Origin and history of the DP camp
After Liberation, the British Army took the survivors of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp to the nearby military barracks and provided them with medical care.
Former concentration camp inmates, forced labourers and prisoners of war deported to Germany from all over Europe were given the legal status of "Displaced Persons" (DP) by the Allies. This entitled them to special care.
After most of the survivors had returned to their countries of origin, it was mainly Jewish people and non-Jewish Polish nationals who remained in Bergen-Belsen. At times, more than 10,000 people lived in the Polish DP camp in Bergen-Belsen. It was dissolved in September 1946. Up to 12,000 people lived in the Jewish DP camp in Bergen-Belsen. It existed until mid-1950.
The DP camp was not only home to survivors from Bergen-Belsen, but also former prisoners from other camps, former forced labourers and survivors of the Shoah.
About the DP camp
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One of the emergency hospitals in the Bergen-Belsen DP camp © Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem When they arrived at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, the British soldiers were not prepared for the diseases that were rampant there, such as typhus and typhus, nor for the extreme malnutrition of the prisoners. While thousands of bodies were still being buried in mass graves on the site of the former concentration camp and the contaminated wooden barracks were being burnt down, the British Army set up an emergency hospital in buildings in the nearby former military barracks. As late as June 1945, more than 11,000 sick people had to be treated there. As the emergency hospital did not have sufficient capacity, many survivors were also treated in hospitals and Auxilliary hospitals in neighbouring towns, such as Celle.
To support the military units, several British Red Cross units and other civilian aid personnel arrived in Bergen-Belsen just one week after the Liberation. The British Red Cross took over the management of civilian medical care. The staff included doctors and aid workers from many countries, including numerous liberated prisoners. In addition, German doctors and nurses were conscripted by the British.
As the number of patients decreased, the barracks buildings were converted into blocks of flats. The emergency hospital became the Bergen-Belsen DP camp.
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At the beginning of September 1945, more than 10,000 non-Jewish people from Poland were still living in the Bergen-Belsen DP camp. They had been used as civilian forced labourers before Liberation or were former prisoners of war and concentration camp inmates. These DPs refused to return to Poland because they rejected the communist regime installed by the Soviet Union in Warsaw. While the Warsaw government wanted to persuade the DPs to return quickly, the Polish national government in exile in London warned against this step.
Everyday life in the Polish DP camp was largely organised by a camp committee. A lively social, cultural and religious life developed. Kindergartens, schools and vocational training courses were set up. A daily Polish information bulletin was soon supplemented by a weekly newspaper. Cultural and sporting activities included choirs and bands, art exhibitions and a cabaret, football teams and athletics competitions.
Nevertheless, the experiences of persecution remained omnipresent. The Polish camp committee set up a department to document the National Socialist crimes. In November 1945, it had a large wooden cross erected on the former concentration camp site, which was consecrated with a Catholic mass in front of thousands of camp inhabitants.
In September 1946, the British military authorities dissolved the Polish DP camp Bergen-Belsen and transferred its residents to other DP camps in the British zone. Around two thirds of the Polish DPs from the British zone returned to Poland. The remainder attempted to emigrate, mainly to the USA and Canada.
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Emigration to Israel, 22 March 1949: The emigration began at the same railway ramp where the prisoners transported to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp had arrived. © Yad Vashem Archive, Jerusalem In addition to former prisoners of the Bergen-Belsen camp, the Jewish DP camp also took in thousands of survivors of the Shoah from Central and Eastern European countries. For the majority of these Jewish DPs, continuing to live in Europe was unimaginable. They rarely had relatives, and their homes and other possessions had been destroyed or looted.
In September 1945, the "Central committee of the liberated Jews in the British sector", based in the DP camp, emerged from the Jewish camp committee founded immediately after Liberation through democratic elections. The political congresses it organised called above all for free emigration to Palestine and the founding of the state of Israel. Not only former Zionists, but also many survivors who had not been Zionist before the Nazi persecution, now supported the goal of a self-determined life in Palestine.
While the British occupying force only regarded the Jews as a religious community, the majority of Jewish survivors saw themselves as a nation in their own right. The committee acted as the government of the Jewish DP camp and set up a police force, a court, schools and cultural and social institutions. Many of the mostly young and single residents started a family and thus found new prospects for the future. In the first two years after Liberation alone, more than a thousand Jewish couples married in Bergen-Belsen, and well over a thousand Jewish children were born before the camp was dissolved.
From 1947, numerous residents left the DP camp due to improved emigration opportunities. The State of Israel was founded in May 1948, and at the beginning of 1949 the British government also lifted the last emigration restrictions. However, other countries such as the USA and Canada also relaxed their immigration conditions. The Bergen-Belsen DP camp was finally dissolved in the summer of 1950.