Gusen

When the Mauthausen Camp became overcrowded in 1939, subcamps were established a few miles west of the Mauthausen Camp to house inmates near to their worksites. Eventually, three such camps near the creek Gusen were established, named Gusen I through III.

Of particular interest for Holocaust historiography is the cremation furnace established at the Gusen I Camp, which was almost identical to the furnaces set up at the Auschwitz Main Camp. Extant records of the Gusen furnace’s operation allow insights into those at Auschwitz. (See the entry on crematoria.)

Gusen is also of interest to Holocaust historians due to claims that one of the three Gusen camps supposedly had a homicidal gas chamber. This tale is exclusively based on eyewitness claims of the late 1960s. Orthodox historians claim that a few improvised homicidal gassings allegedly occurred either in some barracks, or that the camp’s fumigation chamber was used for it, although it had windows which would have been shattered by hypothetical victims. (For more, see Mattogno 2016e, pp. 143f.)

This gassing facility was supposedly set up during the final months of the war, hence after the Himmler order in late 1944, alleged by Kurt Becher, that no more exterminations should happen. It is more likely that inmates evacuated from Auschwitz to Mauthausen and Gusen brought along Auschwitz rumors of gas chambers, and that these rumors were then also spread at and about the Gusen Camps.

Politically speaking, Gusen must have had a homicidal gas chamber, because every memorial site or museum about a German wartime concentration camp demands such a prime tourist attraction. Furthermore, no inmate testifying about homicidal gas chambers can ever be accused of being untruthful, or else prosecutors in many European countries turn their attention to the skeptic.