Genealogy /
Displaced Persons Camp / Work camp and concentration camp difference [86]
I find this chapter of history fascinating.
My mother spent over ten years in DP camps around Germany.
Many of the place names that people mention on this thread I recognise from my conversations with her.
She said the conditions were not always that comfortable i.e. having to share a barracks with dozens of other strangers. To create an air of privacy some families would drape blankets on a string across their area.
Food was strictly rationed and some people felt they were given less food then during the wartime.
But she also said the social aspect was great. People from all walks of life living in the same camp many people with fascinating stories to tell.
She told me that the Poles were one of the last nationalities to be offered the chance to return back to their homeland-Russians were one of the first.
Due to this delay, a lot of Poles in DP camps started to receive letters from relatives back home in Poland telling them that life under the Communists was no better than Nazi rule and as a result many Poles (my family included) decided not to go back to Poland.
Related:
Difference in work camp and concentration camp.My mother told my daughter that when was taken to a work camp to sew. She survived the war, but she also said she was operated on to remove a burst apendex. I am trying to locate a camp that was near Nurnberg. And also a listing of names of folks at such a camp and leads.
I imputed in a search on the net and am having problems finding what I am looking for.
The Red Cross maintained files of DPs (displaced persons of all nationalities) from the war years.
Start here to see if they can help you: redcross.org/services/intl/holotrace/index.html
