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

The small town of Soest (map 4a), the site of Oflag VI A, is located in the central part of present-day Germany, on the eastern edge of the Ruhr region. With 25,000 inhabitants (as of 1939), Soest was the seat of government for the Soest kreis and the major town of the region known as the Soest Börde, one of Germany’s most fertile agricultural areas. Soest was important to the wartime economy because it was home to one of the German railroad system’s largest classification yards; a large transit camp for civilian forced laborers, operated by the regional employment office; and a factory belonging to the firm Akku Hagen, which manufactured batteries.

The prisoner of war (POW) camp was set up on Meiningser Weg, the road from Soest to Neheim, in a military barracks that was under construction at the time. Originally, the plan was to use the facility as a POW camp as early as the fall of 1939. In the end, Oflag VI A was not organized until June 1940, through a reorganization of Stalag VI E. It was guarded by Reserve Battalions (Landesschützenbataillone) XVI/VI (later renamed 466), XX/VI (later renamed 478), and 489.

The plan called for four buildings as housing for around 2,000 officers, aided by approximately 600 orderlies, and an [End Page 244] administration area (Vorlager), where the camp administration was located. From the end of 1943, the outbuildings provided space for a large work detachment of Soviet POWs. Organizationally, however, the work detachment was not part of Oflag VI A but rather of Stalag VI A (also in Soest), whose accommodations had been destroyed in a bombing raid. During the final phase of the war, the superior authority of the Oflag, the Commander of Prisoners of War in Defense District VI (Kommandeur der Kriegsgefangenen im Wehrkreis VI), was also located in these barracks.

In June 1940, when the first POWs—Belgian officers—arrived, the buildings scheduled to house them had not yet been completed. Some of the officers had to sleep in the garages where the Soviet POWs were later lodged. In November 1940, the expansion of the camp was finished, and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) assessed it as follows: “Magnificent camp, even according to the man of confidence [Vertrauensmann].”

The Germans also held Dutch officers in the camp. In July 1940, when the Belgians were moved to Oflag III B in Tibor (today Cibórz, Poland), the Dutch occupied the best quarters, so the French who had arrived in the meantime had to make do with what remained. In November 1940, the Dutch, too, left the camp. From then, until Oflag VI A was closed, it was considered a French camp, if one disregards the work detachment of Soviet POWs also housed there.

Because the group of French officers included men who had been highly qualified professionals in the civilian world, and because the officers had an abundance of free time, a lively cultural life soon developed, as in other Oflags, with support from their home country and the international aid organizations. The POWs could have newspapers and periodicals sent from their homeland; the library, with 25,000 volumes, was larger than the German city library in Soest at that time. Like other camps for officers, Oflag VI A had a camp university, a theater, an orchestra, a cabaret, a jazz band, and other activities.

Although the prisoners received reduced rations rather than the full portions of barracked soldiers—in violation of international law—they did not suffer want, because they received additional provisions from their home country. On average, every French POW got approximately 2.5 kilograms (5.5 pounds) of additional foodstuffs per month. Also, there were precious items such as cigarettes, which could be either used to bribe the guards or sold for cash.

In accordance with the agreements between the Vichy government and the German Reich, the Pétain movement was in charge of the camp at first. There was a Cercle Pétain, which also supplied the surrounding Stalags and work detachments with propaganda material. As the western Allies—and thus de Gaulle also—gained in military strength, the influence of the Pétain supporters diminished. Beginning in 1942, a de Gaulle movement arose. But there were other political movements as well, such as a Breton separatists’ group and a group with an antisemitic orientation. The extent to which this is related to the presence in the camp of one of the most prominent Jewish officers, Lieutenant Alain de Rothschild, is unknown.

In the POW camp system as a whole, the POW groups most inclined to try to escape were the British and the Dutch. Because there were very few British or Dutch prisoners in Soest, it is not surprising that only one sizable escape attempt took place. It occurred on May 8, 1941; of the 14 French participants, only 10 actually managed to get out of the camp before the attempted escape was discovered. The escape culminated in success for only 3 of the 10.

In accordance with the majority situation in the French population, the Catholic faith was the prevailing religion in the camp, and the prisoner population included a number of priests. As early as 1940, a chapel was set up in an attic room, decorated in the French national colors. In addition, there was a small Protestant community and a Masonic lodge.

As previously mentioned, in 1940 the camp initially won high praise from the ICRC inspectors. As time passed, however, the prisoner population increased from around 2,000 to twice that number. The food became worse and worse, and the length of the captivity was a strain on the prisoners’ nerves. In 1942, inspectors described the relationship between the prisoners and the camp administration, highly praised at the outset, only as “strict and correct.” From the fall of 1943 onward, the heating and power supply no longer functioned properly. Beginning in the summer of 1944, postal service to the home country functioned only intermittently. In 1944, there was still recognition that the camp commandant was making an effort, but the overall condition of the camp was categorized as unacceptable. The situation became even more acute in the fall of 1944 and early 1945, when Oflags VI A and VI D also were moved to Soest. In total, there were approximately 5,000 French officers in the Soest camp.

Even though the living conditions deteriorated drastically as the war continued, the mortality rate remained low. There are 15 French prisoners buried in the camp cemetery. The greatest losses were caused by the Allied bombing raid on December 5, 1944, which was followed by other air raids, as well as strafing from low-flying Allied aircraft. On April 6, 1945, the camp was liberated by American troops, and the French POWs were repatriated within a few weeks.