San Sabba

The large complex of buildings making up the rice husking factory constructed in 1913 in San Sabba on the outskirts of Trieste was first used by the Nazis as a temporary prison camp for the detention of Italian servicemen captured after the 8 September 1943.

It was designated Stalag 339 but in late October 1943 it was converted into a Polizeihaftlager (Police detention camp) to be used as a transit camp for deportees bound for Germany and Poland, for the storage of confiscated property and for the internment and execution of hostages, partisans, political prisoners and Jews.

The first room on the left in the underground entry passage was known as the “death cell.” In the “death cell” were kept internees transported from prisons or captured in round-ups and earmarked for execution and cremation within a short time, and indeed according to eye-witness accounts new arrivals in the “death cell” often found themselves sharing the cell with the bodies awaiting cremation.

 
Read the full article here: The San Sabba Concentration Camp

The Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team

www.HolocaustResearchProject.org