. In September 1941, the Belgian Communist prisoners were sent to the Neuengamme concentration camp.

Jewish prisoners in Breendonk were segregated from other prisoners until 1942. Thereafter, they were transferred to the Mechelen (Malines) transit camp in Belgium, or deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. In total over 15 transports (mostly jews) left the camp, almost no one survived.

Upon arrival at the camp new inmates were brought to courtyard were they would have to stand facing to wall until they were processed into the camp. The were forbidden to move and any motion was severely punished. In the camp punishment consisted of beatings, torture in a specially designed chamber, hanging or execution by firing squad, either in the camp or nearby. The camp commander Lagerkommandant Phillip Schmitt was known to set his German Sheppard dog loose on the inmates. His wife was also known to wander the camp, ridiculing the inmates and ordering punishments at whim. Severe and arbitrary beating occurred daily. Once an inmate, a jewish boy of less than 20years old, was unable to continue working. The Flemish SS guards threw him into the moat, he could not swim and they refused to let him out. He struggled for over over 15minutes before finally drowning.

The other inmates were forced to watch any executions that took place. The inmates were only allowed to use the toilet (a large circular vat in the middle of one of the courtyards) twice a day. They had to use it all together at once. They were only given five minutes to do their business. Any longer would mean punishment. But none of the inmates possessed a watch so most left after only a minute in fear of surpassing their alloted time. This causes bowel problems, cramps and diarrhea.

The prisoners were subjected to forced labor, which meant that they were forced to remove the layer of soil that covered the fort. In the few years it was used by the Nazis the millions of cubic meters of soil covering the fort were removed by the prisoners by hand at a grueling pace. They then had to move the soil to create a high circular earth wall around the fort that would hide the camp from view. They only had shovels and carts to complete this enormous task. They had to transport the dirt to the outer wall they were building via carts on rails. The ground in the camp was often very soggy causing the rails to sink away in the mud. They would then have to move the carts (filled with dirt they weighed over 1 ton) by hand, pushing and dragging them over 300 meters back and forth. This was kept up for over 12 hours a day, seven days a week, in even the worst weather conditions. Orders were given only in German, so once in the camp an inmate would be forced to learn it rather quickly, otherwise they would be punished for 'failure to obey orders'. Prisoners were also forced to salute, march and stand at attention every time a guard passed.

Housing in the fort consisted of the old barracks. Built from thick stone the rooms were extremely cold and damp because there were no windows and only minimal venting. They only had a small coal burning stove to heat the entire room in the winters, which was nearly impossible. Each room housed over 48 inmates, originally designed for no more than 38. They slept in three layer bunk beds on a straw mattress. The top bunks were like high priced real estate. Since they only had a small bucket for a toilet during the night. This filled up fairly quickly with over 48 men using it. So many of the sick and weakened inmates simply allowed their waste to drop down to the lower levels. This caused much fighting in between inmates, which was probably what the guards wanted.

Jewish prisoners were segregated from other inmates. For this reason they were housed in specially constructed wooden barracks. Poor insulation and over-crowding in these barracks was common.

Other prisoners were housed in cells, originally to serve punishments but later to isolate certain prisoners for later interrogation and torture.

Food was severely rationed for the prisoners and distributed in certain set amounts to the various types of inmates. Yews received the lowest amount of food and water. Food in the camp consisted three meals. In the morning they received on average: 2 cups of a coffee substitute made of roasted acorns and 125grams of bread. At noon they received 1 bowl of soup (mostly just hot water)In the evening they received: 2 cups of a coffee substitute made of roasted acorns and 1oograms of bread (sometimes with a spoon of marmalade or sugar. This is far from enough to sustain a human being, especially since they were subjected to intense cold or heat, harsh heavy labor and physical punishments.

For this reason Fort Breendonk has been described as one of the worst camps in all of Europe. It wasn't a concentration or extermination camp, merely a gathering place for later deportation. But the whole of the camp was so cruel and harsh that those that left alive were so weak that survival at the next camp was nearly impossible, often they were so sick and weak that they were lead straight to the gas chamber or died within weeks of their arrival. The regime in the camp was similar if not ever harsher than in an actual concentration camp. Fewer than 10% of the nearly 4000 inmates survived the war.

Breendonk II
Following liberation in September 1944 Fort Breendonk was briefly used as an internment camp for Belgian collaborators with the Nazi occupiers. This period of the Fort's existence is known as "Breendonk II". The internees were moved to Dossin Barracks, Mechelen, on 10th October 1944.

Trials of the Flemish SS guards, considered Nazi collaborators, were held during 1946 in Mechelen - including some of guards and officials at Fort Breendonk. Of those who were convicted, 14 were sentenced to be executed by firing squad in 1947. 2 appealed their case and had their sentences revised into life imprisonment. 4 more people were sentenced to life in prison. 1 person to 20 years of prison. 1 to 15 years of prison. 1 person was acquitted. 2 more death sentences were given in absence of the defendant but the perpetrators were never captured. They remain at large, though are by now most likely dead of old age. The Nazi camp commandant, Philipp Schmitt, was tried in Antwerp in 1949 and sentenced to death. He was shot on the 9th of august 1950. He never showed any remorse and denied all of the atrocities that occurred at Breendonk, claiming he was merely reeducating the inmates as ordered.

Present memorial
In 1947 Fort Breendonk was declared to be a national memorial, recognising the suffering and cruelty that had been inflicted on the prisoners during World War II. The fort is now a well-preserved example of the prison camps operated by Nazi Germany during WW II.

Fort Breendonk is open to visitors all year round. It is located close to the A12 Brussels-Antwerp road.

Pictures of working Nazi interment camps during the war are rare in itself but for the longest time it was believed that absolutely no pictures of Breendonk during the war existed. But in the early 1970's a batch of photo's of the camp was discovered in the possessions of Dutch photographer Otto Spronk. He had collected thousands of pictures and films of the Third Reich as part of his work for the SOMA, a dutch organization that focused on preserving any material of wars. The collection consisted of 37 pictures depicting the daily order of events in the camp. Role call, eating, forced labor, and even the SS officers going about their business, relaxed and cheerful as the inmates toiled on. There's even a picture of the Nazi camp commandant, Philipp Schmitt playing with his infamous dog 'Lump'. They were taken by German Nazi photographer Otto Kropf. they were taken for propaganda purposes but never used. All pictures are essentially clichés stills, none of the daily atrocities or horrors of the camp are shown, of course. But they are the only reference material available. Several of the inmates on the pictures managed to survive the war and were able to identify the others on the pictures and the circumstances in which they were taken. The pictures are considered to valuable Belgium wartime heritage and books containing them and further info about the camp can be purchased at the memorial.