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The Auschwitz Tattoo

A visit to the Sydney Jewish Museum is made all the more memorable and moving with the opportunity to meet Holocaust survivors. Occasionally, a survivor might roll up their sleeves and show visitors their permanent marker: the tattoo from Auschwitz.

Tattooing was done at Auschwitz but only to prisoners who were ‘selected’ to be slaves rather than gassed. Ultimately, a system of two piercing needles of differing lengths dipped into ink, attached to a wooden grip, was deliberated. Most survivors who were branded by the Germans like cattle do not see it as a badge of shame; rather, they feel that it demonstrates the inhumanity of the German perpetrators.

In 2011, the Museum’s curators commissioned photographer Andrew Harris to document some of Sydney’s Holocaust survivors and their tattoos. Photos were taken of Eddie Jaku, Lotte Weiss, Margaret Odze, Naftal Sieff, Olga Wachtel, Susan Rosza, Ruth Widder and Mala Sonnabend – all depicted going about their lives, living with their painful memories, and bearing a permanent mark on their arms. Subsequently, Katherine Griffiths and Nadine Saacks documented survivors, photographs of whom are included in this online exhibition.

A guy who got a number was lucky. Why?
Because he didn’t go straight away to the
crematoria.

Lou Sokolov, Auschwitz tattooist

‘The Auschwitz Tattoo’ is inspired by the exhibition ‘Marked’: Holocaust survivors and their tattoos at the Jewish Holocaust Centre in Melbourne in 2010.

The Auschwitz Tattoo

A visit to the Sydney Jewish Museum is made all the more memorable and moving with the opportunity to meet Holocaust survivors. Occasionally, a survivor might roll up their sleeves and show visitors their permanent marker: the tattoo from Auschwitz.

Tattooing was done at Auschwitz but only to prisoners who were ‘selected’ to be slaves rather than gassed. Ultimately, a system of two piercing needles of differing lengths dipped into ink, attached to a wooden grip, was deliberated. Most survivors who were branded by the Germans like cattle do not see it as a badge of shame; rather, they feel that it demonstrates the inhumanity of the German perpetrators.

In 2011, the Museum’s curators commissioned photographer Andrew Harris to document some of Sydney’s Holocaust survivors and their tattoos. Photos were taken of Eddie Jaku, Lotte Weiss, Margaret Odze, Naftal Sieff, Olga Wachtel, Susan Rosza, Ruth Widder and Mala Sonnabend – all depicted going about their lives, living with their painful memories, and bearing a permanent mark on their arms. Subsequently, Katherine Griffiths and Nadine Saacks documented survivors, photographs of whom are included in this online exhibition.

A guy who got a number was lucky. Why?
Because he didn’t go straight away to the
crematoria.

Lou Sokolov, Auschwitz tattooist

‘The Auschwitz Tattoo’ is inspired by the exhibition ‘Marked’: Holocaust survivors and their tattoos at the Jewish Holocaust Centre in Melbourne in 2010.

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Origins

In Auschwitz, the SS camp leaders encountered a problem in late 1940: The rampant death rate of inmates was making it difficult to identify corpses once the clothing showing their registration number had been quickly removed for re-use. The tattoo became a way to assist the murderers in identifying the victims.

Jewish women entering Auschwitz in March 1942 were the first to be tattooed with four-digit numbers. Arrival time and size of the transport determined the serial numbers allocated to the new arrivals. The procedure lasted 30 seconds, and was originally performed with an impractical metal stamp, then a single and finally a double needle device. Lou Sokolov, chief Auschwitz tattooist, and his assistant marked more than 200,000 inmates, almost half the camp population. Soon, more men were required to do the job. In 1944, women were also recruited as tattooists.

Jews arriving in Auschwitz who were selected to be murdered in gas chambers were neither registered nor tattooed. Most inmates selected for slave labour, however, were tattooed. Some inmates were not tattooed: Reich Germans, Ethnic Germans and other non-Jews classified as ‘education prisoners’ or ‘police prisoners’. Unlike Jews and the Roma and Sinti, they were not included in the program of the “Final Solution” and could be discharged from Auschwitz.

The tattoo had three distinct functions: to mark and humiliate prisoners, to prevent their escape and to expedite the identification of corpses already stripped of their uniforms, particularly following mass killings or deaths.

To distinguish between Jewish and non-Jewish tattoos, a small coloured triangle was sometimes added under the tattoo of Jews, indicating that they could be sent to the gas chambers. Some Jews remained untattooed at the request of German industrialists. Upon arrival, they were registered as ‘depot prisoners’ detained temporarily in a transit compound until deported and deployed as slave labourers in war relevant factories throughout Nazi-controlled Europe.

Photographed by Katherine Griffiths

 

Origins

In Auschwitz, the SS camp leaders encountered a problem in late 1940: The rampant death rate of inmates was making it difficult to identify corpses once the clothing showing their registration number had been quickly removed for re-use. The tattoo became a way to assist the murderers in identifying the victims.

Jewish women entering Auschwitz in March 1942 were the first to be tattooed with four-digit numbers. Arrival time and size of the transport determined the serial numbers allocated to the new arrivals. The procedure lasted 30 seconds, and was originally performed with an impractical metal stamp, then a single and finally a double needle device. Lou Sokolov, chief Auschwitz tattooist, and his assistant marked more than 200,000 inmates, almost half the camp population. Soon, more men were required to do the job. In 1944, women were also recruited as tattooists.

Jews arriving in Auschwitz who were selected to be murdered in gas chambers were neither registered nor tattooed. Most inmates selected for slave labour, however, were tattooed. Some inmates were not tattooed: Reich Germans, Ethnic Germans and other non-Jews classified as ‘education prisoners’ or ‘police prisoners’. Unlike Jews and the Roma and Sinti, they were not included in the program of the “Final Solution” and could be discharged from Auschwitz.

The tattoo had three distinct functions: to mark and humiliate prisoners, to prevent their escape and to expedite the identification of corpses already stripped of their uniforms, particularly following mass killings or deaths.

To distinguish between Jewish and non-Jewish tattoos, a small coloured triangle was sometimes added under the tattoo of Jews, indicating that they could be sent to the gas chambers. Some Jews remained untattooed at the request of German industrialists. Upon arrival, they were registered as ‘depot prisoners’ detained temporarily in a transit compound until deported and deployed as slave labourers in war relevant factories throughout Nazi-controlled Europe.

Photographed by Katherine Griffiths

 

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Types of Marks

Coloured triangles (German: Winkel) were introduced and tested in the ‘model’ camp in Dachau in 1933. They later served in all Nazi concentration camps to monitor and control the inmates by creating a hierarchy among them. The colour of the Winkel showed the prisoner’s category: red for political prisoners, green for ‘criminals’, purple for Jehovah’s Witnesses, black for ‘asocials’, often prostitutes and other social outcasts, black or brown for Sinti and Roma; blue for emigrants, pink for male homosexuals. In addition, capital letters signalled the nationality of non-Jews. A range of other special symbols were used in different camps and evolved over time. Jews were identifiable by a two-coloured, six-pointed star: a yellow Winkel overlaid by another coloured triangle.

Only in Auschwitz, ‘new arrivals’ selected for work were tattooed – as a rule, onto their left forearm. No document has yet been found that sheds light on the introduction of the tattoo. The question as to why tattoos were never imposed on prisoners of other concentration camps is unanswered.

Read about the experiences of Holocaust survivors, who tell the stories of their tattoos from Auschwitz in this online exhibition.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

Types of Marks

Coloured triangles (German: Winkel) were introduced and tested in the ‘model’ camp in Dachau in 1933. They later served in all Nazi concentration camps to monitor and control the inmates by creating a hierarchy among them. The colour of the Winkel showed the prisoner’s category: red for political prisoners, green for ‘criminals’, purple for Jehovah’s Witnesses, black for ‘asocials’, often prostitutes and other social outcasts, black or brown for Sinti and Roma; blue for emigrants, pink for male homosexuals. In addition, capital letters signalled the nationality of non-Jews. A range of other special symbols were used in different camps and evolved over time. Jews were identifiable by a two-coloured, six-pointed star: a yellow Winkel overlaid by another coloured triangle.

Only in Auschwitz, ‘new arrivals’ selected for work were tattooed – as a rule, onto their left forearm. No document has yet been found that sheds light on the introduction of the tattoo. The question as to why tattoos were never imposed on prisoners of other concentration camps is unanswered.

Read about the experiences of Holocaust survivors, who tell the stories of their tattoos from Auschwitz in this online exhibition.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

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Naftal Sieff's tattoo

Naftal Sieff, 132852

Naftal Sieff arrived in Birkenau in June-July 1943.

The usual procedure, selection, take off all clothes, delousing, painted with carbolic acid and they shaved you everywhere, and then we got a striped uniform and got a number. All part of the ‘reception committee’. I was 19 at the time. I remember the tattoo artist was uncaring in the use of his needle and I bled. I had no particular thoughts about the tattooing event as everything which was happening to me at that time was nothing but complete confusion.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

Naftal Sieff's tattoo

Naftal Sieff, 132852

Naftal Sieff arrived in Birkenau in June-July 1943.

The usual procedure, selection, take off all clothes, delousing, painted with carbolic acid and they shaved you everywhere, and then we got a striped uniform and got a number. All part of the ‘reception committee’. I was 19 at the time. I remember the tattoo artist was uncaring in the use of his needle and I bled. I had no particular thoughts about the tattooing event as everything which was happening to me at that time was nothing but complete confusion.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

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Eddie Jaku, 72338

In October 1943, Eddie Jaku OAM’s family was arrested. Eddie endured a gruelling train ride to Auschwitz, where his mother, aged 43, and father, aged 50, were murdered in a gas chamber. Eddie survived, being marked as an “economically indispensable Jew”.

In Auschwitz, you had to remember your number, if you didn’t remember and they would call your number you would get two lashes. My block supervisor didn’t know my name, he knew my number and that’s how he called me.

Hear Eddie speak about the story of his tattoo.

Photographed by Katherine Griffiths

 

Eddie Jaku, 72338

In October 1943, Eddie Jaku OAM’s family was arrested. Eddie endured a gruelling train ride to Auschwitz, where his mother, aged 43, and father, aged 50, were murdered in a gas chamber. Eddie survived, being marked as an “economically indispensable Jew”.

In Auschwitz, you had to remember your number, if you didn’t remember and they would call your number you would get two lashes. My block supervisor didn’t know my name, he knew my number and that’s how he called me.

Hear Eddie speak about the story of his tattoo.

Photographed by Katherine Griffiths

 

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Olga Wachtel's tattoo

Olga Wachtel (nee Ehrmann), 72675

Polish prisoners were sitting at the table and they did the tattoos. They said, ‘Give me your left arm’ in German. They had sharpened pieces of wood which they dipped into liquid and pierced my skin with lots of tiny holes to make my number 72675. My mother was tattooed after me with the next number 72676. My husband came to Auschwitz six months after me and he did not get a tattoo.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

Olga Wachtel's tattoo

Olga Wachtel (nee Ehrmann), 72675

Polish prisoners were sitting at the table and they did the tattoos. They said, ‘Give me your left arm’ in German. They had sharpened pieces of wood which they dipped into liquid and pierced my skin with lots of tiny holes to make my number 72675. My mother was tattooed after me with the next number 72676. My husband came to Auschwitz six months after me and he did not get a tattoo.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

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Ruth Widder's tattoo

Ruth Widder (nee Perlhefter), A4144

No one knew what was going on at all and so when asked to hold out our arm for the tattoo, it was just another order we had to obey. There were quite a few ‘artists’ all tattooing the large amounts of people at the same time. Not all of the tattoos looked the same size, shape or neatness at all. My tattoo is quite neat, but I remember one tattooist who couldn’t see very well, and as a result all the people who were done by her had much larger, messier numbers.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

Ruth Widder's tattoo

Ruth Widder (nee Perlhefter), A4144

No one knew what was going on at all and so when asked to hold out our arm for the tattoo, it was just another order we had to obey. There were quite a few ‘artists’ all tattooing the large amounts of people at the same time. Not all of the tattoos looked the same size, shape or neatness at all. My tattoo is quite neat, but I remember one tattooist who couldn’t see very well, and as a result all the people who were done by her had much larger, messier numbers.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

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Lotte Weiss' tattoo

Lotte Weiss (nee Franklova), 2065

Lotte was registered in Auschwitz on 28 March 1942. In January 1945, she was transferred to Gross-Rosen concentration camp, and from there, in March/April, to Flossenbürg. She was liberated in Theresienstadt on 8 May 1945.

“The man who tattooed me, I knew from Bratislava… He wasn’t allowed to speak because the SS man was behind him with his submachine gun and so he only whispered, but in that he made my number twice as large as the others, because he still wanted to talk to me.”

Hear Lotte speak about her tattoo.

Lotte passed away in February 2021.

Image to left photographed by Katherine Griffiths

Image above photographed by Andrew Harris

 

Lotte Weiss' tattoo

Lotte Weiss (nee Franklova), 2065

Lotte was registered in Auschwitz on 28 March 1942. In January 1945, she was transferred to Gross-Rosen concentration camp, and from there, in March/April, to Flossenbürg. She was liberated in Theresienstadt on 8 May 1945.

“The man who tattooed me, I knew from Bratislava… He wasn’t allowed to speak because the SS man was behind him with his submachine gun and so he only whispered, but in that he made my number twice as large as the others, because he still wanted to talk to me.”

Hear Lotte speak about her tattoo.

Lotte passed away in February 2021.

Image to left photographed by Katherine Griffiths

Image above photographed by Andrew Harris

 

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Susan (Zsuzsanna) Rozsa's tattoo

Susan Rozsa (nee Benko), A/B20770

Susan (Zsuzsanna) Rozsa was registered in Auschwitz on 10 August 1944 after arriving on a transport from Hungary. She was transferred to Buchenwald concentration camp on 31 August 1944.

It happened twice because they changed the number and it involved queuing up for half a day each time.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

Susan (Zsuzsanna) Rozsa's tattoo

Susan Rozsa (nee Benko), A/B20770

Susan (Zsuzsanna) Rozsa was registered in Auschwitz on 10 August 1944 after arriving on a transport from Hungary. She was transferred to Buchenwald concentration camp on 31 August 1944.

It happened twice because they changed the number and it involved queuing up for half a day each time.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

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Jack Meister's tattoo

Jack Meister, B-488

Jack Meister was transported to Radom labour camp and worked in a factory for a year before being transported to Auschwitz, where he was tattooed. He was then transferred to Buna concentration camp, which was part of the Auschwitz complex.

I kept it to remind me where I was and what I went through, everything… This number, I never forget what I went through. It reminds me all my life.

Hear Jack recount the story of his tattoo.

Photographed by Katherine Griffiths

 

Jack Meister's tattoo

Jack Meister, B-488

Jack Meister was transported to Radom labour camp and worked in a factory for a year before being transported to Auschwitz, where he was tattooed. He was then transferred to Buna concentration camp, which was part of the Auschwitz complex.

I kept it to remind me where I was and what I went through, everything… This number, I never forget what I went through. It reminds me all my life.

Hear Jack recount the story of his tattoo.

Photographed by Katherine Griffiths

 

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Margaret Odza's tattoo

Margaret Odze (nee Brennerova), 4344

(I was one of) the first 5000 from Slovakia. I arrived in Auschwitz on 1 May 1942. My grandson, when he was young, always said ‘What’s that’. I joked with him, it’s a telephone number. Later on, he came home from school and said, ‘Nana I know what’s the number.’

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

Margaret Odza's tattoo

Margaret Odze (nee Brennerova), 4344

(I was one of) the first 5000 from Slovakia. I arrived in Auschwitz on 1 May 1942. My grandson, when he was young, always said ‘What’s that’. I joked with him, it’s a telephone number. Later on, he came home from school and said, ‘Nana I know what’s the number.’

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

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Mala Sonnabend's tattoo

Mala Rekant Sonnabend (nee Israel), 74260

We stood outside naked. Then they gave us some clothes to put on and sent us to a place where there was a long table, with girls sitting behind the table and they were tattooing numbers on your arm. As you were standing in the row they were giving you the number. My number 74260, with a little triangle underneath it. The triangle meant Jewish.

Mala passed away in January 2018.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

Mala Sonnabend's tattoo

Mala Rekant Sonnabend (nee Israel), 74260

We stood outside naked. Then they gave us some clothes to put on and sent us to a place where there was a long table, with girls sitting behind the table and they were tattooing numbers on your arm. As you were standing in the row they were giving you the number. My number 74260, with a little triangle underneath it. The triangle meant Jewish.

Mala passed away in January 2018.

Photographed by Andrew Harris

 

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Kuba Enoch's tattoo

Kuba Enoch, B4831

Kuba Enoch was registered in Auschwitz on 4 August 1944 after arriving on a transport from the camp of Jewish forced labourers in Ostrowiec. In January 1945, he was sent on a death march to Buchenwald concentration camp.

According to the Jewish law, a tattoo is forbidden because it says that God gives you a perfect body, leave it like the way it is. We would discuss it a lot with our rabbis at the time and they said, look the tattoo was forced on you. You don’t need to take it off, it wasn’t done by your free will. So that’s why it stayed.

Hear Kuba tell the story of his tattoo.

Hear Kuba speak about the lasting impacts of this permanent mark.

Kuba passed away in July 2021.

Image to left photographed by Katherine Griffiths

Image above photographed by Nadine Saacks

 

Kuba Enoch's tattoo

Kuba Enoch, B4831

Kuba Enoch was registered in Auschwitz on 4 August 1944 after arriving on a transport from the camp of Jewish forced labourers in Ostrowiec. In January 1945, he was sent on a death march to Buchenwald concentration camp.

According to the Jewish law, a tattoo is forbidden because it says that God gives you a perfect body, leave it like the way it is. We would discuss it a lot with our rabbis at the time and they said, look the tattoo was forced on you. You don’t need to take it off, it wasn’t done by your free will. So that’s why it stayed.

Hear Kuba tell the story of his tattoo.

Hear Kuba speak about the lasting impacts of this permanent mark.

Kuba passed away in July 2021.

Image to left photographed by Katherine Griffiths

Image above photographed by Nadine Saacks

 

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Lasting Impacts

Survivors never forgot the intense pain caused by the tattooing procedure. One survivor recalled, “When I arrived in Auschwitz and got my tattoo, I sobbed uncontrollably… [the Nazis] told me: ‘You are now not a name but a number.’” One survivor, instructed to register ‘new arrivals’ in the women’s camp, testified, “Reception and registration transformed human beings into stones and numbers. The women were totally confused and disoriented, happy to be still alive.

Following liberation, some survivors hastened to have the physical reminder of their humiliation removed; only a scar remained. Others used their numbers as pin numbers or as lucky numbers, especially at horse racings or Lotto games. Tattoo numbers were recorded in restitution files, providing the evidence of the date of arrival in Auschwitz, the place from where the ‘Jew Transport’ had commenced, as well as the number of deportees. The tattoo elicited different reactions: some people were bewildered, not knowing what it meant. Others realised that the tattoo bearer had managed to survive the horrors of Auschwitz.

In recent years, as part of an upsurge of tattooing amongst young people, grandchildren of survivors have chosen to have the Auschwitz tattoo of their grandparent as their chosen tattoo. Whether the appropriation of the Auschwitz tattoo is a symbol of Holocaust memory or a perpetuation of genocidal trauma is up for personal interpretation.

 

Credits:

Historian: Emeritus Professor Konrad Kwiet

Curator: Roslyn Sugarman

Photographers:

Andrew Harris: Margaret Odze, Susan Rosza, Naftal Sieff, Mala Sonnabend, Olga Wachtel, Ruth Widder

Katherine Griffiths: Eddie Jaku, Jack Meister, Lotte Weiss, Kuba Enoch

Nadine Saacks: Kuba Enoch

 

Lasting Impacts

Survivors never forgot the intense pain caused by the tattooing procedure. One survivor recalled, “When I arrived in Auschwitz and got my tattoo, I sobbed uncontrollably… [the Nazis] told me: ‘You are now not a name but a number.’” One survivor, instructed to register ‘new arrivals’ in the women’s camp, testified, “Reception and registration transformed human beings into stones and numbers. The women were totally confused and disoriented, happy to be still alive.

Following liberation, some survivors hastened to have the physical reminder of their humiliation removed; only a scar remained. Others used their numbers as pin numbers or as lucky numbers, especially at horse racings or Lotto games. Tattoo numbers were recorded in restitution files, providing the evidence of the date of arrival in Auschwitz, the place from where the ‘Jew Transport’ had commenced, as well as the number of deportees. The tattoo elicited different reactions: some people were bewildered, not knowing what it meant. Others realised that the tattoo bearer had managed to survive the horrors of Auschwitz.

In recent years, as part of an upsurge of tattooing amongst young people, grandchildren of survivors have chosen to have the Auschwitz tattoo of their grandparent as their chosen tattoo. Whether the appropriation of the Auschwitz tattoo is a symbol of Holocaust memory or a perpetuation of genocidal trauma is up for personal interpretation.

 

Credits:

Historian: Emeritus Professor Konrad Kwiet

Curator: Roslyn Sugarman

Photographers:

Andrew Harris: Margaret Odze, Susan Rosza, Naftal Sieff, Mala Sonnabend, Olga Wachtel, Ruth Widder

Katherine Griffiths: Eddie Jaku, Jack Meister, Lotte Weiss, Kuba Enoch

Nadine Saacks: Kuba Enoch