Thread by @ArolsenArchives

(1/4) When the Nazis came to power in 1933, their political opponents immediately became the prime target for persecution. They arrested tens of thousands of them and carted them off to makeshift concentration camps like Kemna, #Sachsenburg, or Heuberg.

(2/4) Often, little is known about these so-called early concentration camps. Most of the documents were destroyed at the end of the war if not before. So quite early on, in 1950 or thereabouts, employees of the International Tracing Service started to do their own research.

(3/4) When former prisoners of the "early" concentration camps submitted an inquiry, the staff in Arolsen would ask them to fill out a questionnaire.

(4/4) Thanks to these questionnaires, information about the early concentration camps that would otherwise have been forgotten can still be accessed in the Arolsen Archives today.

Find more information in our online archive: collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/archive/1-1…