What did the term selection refer to?
Holocaust literature often uses ‘selection’ as meaning a process in which prisoners were segregated into a group that would be put to work and a group that would be put to death. Of course, the process of sorting prisoners by sex and age before the delousing procedure was a standard and implied nothing sinister since the prisoners had to strip in order to take a shower. The Nazi concentration camps generally segregated prisoners by sex with children under 14 staying with their mothers if an entire family was put into the camp. Prisoners were also selected and organized by the type of work that was assigned to them. Selections also took place when prisoners were to be reassigned to other camps, or were to be released. Many who spent time in Auschwitz served sentences of less than a year and went home after completing their sentence. In addition sick prisoners were triaged and sent to hospital blocks.
It referred to selecting which Jews would be murdered immediately and which would be worked to near-death and then murdered. As Jews arrived at camps such as Auschwitz, they were visually inspected by SS doctors. The so-called “able to work” Jews were sent to one side, and those deemed unable to work were sent to the other side. This latter group — always the large majority — was immediately gassed. The process of deciding which Jews died immediately and which were spared for a time, was called the “selection”.
Holocaust literature often uses ‘selection’ as meaning a process in which prisoners were segregated into a group that would be put to work and a group that would be put to death. Of course, the process of sorting prisoners by sex and age before the delousing procedure was a standard and implied nothing sinister since the prisoners had to strip in order to take a shower. The Nazi concentration camps generally segregated prisoners by sex with children under 14 staying with their mothers if an entire family was put into the camp. Prisoners were also selected and organized by the type of work that was assigned to them. Selections also took place when prisoners were to be reassigned to other camps, or were to be released. Many who spent time in Auschwitz served sentences of less than a year and went home after completing their sentence. In addition sick prisoners were triaged and sent to hospital blocks.
Holocaust literature often uses ‘selection’ as meaning a process in which prisoners were segregated into a group that would be put to work and a group that would be put to death. Of course, the process of sorting prisoners by sex and age before the delousing procedure was a standard and implied nothing sinister since the prisoners had to strip in order to take a shower. The Nazi concentration camps generally segregated prisoners by sex with children under 14 staying with their mothers if an entire family was put into the camp. Prisoners were also selected and organized by the type of work that was assigned to them. Selections also took place when prisoners were to be reassigned to other camps, or were to be released. Many who spent time in Auschwitz served sentences of less than a year and went home after completing their sentence. In addition sick prisoners were triaged and sent to hospital blocks. Many of these procedures required a quick visual examination by an SS doctor who to par
