Day after liberation of Belsen by British 8 Corps; SS overseers
Creator(s)
- Michael Lewis (Camera Operator)
- Imperial War Museums
Scope and Content
British MP Daniel O'Shaughnessy and surrendered Hungarian guard on duty at main entrance of Belsen Concentration Camp. Notice on sentry box reads: "Allied Military Commander. Entrance Belsen Camp." Supply truck backs up and German POWs unload flour sacks from truck into warehouse. British RASC men also help unload truck. Blurry shot of a tattooed arm. Two smiling young female inmates, healthy, with soldiers. Sign in Russian on barbed wire reading "Halt! Anyone crossing the wire will be shot!". Series of shots of women behind barbed wire, waving to camera and talking with British soldier in foreground, Mania Salinger in middle with right arm raised at 15:10:31. MS and CU, women, have hair, nice, joyful faces, crinkly eyes. Doll woman with mouth open (seen before). CU, bloody, spotted mounds of naked corpses, fills frame. Corpses are female. Brief LS, Jewish star, smoky, women all huddled around, watching British soldier open a tin of sweets, woman takes a sweet. MS across compound where women are cooking over open fires, smoke obscures view. Frame right woman stands naked to the waist, washing. VCU, faces of corpses, skin is mottled. VCU, face, ruined eyelid, up into mouth, eye socket, tattoo on arm - 35698 BK 24. Male corpse spread-eagled to camera. LS, watchtower. Woman walks towards camera. LS of half-dressed corpses. Pan up to survivors, dressing tents, women sitting around, woman puts skirt on. Woman's back to camera, scratches her back. Topless woman washes face, arms, breasts. Heaps of bodies sleeping in sun; CU, sleeping. MS, two women with striped clothes and kerchiefs sit around. Crying woman grasping soldier's hand, walking around camp. [Soldier is AFPU cameraman Martin Wilson.] LS, from tower, survivors all in bunch waiting, smoke, walking through open gate. CU as soup is ladled into bowls from large cauldron, man serving is ex-prisoner. VCU, survivors' faces. VCU, soup, picnic tables in BG. CU as two SS men are checked for weapons and surrender their papers. VCU, deaths head on lapels. British frisk SS men. No. 4 bayonet pokes into frame left. Down barrel of gun to German POWs. Female guards leave building scowling, VCU on faces, then MCU. 15:18:02 SS Aufseherinnen (SS women overseers) leaving building, close and fast past camera. 15:18:03 Juana Bormann 15:18:06 Herta Bothe 15:18:10 Herta Ehlert 15:18:13 Luisa Danz 15:18:16 Hildegard Laechert (?). 15:18:18 CU of Herta Bothe standing outside. 15:18:23 MS of Bothe, others, Herta Ehlert looking straight at camera. CU of British guards. CU as war correspondent talks with colleague. CU, flowers on trees. Germans heaving and swinging women's brittle flattened bodies on back of flatbed. CU, crying survivors stand together. Camp commandant Josef Kramer under heavy guard leaves building.
Note(s)
For some duplicate (although poorer quality) footage, see Stories 2647 and 2652 on Film ID 165. Detailed cameraman's shot list available in Film and Video departmental files. Survivor Mania Salinger is interviewed in the 2015 British documentary, "Night Will Fall".
Subjects
- FLOWERS
- BARBED WIRE
- SIGNS/POSTERS
- POWS
- WAR CRIMINALS/WAR CRIMES TRIALS
- TENTS
- GATES
- SOUP
- LIBERATION
- FIRES
- SOLDIERS/MILITARY (BRITISH)
- CONCENTRATION CAMPS (LIBERATION)
- WOMEN
- STARS OF DAVID
- TATTOOS
- SOLDIERS/MILITARY (GERMAN)
- BERGEN-BELSEN
- CLOTHES
- CORPSES
- TRUCKS
- KRAMER, JOSEF
- GERMANY
- PASSPORTS
- FOOD
- EATING
- GUARDS
- CONCENTRATION CAMPS
- SS (SCHUTZSTAFFEL)
- SMOKE
- WATCH TOWERS
- SOLDIERS/MILITARY
Places
- Belsen, Germany
Genre
- Film
- Unedited.