Bored kapos in the concentration camp in Auschwitz sought all kinds of "entertainment" - most of them invented increasingly brutal methods of bullying prisoners. Boxing has become one of the guards' games. For inmates, duels in the ring were fought for life and death.
It was the first Sunday in March 1941. A group of skeletal young people sat on a sun-heated pile of bricks next to the kitchen building. They were completely naked. Their striped uniforms and underwear were taken for disinfection, because after the first winter in Auschwitz, lice became an unbearable plague in the camp.
Now, exhausted, they took pleasure in the warmth that permeated their bodies. However, their noses were irritated more and more by the kitchen smells coming from the neighboring building. There was something going on inside, there were screams in Polish and German, as if some fight was taking place. - Probably Kapo Walter wrecks some Muslim One of the prisoners said.
Live punching bags
The others nodded. Two weeks earlier, a new functional appeared in the camp, who joined the first thirty kapos sent here from KL Sachsenhausen as soon as Auschwitz was opened. His name was Walter Dunning and he was an athletic blonde with tiny eyes and broken browbones.
He quickly became the terror of the prisoners on a par with the two greatest sadists - Bruno Brodniewitsch and Leo Wietschorek, numbers 1 and 30, who had the largest number of tortured people on their conscience. These two, however, were in their forties and even if they wanted to hit more, they lacked the strength. Dunning was much younger than them and was bursting with energy.
The text is an excerpt from Andrzej Fedorowicz's book Gladiators from the Death Camps, which was published by Bellona.
From the moment he appeared, the prisoners began to serve as punch bags. It took only a few days for the more than twenty people who had been knocked out by the kapos to be unfit for work. And in Auschwitz it meant almost certain death.
- They say that this is a pre-war German middleweight champion ...
- I haven't heard of anyone like that. Probably the SS men are spreading it to make the prisoners even more obedient The young man with a soft, long face replied.
His name was Tadeusz Pietrzykowski and he was number 77. He came to the camp with the first transport and was there for almost nine months. The prisoners knew who he was - a boxer from the Warsaw club "Legia", trained by the famous Feliks Stamm.
The last fight
Before the war, Tadeusz had the nickname "Teddy" and he had the makings of a good career. But here in Auschwitz, it didn't matter. It was unthinkable that any prisoner would hit a functionary and survive. Although a few did.
That boxer was called Dobrowolski. He was in quarantine when one of the kapos, maybe even Brodniewitsch, pushed him on roll call during the ranks. The prisoner, without thinking twice, hit him in the jaw with his right hook.
Bored kapos in the concentration camp in Auschwitz sought all kinds of "entertainment" - most of them involved inventing more and more brutal methods of tormenting prisoners. Still from the movie "Boxer and Death" (dir. Peter Solan). Umeleckých Film Studio Praha
For the next week the kapo and his colleagues tormented Dobrowolski until his body turned black as a result of beatings. They assigned him to work in the heaviest commando, where wagons with bricks and cement had to be unloaded. But the boxer was still alive. At some point, even SS men started coming to block 10 to watch this phenomenon, and even offered him cigarettes.
In the end, Dobrowolski decided to end this torment on his own terms. When they attacked him again, he knocked out two kapos, beat the one who tormented him the most, and then walked over to the postenketta where he was shot. So ended the people who dared to hit the camp bandit guards.
Nothing to lose
The smell of cooked dinner annoyed the prisoners sitting on the pile of bricks more and more. The hunger was getting stronger, paralyzing all the senses, taking over them. They would most like to go somewhere out of here where they would not feel this maddening smell, but they were not allowed to move from there. Perhaps to drown out that ruthless pumping in the stomach, someone started humming a well-known camp song about Auschwitz.
- W Auschwitz lager where I lived Kraft durch Frude got it - intoned the prisoner softly.
- Stand up brother in the morning, stand up in the evening and stand at noon like f ** k! - the choir of the rest answered him.
- There is a brick chimney, but we fool it!
- Stand up brother in the morning, stand up in the evening and stand like f ** k! at noon
- Haftling the sick man is cared for in The Krankenbale will heal him!
- Stand up brother in the morning, stand up in the evening and stand like f ** k! at noon
They were a little relieved to sing the song, but not for long. The hunger was getting so strong again that the men were even squirming on a pile of bricks. At one point, they noticed that a prisoner was coming from the kitchen. He approached Pietrzykowski.
- Are you a boxer? - He asked. Teddy nodded.
- Want to earn bread in battle?
Teddy confirmed again.
- How much? - he asked.
- Half a loaf. And a cube of margarine.
- With whom?
- With Kapo Dunning Teddy heard back. However, it did not make any impression on him. Hunger killed the fear in him.
- I don't have any clothes. Bring me something and I'll go He replied. The prisoner ran towards the kitchen.
The text is an excerpt from Andrzej Fedorowicz's book Gladiators from the Death Camps, which was published by Bellona.
- Are you crazy? Dunning will kill you! He weighs over 70 kilograms and you are forty at most! - One of the colleagues tried to stop Teddy. It was Bolek Kupiec, number 792, a sculptor from Poronin, who was sent to Auschwitz in the second transport. Pietrzykowski was friends with him, as was his younger brother Antek, who was sent to the camp less than four months later. They were brave, reasonable people and Teddy usually took their opinion into account. But this time he wasn't going to.
- Bolek, they give bread for the fight. I am hungry, others are hungry too. You and your brother can carve wood, Chief Hoess himself wants you to house him. Apart from boxing, I can do nothing, I have no profession. Had it not been for your help, I probably wouldn't have survived this winter. This fight is my last chance, I have nothing to lose Teddy replied quickly.
- I won't let you go. Did you know that this Walter broke the jaws of two prisoners yesterday? - Bolek grabbed his arm.
- Listen, they beat me more than once. They know I'm a boxer. Instead, I got a heavy spanking from the block supervisors and kapos, and yet I did not break down. And now… Now I have the opportunity to give them back and get some bread for all of us . Don't stop me Teddy took Bolek's hand off his shoulder.
A prisoner came running, carrying some shorts. Pietrzykowski founded them. He looked at his colleagues. They looked at him as if they were going to see each other for the last time. He turned and walked towards the kitchen, from which now came the croaking of German kapos. It was March 2, 1941, the day that was to change the lives of Tadeusz Pietrzykowski and other prisoners in Auschwitz forever.
Source:
The text is an excerpt from Andrzej Fedorowicz's book Gladiators from the Death Camps, which was published by the Bellona publishing house.