A Nazi concentration camp on the island of Alderney has been studied for the first time since its destruction at the end of World War Two to reveal details of the site where Hitler's soldiers conducted heinous acts against prisoners.
Alderney was home to the only concentration camps in Britain during the war and the remains of more than 30 structures have now been revealed by archaeologists using ground-penetrating radar at the most sinister — Sylt.
One of the new finds at the site of the death camp, which was run by the Schutzstaffel (SS) from 1943, was a tunnel from the soldiers' bathhouse, below the barbed wire fence and into a villa outside of the camp.
It connected to the villa of the camp's Commandant and this well-lit passage is thought to have been regularly used by the German occupiers.
Archaeologists are unsure of its exact purpose but say it may have been used to sneak in women for a brothel.
Other findings include both prisoner and SS buildings — barracks, kitchens, toilets and bathhouses — as well as gateposts and perimeter fence remnants.
A handful of physical structures remain visible today, including a trough for horses and an SS orderly built by slave labour, but the researchers sought to uncover hidden signs of the Nazi era.
The German occupiers destroyed as much evidence of the camp and its monstrosities as they could in 1944 when it was clear the Allied forces would win the war.
The researchers used non-invasive methods and were able to identify and map key features of the camp and show how it expanded from a small forced labour camp of 100 to a fully-fledged Nazi death camp run by SS tyrants. (more...)
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