Im Konzentrationslager Dachau

The file contains the typewritten report by Werner J. Cahnman on his imprisonment at the Dachau concentration camp in November 1938. The report was originally written in English, translated by Edwin Tangl and R. Alvarez, and published by the “Bund der Opfer des politischen Freiheitskampfes in Tirol” who sent it to its members. Both the organization’s accompanying letter as well as the report are undated, but were probably written after 1963, as Cahnman refers to literature published in 1963. In his testimony, Cahnman gives a detailed report on the events following his imprisonment in his hometown Munich, of the daily life in the Dachau concentration camp, and of his release in December 1938, followed by his emigration to the United States in June 1939. Besides his personal memories of that period, he reflects on the social conditions of concentration camp inmates and on the situation of Jewish people in Nazi Germany based on the writings by Bruno Bettelheim, Primo Levi, Raoul Hilberg, and Hannah Arendt.