The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945

The Wehrmacht established Oflag II E (map 4b) on September 23, 1940, in Neubrandenburg, Germany, which was part of Defense District (Wehrkreis) II.¹ The Germans had placed Polish prisoners of war (POWs) of all ranks in Stalag II A. After a time, they separated the officers and placed them in garages in a nearby military base while Oflag II E was under construction. The camp complex was also referred to as “Lager Fünfeichen,” after the former estate on which it was located (now within the city limits of Neubrandenburg).

Oflag II E was subordinate to the Commander of Prisoners of War in Defense District II (Kommandeur der Kriegsgefangenen im Wehrkreis II). The first commandant was Oberstleutnant Gärtner, an elderly former policeman and World War I veteran. His adjutant was Hauptmann Maurer. Gärtner was succeeded as commandant by Oberst Freiherr von Steinecker in the summer of 1942. The counterintelligence (Abwehr) officer in the camp was Hauptmann Georg Pawlas, the camp officer was Captain Walter Pockrandt, and the administrative group was headed by Oberzahlmeister Walter Moldenhauer.²

For nearly three years, Oflag II E held only Polish POWs: roughly 2,300–2,500 officers and 140–350 orderlies (the exception being March 1941, when there were 454 Belgian officers and 80 enlisted men in the camp). In the spring of 1944, a smaller number of Soviet and Dutch POWs replaced the Poles.³

Conditions in the camp were generally in keeping with the 1929 Geneva Convention on the Treatment of Prisoners of War. The prisoners were guarded by Landesschützen personnel. They lived in a collection of buildings including garages that had formerly belonged to a German armored division, as well as a group of wooden barracks about 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) away from the main camp. The prisoners in the “garage camp” lived in double bunk beds. Most of the cultural activities for Polish officers took place in the “garage camp.” These activities included a choir, an orchestra, and a theater troupe; these groups remained intact after their members were transferred from Oflag II A in 1940. The orchestra and choir performed a program of classical symphonies, while the theater troupe performed popular Polish comedies of the interwar period. The prisoners also organized courses and [End Page 233] lectures in subjects such as mathematics, philosophy, economics, geography, and architecture. They also played sports and organized a “camp Olympics.”⁴

The Germans transferred the majority of the prisoners to other camps on February 29, 1944.⁵ Oflag II E was then redesignated Oflag 67.