Addition

The Cosel period.

From 28 August to 12 December 1942

The period from 28 August to 12 December 1942 was known as the so-called Cosel period. Deportation trains  made a stopover at the freight station of Cosel, located 80 km west of Auschwitz. During that stop, boys and men who were considered fit for work by the Germans, were usually forcibly separated from their families and taken off the train and put to work in the surrounding labor camps of Upper Silesia.  

The “arbeitsfähige”men (fit for work) who were taken off the train in Cosel were generally in the age group of ±15-50 years, in some individual cases slightly older. However, those who remained on the train were sent onwards to Ausschwitz, Broadly speaking, these were the older, weak or sickly men and the women and children and in general it can be stated that this group was killed by gassing immediately upon arrival at Auschwitz. 

During this period, about 9000 men from 39 trains to Auschwitz, also from Belgium and France, were taken there by the Germans. From them, 3500 men in 18 trains came from Westerbork in Holland. Only 700-900 have survived the war and from those 3500 men from Westerbork, only 181, and from them, 126 from the camp Blechhammer. 

The freight station/depot of Cosel, the location were selections took place, has not changed significantly since 1942. On 2 September 2016, a monument to commemorate the victims, was revealed by survivors of the victims. 

Source: translated from the dutch website wikipedia website about Kozle. and from the publication Auschwitz III, the Cosel Period, edited October 1952 by the Red Cross. 

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