Flossenbürg concentration camp

Flossenbürg concentration camp memorial site - darkometer rating : 7 - One of the less well-known sites of the former main concentration camps within Germany , in a remote corner of Bavaria. Forced labour in a nearby quarry and later in other industries was the main purpose of the camp. After WWII , the site was long rather neglected, but in recent years it has been brought into line with other memorial sites of its type in Germany, with the establishment of modern, state-of-the-art exhibitions. It remains an unusual example of such sites, however, due to its park-like appearance which these days starkly contrasts with the grim history of the place. > More background info > What there is to see > Location > Access and costs > Time required > Combinations with other dark destinations > Combinations with non-dark destinations > Photos More background info: Flossenbürg was a Nazi concentration camp set up in May 1938 in a remote southern corner of Germany near the border with the already annexed Sudetenland (today in the Czech Republic ). It primarily held political prisoners and POWs, who were exploited for forced labour, especially in the nearby quarry, but later also in arms production. The location had in fact been specifically chosen because of Flossenbürg's history of quarrying of high-quality granite. And that was the stuff needed by the Nazis for their ambitious programme of construction of megalomaniacal representational buildings, such as in Nuremberg or Berlin . The camp's main purpose was thus no longer simply imprisonment of political opponents (as initially with the founding of the earliest camps such as Dachau ); here the exploitation of labour was the main raison d'être for the establishment of the camp.