Dachau – the great cemetery of Catholic priests
"Initially, a priest would not live at all for more than a few days. They were clubbed to death in the square... or at some other 'job' designed specifically to torment them. Then – at the beginning of 1941 – following an intervention from Rome, the priests were transported to Dachau..." This is Witold Pilecki's 1943 report from Auschwitz providing valuable inside information for the Polish underground authorities.A total of 1,780 Polish priests were imprisoned in Dachau, which constituted almost 70% of all Catholic clergy imprisoned there (2,579 – cf. ); 868 died or were killed in the camp. Paul Berben, in his monograph Dachau 1933-1945, quotes the memories of priests from various countries.
Father Francis de Sales Hess was a vicar in Dorfgastein, Austria. In the bell tower of a church under construction, he posted a condemnation of the neo-pagan system of German National Socialism. He was denounced, and in August 1938, he was sent to Dachau. He survived and wrote about his experiences – how the SS ordered priests to abandon all hope of leaving the camp alive, how they mocked Christ as a "stinking Jew," how one of the priests, Father Andreas Rieser, had a barbed-wire crown placed on his head, the Jews were ordered to spit on him, and then he was given heavy beams to carry, just as Christ carried the cross.
Father F. Seitz from the Speyer diocese, who arrived at the camp in 1940, was greeted with mockery of Pope Pius XII, whose picture he carried in his breviary. The German SS men mocked that the Roman pope would also be sent to Dachau along with all the priests, thus ending "Catholic swindles" forever. Images of Our Lady were similarly mocked. Father August Wessing, parish priest and dean of the diocese of the "Lion of Muenster", as Father F. Korszyński writes in his memoirs, had many Poles in his parish and, contrary to Nazi prohibitions, willingly celebrated services for them, preaching in Polish and hearing confessions in Polish. For this, he was arrested and imprisoned in the Dachau concentration camp, where he died in early March 1945.
By March 1941, a special ward for priests was established, separated by barbed wire. Polish monks and priests were particularly treated with cruelty. A large group of them—nearly 700—were brought to the camp in December 1940 from Auschwitz, Sachsenhausen, and Buchenwald as part of the concentration of imprisoned priests. The Polish priests were pressured to sign the Volksliste, and after refusing to do so, they were separated from the German priests on September 19, 1941. They were quartered in Block 26 and forbidden from attending the camp chapel, where daily Mass had previously been celebrated by Father Paul Prabucki, a priest of the Chełmno diocese. Father Albert Urbański, a Carmelite, writes about these services ( Clergy in Dachau – Memories of the experiences of about 2,000 priests in a Nazi concentration camp) as follows: "When, finally, after so many months of mockery not only of us, but of everything divine and holy, in the same place... where we had been subjected to the complete and ruthless power of the pagan Hitlerites... a sorrowful melody flowed: Under Your Protection [Sub Tuum Praesidium]... Our hearts, filled with gratitude, blessed the Comforter of the Afflicted. And when Father Prabucki then intoned "Holy God" [Supplications], our hearts and minds, contrite with penance, understood that it was the Lord's mercy that had saved us from perishing... The late Father Paweł Prabucki celebrated Holy Mass for the first time in Dachau on January 22, 1941."
After their separation in September 1941, Polish priests were starved, exhausted by work in harsh weather conditions, and subjected to mass medical experiments and torture (over 140 people). Some were simply beaten to death. Godless criminals, often non-believers, were brought into their barracks as room and block supervisors. Initially, as Father Urbański writes, services were necessarily limited to the evening prayer. Despite the above, priests from Block 26 sometimes managed to smuggle a fraction of the consecrated Host into the "Polish" block. " The particles... were divided into pieces the size of a grain of wheat. They were usually received on the block street in the morning before roll call, thus protected by the darkness of night."
Later, after the German defeats and the arrival of more sympathetic camp personnel and the replacement of block leaders, bread and wine were secretly obtained: "Some people summoned the courage to celebrate Mass in our block. Meanwhile, a vigilant guard kept watch in the living room. Amidst the enormous crowd, one of the priests, sitting at a table in striped camp clothing, using a glass to consecrate the wine, celebrated the much-anticipated Holy Mass." In 1944, the situation improved enough that food parcels began to include parts and accessories for celebrating Mass: " Over time, the sacristy of the 'spiritual fathers' in each room of our block was, though miniature, fully equipped." However, these parcels stopped arriving after the Soviets occupied Polish territories. Only in the autumn of 1944 were Poles "officially" allowed to attend camp services once a week.
Father John Bernard from Luxembourg, who arrived in Dachau on May 19, 1941, described his stay in his memoir, "Priestblock 25487. " He summarizes the beating of one of the Poles, under the pretext of his inability to learn camp songs, as follows: " It was an encounter with a completely alien, demonic world. Suddenly I understood what sadism was." On another occasion, a Polish priest was beaten for being caught stealing a piece of bread. As Czech priest Father Biedrich Hoffman writes in his monograph " And Who Will Kill You?" , German guards inflicted particular harassment on Poles on religious and national holidays, such as May 3, the feast of Our Lady Queen of Poland.
During the separation of Polish priests from German ones in September 1941, Father Bernard, along with, among others, Robert Regout, a lecturer at the University of Nijmegen, joined the Polish group and found himself in Barracks 28 (later 30), where they were greeted by the camp commandant Hofmann: "To imagine this speech, take the most vulgar expressions you know and mix them with the greatest nonsense you have ever heard from human lips. Add some mockery of the Pope and the Church, garnish the whole thing with a generous amount of 'priest rabble' and 'herd of priests' and you will have an approximate context in which only one message really mattered: 'the privileges you had until now have ended'... The new regime did not have to wait long. The next day we were no longer allowed access to wine, noon rest, and participation in Mass... Then Block 26 for German priests was surrounded by a new barbed wire barrier. This meant that we were cut off from the chapel, and when it became clear that we enjoyed spending an hour in which Mass was celebrated, lurking near the rear windows of the chapel; they were painted over with white paint. Soon after, our breviaries and rosaries were taken away. Religious practices of any kind were strictly forbidden." Later, when the autumn chill and frost set in, Father Bernard did not succumb to the temptation to be transferred to the "German" block at the instigation of the camp authorities.
Father Bernard described Christmas 1941 as follows: "Poles sing melancholic songs. A man with a wonderful voice sings the Gloria to the tune of an old chorale. Et in terra pax hominibus… The Polish bishop [Kozal] gives his comments. I don't understand much. May our sacrifice contribute to bringing peace to the world. The room foreman is beginning to get bored. He goes and brings companions from other rooms, and everyone sings O, du lieber Augustin. We go to bed sad and dreaming of home. (...) A few days later, a transport of 600 Polish priests arrives." Msgr. Kozal's presence is reassuring: " Benedictio Dei omnipotentis... The Bishop of Włocławek, Father Kozal, gives his blessing. Protestants also cross themselves. And we feel that the bishop's blessing gives meaning to our suffering, elevates it above what is purely human, and connects our small, personal suffering with the sea of suffering and persecution that the Church of Christ endures and must endure. His blessing gives us a share in the graces, consolation, and sources of strength that nourished the first Martyrs. Oh, the miracle of the Communion of saints, which becomes our experience here! Even our sleep is illuminated by a great certainty: et non prevalebunt... And the gates of hell will not prevail against it."
He was later released for 10 days to go home and bury his mother, hoping to use him as an opportunity to persuade the other five priests from Luxembourg to collaborate. He considered escaping, but fearing reprisals against his family, including his brother, who had vouched for his return, he returned to the camp. When Father Bernard was admitted to the infirmary, a Polish priest cared for him:
“The room is crowded and all the straw mattresses, over a hundred, are occupied. In many cases, three people occupy two mattresses. I encounter half-terrified, half-hostile glances from people clearly afraid of having to give up some of their own space. Then someone tugs at my shirt: come, lie down next to me. I understand Polish that much. And the man gives me a look as if saying: I'll make room for you in a moment. He's a priest, a professor at a Polish seminary. I don't remember feeling so comfortable in my entire life... The next evening I couldn't move. I had to lie on my back because with every movement I felt the water [from the swelling] stopping my heart. This night will be my last... In Dachau, at least, there was peace before God. My Polish neighbor secretly gave me absolution for the last time. I can truly say that in my entire life I have never felt so close to Heaven. Then I thought again of Luxembourg, of my dear family back home. And I told you a long list sins because of which I wanted to offer Him my life."
Father Bernard, however, survived, thanks to the help of people who managed to arrange an injection of medicine for him.
Another Dachau prisoner, a Pole, Father Leon Stępniak recalled (after: A. Jagodzińska: Dachau in the memories of priest-prisoners):
"In the second room, we had to strip naked and surrender everything, including personal belongings and religious objects: medallions, rosaries, breviaries, prayer books. I was deeply moved by that moment. Only suspenders and handkerchiefs were left. However, we managed to keep many devotional items. For example, Father Marian Szczerkowski... sewed his medallion of the Virgin Mary in the corner of a handkerchief and kept it that way until the end of his stay in Dachau. While I was working in the gardens on the plantation, an SS man took me to the forest to gather spruce branches. When he learned I was a priest, he took a rosary out of his pocket and gave it to me, saying that he had it from his mother and that when he was on leave, he would get a new one... This SS man was the son of a German from Belgium, from a Catholic family. He was drafted into the army and dressed in an SS uniform. The next day, such an SS man brought me two pieces of bread spread with margarine covered with sausage. I never saw him again... When the sun was warm, the work was bearable, but when it rained and snowed, it was terrible. Father Florian Stępniak, a Capuchin friar born in 1912, was so exhausted by work on the plantation that the camp commission placed him on the list of invalids. After a while, he was called, in alphabetical order, to Hartheim in Austria and killed... Work on the plantations was extremely exhausting. Even young priests died very quickly. My friend from the first years of middle school, Bolesław Rex, risked his life to drag me out of the plantation and transferred me to his commando. Vegetables and flowers were grown there.... There, you could eat something from the waste that was thrown into the compost."
Canon Fr. Mieczysław Januszczak recalled: " Hunger lasting not just one day, one month, one year, but two, three, four, or more. From hunger, non-healing wounds, dysentery, heart and kidney disease, urination up to 17 times a night, unquenchable thirst, and the drinks were killing." Father Casimir Hamerszmit: "For a time, two of us worked in the kennels. There were German shepherd dogs in separate cages. An SS man entered with a large bowl of porridge containing military biscuits. When he left, I said to my colleague: 'Let's get to work! Hold the dog and I'll take his food.' I poured the contents of the bowl into my hat. We locked the dog in and ate what was left behind behind the boards. Luckily, an SS man didn't encounter us, or we could have lost our lives."
A priest from Włocławek, rector of the local seminary, who died in 1962, Father Franciszek Korszyński arrived in Dachau together with Msgr. Michael Kozal on April 25, 1941. He wrote this in his memoir " Bright Rays in Dachau": "We are in the kitchen to get the food cauldrons. Everyone is holding on as best they can so as not to slip on the slippery floor, so as not to fall and bring down a hail of blows from the hands of the SS men lined up in a row. In front of me walks the already mentioned priest, Canon Straszewski, with someone else. He didn't fall, but the poor man got into the SS man's way in a different way, that is, he drew his attention, because this scoundrel starts beating his arched back with a stick. He beat mercilessly.... On the feast of the Name of Jesus, priest Dr. Edward Grzymała ..., having gathered a group of his colleagues, gave them a beautiful spiritual conference. The wicked room attendant found out about it and beat him cruelly for it, drawing blood... Father Grzymała was happy that he suffered for the Name of Jesus, about which he had previously He spoke so beautifully at that moment. The moral suffering of our priests and alumni was deeply painful when the godless Nazis tempted them to renounce their priestly vocation."
And so a brave rebuff " was given to the tempters in Dachau by alumnus Stanisław Grzesitowski. What they had not promised him! But he scorned all promises, preferred to continue enduring his terrible captivity rather than renounce the idea of priesthood. Some time later he died of hunger and ill-treatment, but remained faithful to his vocation... I will also mention Father Stanisław Kucharzak... One day in the spring of 1941, he was summoned to the camp office, to the political department. An SS officer received him politely, gave him three letters to read, in which the parishioners asked for his release, and then spoke to him in more or less the following words: "We are giving you the opportunity to return to freedom... We will make you an officer, we will give you the rank of major and a car at your disposal. But you must renounce the priesthood, break with your family, sign the list of German nationals and sign an undertaking that you will cooperated with us." Father Kucharzak replied that he could not do that because he was a Pole by birth and a Catholic priest, and therefore must be faithful to God, the Church, and the Homeland.
"With the arrival of parcels that, in addition to food, brought us hosts and sacramental wine at least once a week, we were fortunate enough to participate in Holy Mass celebrated secretly, catacomb-style.... Other fellow prisoners also requested Holy Communion. Therefore, recognizing the exceptional conditions of captivity and trusting that God in His goodness would not be angry with us if we departed from the liturgical regulations ..., we took the Lord Jesus with us to work, so that we could use this opportunity to communion with our colleagues."
The summer of 1942 proved critical: "When, however, around mid-1942, hunger greatly weakened our physical and mental strength, even our religious life suffered as a result, and to a serious degree: a person who becomes incapable of thinking due to exhaustion cannot rise to God in mind and heart, or at least it comes to him with great difficulty. Therefore, St. Thomas Aquinas rightly says that for a Christian to live a Christian life, he needs a certain minimum standard of living. And we did not have this minimum when we were dying of hunger like flies. But then came the food parcels, thanks to which we were revived physically and mentally. Then our religious life also revived... Both hosts and bottles of sacramental wine began to arrive in the food parcels. Thus, secretly from the camp authorities, but with some knowledge of some SS men, who then easily empathized with our desires, understanding their own interests – for we shared with them With our parcels – we began celebrating Holy Mass... Almost exclusively on Sunday mornings, when dawn was just beginning, we would set up sentries in the corner of the block, so that at any moment they could warn us of the approach of an undesirable, i.e., an SS man not yet initiated, not bribed. In the room, all its inhabitants, with great concentration and excitement, participated in the Holy Mass, which one of the priests offered on an ordinary table, with one or two small candles, using an ordinary camp mug, in ordinary camp attire, to the Lord of lords..."
As M. Gorajczyk writes ( The Fate of the Polish clergy imprisoned in German concentration camps in the years 1940-45 on the example of missionary fathers – prisoners of KL Auschwitz and KL Dachau ), the highest mortality rate of Polish clergy from hunger and murder (including especially the so-called transports of invalids) took place in 1942 (651).
On January 26, 1943, Msgr. Kozal died in the camp hospital, presumably suffering from typhus. Earlier, the German camp authorities had allowed him to celebrate Mass to mark the anniversary of his priestly ordination. The camp authorities refused a funeral, instead ordering his body to be cremated. Father A. Szymkiewicz wrote: White smoke billows over the crematorium / It quietly dissipated, leaving ashes / From behind the barbed wire of the camp, a small handful of prisoners / sent a sigh of sadness this way / And above, the sky, blue skies of hope, the sun! O, lux aeterna – luceat ei. Poles later clung to the Bishop of the French diocese of Clermont, Msgr. Gabriel Piguet, who arrived in Dachau in 1944. After the easing of restrictions, he even participated in a Polish Christmas carol evening in early 1945.
In his brief mentions of individual priests, Father Korszyński recalls, among others, Father Hilary – Paul Januszewski – prior of the Carmelites in Cracow: " in the prime of life, a serious and good man, a saintly monk. When the camp command appealed to Catholic priests to volunteer to care for the sick in the infected blocks, he was the first to volunteer. And as he said goodbye to his loved ones, he told himself he was going to certain death. And so it happened: he died, having contracted the infection from those he was caring for" [March 25, 1945]. Father Vincent Frelichowski shared his fate.
Father Urbański wrote about this epidemic of typhus and dysentery: " What does the death of the body mean compared to the eternal salvation of even a single soul?" Therefore, several priests volunteered to go to these blocks afflicted with typhus and diarrhea, realizing that by entering the quarantine gate they were bidding farewell to this world. Indeed, all of them, except Father Kubica, became infected and suffered from severe typhus, while Father Frelichowski and Father Hilary Januszewski sealed their priestly duty with death. A common characteristic of these "death blocks" was the desire for reconciliation with God. In Block 30, for example, there were a dozen or so different nationalities. Apart from the Jews, who were few in number, everyone asked for a priest. Even the Protestants confessed here that they had long been convinced that the Lutheran faith was not true, but human considerations had prevented them from converting to Catholicism. Now they accepted conditional baptism and with indescribable joy they were united with the true Church of Christ. However, the priest was unable to provide for everyone. It was very difficult to stay in such a filthy room for even one hour. There was a terrible stench of corpses there... I often saw people using a corpse as a pillow. Besides the stench of corpses, the room was filled with an unpleasant stench coming from the secretions of people suffering from diarrhea... This stench of corpses and the stench affected me so much that on the first day of entering such a room I literally felt a physical trembling in my knees and had to leave immediately to avoid falling down from fainting. I should emphasize that by nature I am not very sensitive to these things, and over four years in the camps I had become accustomed to corpses like a miner to coal.... After eighteen days in that 30th block, I contracted typhus. It was at the end of February 1945.... After enduring typhus and due to complications, I was as weak as a few-month-old baby.... I regretted nothing. The most important thing was that I had given Christ to the dying. The Eucharistic Jesus came to these dying skeletons, these stinking slaves, abandoned here by the entire world, and made them free: free with a freedom that no more imposing human or devilish violence would disturb."
Father Dominic Jędrzejewski, parish priest from Gosławice [born 1886], as Father Korszyński writes, was: "a wonderful priestly figure, radiating goodness. He rejected the offer of regaining his freedom at the price of renouncing his priestly functions. Well-read and experienced, he willingly shared his knowledge, especially with the alumni who clung to him. Exhausted of physical strength, to the last, he did not complain about anyone. He readily accepted the help of stronger colleagues who carried him to work on their backs. He died of exhaustion at work on August 29, 1942."
Fr. Francis Miśka: " Director of the Salesian Fathers' Institute in Lad, where we were imprisoned. With his great kindness and tact towards the prisoners, his courage towards the Nazis and his ability to resolve even difficult matters with them, he won the minds and hearts of all of us. In Dachau... he built on his optimism and patience in enduring the suffering he experienced, especially due to a leg ailment. Unfortunately, he died shortly thereafter, on May 30, 1942."
Fr. Emil Szramek – a well-known patriotic activist in Silesia before the war, "in the camp he was distinguished by his piety and strong spirit. He died... on January 13, 1942." Fr. Paul Prabucki – celebrant of camp Masses in the chapel in Block 26 until September 17, 1941, previously also a celebrant in the Sachsenhausen camp died of exhaustion on August 30, 1942, his brother priests also died in Dachau – Father Aloise Prabucki (July 17, 1942) and Father Boleslaus Prabucki (August 12, 1942). Father Boleslaus Szkiłądź, in his twenties (born 1914), " a student at the Gregorian University in Rome. After earning his bachelor's degree, he went to Poland to spend the holidays with his family, but then, immediately after the outbreak of the war, the Gestapo arrested him. He was brought via Stutthof and Sachsenhausen to Dachau, where he spent almost five years. Despite the greatest persecution, he maintained his composure and serenity. He was one of those who risked his life to care for the sick in the infected blocks." He survived the camp but died at the age of 44, in 1958.
More biographies intertwined with the camp and other places of torture for Poles and clergy: Father Stanisław Werenik from Czarna Wieś in the Vilnius diocese was among the oldest (born 1883). On September 19, 1939, he fled west from the Soviets. Arrested in early April 1940 by the Gestapo, he became the first Polish priest to arrive in Dachau on April 19, 1940. As Father Korszyński writes: " older, but full of life and sometimes humor. Good, kind, helpful, and therefore respected and liked... As the priest who had been in Dachau the longest, he celebrated a solemn thanksgiving service after liberation." He died in 1964. Father Ludwik Syrewicz (born 1889), formerly dean in Rivne, Lutsk diocese. He arrived in Dachau only in June 1944, after being arrested on January 11, 1944. He had previously witnessed the massacres of Poles by Ukrainians in Volhynia. Father Korszyński writes of him laconically: " Before he was brought to Dachau, he had suffered greatly, and therefore was sick and physically weak. However, spiritually, he was in very good health. With his culture and kindness, he won over the minds and hearts of those around him." He died in 1947, as the parish priest of a parish in Warmia.
Father Urbański adds that out of gratitude to Our Lady for the proofs of Her protection, the priests in Dachau consecrated themselves to Her Immaculate Heart. “ The joint act of the entire Polish clergy there, dedicating each one individually, as well as the entire block 28, to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, was sorrowful, full of deep faith and filled with love and gratitude... The act of consecration took place simultaneously in all rooms, and from then on, each room had, usually hidden, but at the end visible, an image of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. In the fourth room, there was a beautiful bas-relief, which Father Franciszek Nowak had made in the evenings over several weeks with chisels and a penknife. Shortly before our liberation by the Americans, we also made a joint act of entrusting ourselves to the care of St. Joseph... We often recalled the numerous proofs through which the Mother of God appeared to us as the Comforter of the Afflicted, especially the feast of the Immaculate Conception in 1940 [ when the camp regime was slightly relaxed – author's note] and the Annunciation in 1941... During our nearly five-year stay in At Dachau, Catholic priests saw firsthand that Jesus, though now invisible, seemingly weak—hidden under the species of bread—is nevertheless Almighty... They further learned that the Mother of God is truly the Comforter of the Afflicted. They finally learned that the Church of Christ stands on such a rock that the gates of hell will never prevail."
The liberation of Dachau took place on Sunday, April 29, 1945, when in the afternoon an American unit belonging to General George Patton's 7th Army entered the camp.
As Fr. Korszyński writes, after liberation, all the priests were unanimous: "We were all in favor of building a temple at the site of the crime and suffering, where constant adoration would take place. Of course, a priest specially delegated by the church authorities would have to be present there. There was even talk of a male or female religious order dedicated to this. And not only we, the priests, keenly felt the need for expiation at the camp site, but also lay former prisoners spoke in favor of it... I would not like to see this basilica as a 'basilica in memory of those murdered in Dachau'. I would rather see it as an Expiation Shrine, where in various ways acts of reparation to God for the insults committed there would take place... The external surroundings of the temple would have to be appropriately adapted. In any case, all the disgusting blocks and other shacks that existed in the camp during the times of captivity, and above all the barbed wire, would have to disappear, The watchtowers and everything that might in any way remind us of our misery. The camp gate could probably remain, as it's quite distinctive, but instead of the inscription: Konzentrationslager Dachau, it should have the inscription: Sanctuarium Expiatorum in Dachau, and instead of the words: Arbeit macht frei, I would insert the words of St. Paul: Ubi abundavit delictum, superabundat gratia – where crime abounded, grace abounds all the more [Romans 5:20].
May DACHAU – GOLGOTHA become DACHAU – SANCTUARY!”
Impious, anti-Christ ideology survived in other guises than German National Socialism. The pious plan of Father Korszyński and his fellow Dachau prisoners unfortunately did not come true. Nor was a basilica built at Auschwitz, the site of Father Maximilian Maria Kolbe's death.