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

The Wehrmacht established the headquarters of Oflag X C in September 1939; however, it apparently did not begin operation until the following year. In June 1940, the camp was deployed in Lübeck, in Defense District (Wehrkreis) X. Beginning in the fall of 1941, the camp was also used as a penal camp (Straflager; also referred to as a special camp or Sonderlager) for officers from other camps who had committed serious violations of camp rules or attempted to escape.¹ Oflag X C was subordinate to the Commander of Prisoners of War in Defense District X (Kommandeur der Kriegsgefangenen im Wehrkreis X).

Oflag X C was located in a former artillery barracks situated on a sandy area on the outskirts of Lübeck.² The camp initially made up of 16 wooden barracks, each of which consisted of 14 rooms of varying sizes. The smaller rooms, which had single beds, held between 3 and 10 prisoners, while the larger rooms held 16–18 men and had double bunk beds. In general, higher-ranking officers lived in smaller rooms. All prisoners had a straw mattress and two blankets. The rooms were generally sufficiently ventilated during the day but became stuffy at night because the prisoners were required to close the windows. The prisoners were deloused upon arrival and had access to bathing facilities in their barracks. They operated their own kitchen facilities, which were generally adequate. The camp infirmary treated only minor illnesses and injuries, since it only had one exam room and one surgery; more seriously ill prisoners were sent to the prisoner hospital in Sandbostel.³

The first commandant of the camp was Oberstleutnant von Wachmeister. In July 1941, he was replaced by Oberst von Fuchs, who remained at the camp until March 1943, when he was replaced by Oberstleutnant Janssen. The final commandant was Oberst Berndt, who replaced Janssen in October 1943.⁴ The camp held American, Belgian, British and Commonwealth, French, Greek, Polish, Serbian, and Soviet officers. The first prisoners were French officers transferred to the camp in Lübeck from Oflag X A in Itzehoe in June 1940.⁵ As of September 10, 1940, there were 1,197 French officers, 355 French orderlies, and 1 Belgian orderly in the camp.⁶ The first Polish prisoners arrived in October 1940, although there was not a permanent Polish contingent in the camp until November 1941. The French officers were transferred out of the camp (mainly to Oflag X D in Hamburg-Fischbek) to make room for the Polish prisoners in the spring of 1941.⁷ The first Serbian officers arrived in June 1941 but were only present for a short time; a small but permanent population of Serbian prisoners arrived beginning in April 1942. British and American prisoners were first brought to the camp in August 1941: the British prisoners were mainly RAF soldiers transferred from Dulag Luft West in Oberursel and British army (including Australian and New Zealander) personnel captured in Greece, while the Americans were airmen from Stalag Luft 1 in Barth.⁸ The British and American prisoners were transferred to Oflag VI B in Warburg on October 7, 1941.⁹ There was one Soviet officer in the camp from June 1942 to October 1943. The camp reached its maximum population with 1,836 officers and 188 orderlies in February 1942.¹⁰

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Oflag X C at Lübeck. French POWs and their barracks, March 1944.

COURTESY OF ICRC.

Although the Germans generally treated captured officers well and observed the provisions of the Geneva Convention of 1929, British officers living in Oflag X C reported that the conditions were often quite difficult. Their food rations consisted of 200–300 grams (7–10.6 ounces) of bread with a tablespoon of margarine or other fat and a tablespoon of potted meat or horsemeat every morning, with a tablespoon of ersatz jam or whey cheese once every two weeks at breakfast, and a bowl of cabbage soup and three or four [End Page 264] boiled potatoes at lunch and dinner, with a cup of mint tea at each meal and an occasional piece of blutwurst in the evening. The prisoners found these rations, which amounted to between 1,400 and 1,500 calories, insufficient for their dietary needs.¹¹ Many of the British and Commonwealth prisoners in the camp lost significant amounts of weight and were given double Red Cross rations after their arrival at Oflag VI B to help them regain weight.¹² In addition, the German Feldwebel who ran the kitchen often stole the prisoners’ food rations to sell on the black market. Red Cross food parcels were only delivered intermittently, and the camp canteen was poorly stocked. The prisoners received 20 cigarettes per week.¹³

Medical care was provided in the camp (mainly by prisoner physicians), although it was often not sufficient due to shortages of both personnel and supplies.¹⁴ British army prisoners captured in southeastern Europe, who were frequently ill with dysentery and malaria when they arrived, were particularly badly affected by these shortcomings. Many prisoners lacked sufficient clothing, as the Germans took the prisoners’ good British uniforms and replaced them with surplus French or Polish uniforms. The coal ration was very small—one and a half briquettes per room every two days—which meant that the prisoners’ quarters were often not sufficiently heated. The camp became very crowded and the atmosphere in the camp was described as “spiritless.” The prisoners’ morale was made even worse by the camp commandant, an “old Prussian” who hated the British prisoners. However, in early October, shortly before their transfer to Oflag VI B, an American embassy official visited the prisoners, noted their complaints, and relayed them to Geneva, which resulted in increased food and cigarette rations and the delivery of Red Cross parcels, which were subsequently shipped to Warburg along with the prisoners. The prisoners were taken to Warburg in open cattle trucks, a trip that took 36 hours.¹⁵

The French officers at Oflag X C also reported that the conditions in the camp were difficult early in their captivity but improved somewhat over time. Some of the French prisoners were simply officers who had been captured by the Germans, but others were prisoners who had attempted to escape from other camps—such as Oflag IV C at Colditz—or were classified as “refractory” or “anti-German” (deutschfeindlich). Although Oflag X C was intended to be a place of stricter confinement for these prisoners, there were, nonetheless, escape attempts. Between January and May 1944, at least 14 prisoners escaped from the camp and were recaptured; 11 of these prisoners were deported to the Mauthausen concentration camp after they were recaptured. The prisoners engaged in clandestine political activities in the camp, forming a “popular front” of socialist, communist, and various other radical orientations.¹⁶

French officer Antony Sternberg was one of the prisoners who was transferred to Oflag X C from Oflag IV C. His group left Colditz late in the morning of May 28, 1942, and arrived at Lübeck at noon the following day.¹⁷ Among the prisoners who were shipped to Oflag X C at this time was Captain Robert Blum, son of the former French Socialist prime minister Léon Blum (who was himself imprisoned at Buchenwald from 1943 to 1945). Blum was taken out of the regular barracks and kept in solitary confinement in a special barrack for prominent prisoners. One of the other prisoners who was held in this barrack was Lieutenant Iakov Dzhugashvili, Joseph Stalin’s son, who later died at the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. According to Sternberg, Dzhugashvili received no letters or packages from outside the camp during his time there.¹⁸ Sternberg also recalled an incident in which a Polish officer who had gone out for a walk around the camp for exercise prior to reveille was shot by a German officer.¹⁹ Sternberg and most of the other French officers who were sent to Oflag X C from Oflag IV C remained there until the liberation of the camp.

Strict discipline was enforced on the prisoners who were sent to Oflag X C as punishment for their actions in other camps. The German officers in the camp were given orders to shoot without warning if the prisoners interacted with civilians outside the camp, threw objects through the fence, attempted to climb the fence or flee from the camp by other means, stole camp property, left their barracks without permission, or even stood too close to the camp gate. These prisoners were also required to wear an identification card with their photo around their neck, which was periodically inspected by the guards. The approximately 60 Jewish officers were kept separate from the other officers in a special barrack marked with a Star of David. The majority of the French doctors in the camp—who were not allowed to practice medicine—were Jewish. However, the Jewish prisoners were only kept separate from the other prisoners at night; they were able to interact freely with one another during the day.²⁰

Information about the cultural and recreational activities during the British and American officers’ time in Oflag X C is limited. However, by March 1942, the remaining prisoners in the camp had begun to develop a cultural life within the camp. A YMCA delegate reported that the prisoners had organized educational courses on a variety of subjects and that there was a 20-man orchestra in the camp.²¹ One of the French officers in the camp, Lieutenant Fernand Braudel, was a historian who taught courses in the camp university and wrote a book, La Méditerranée et le mond méditerranéan à l’époque de Philippe II (The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Period of Philip II) while imprisoned there, receiving materials he needed for his research and sending chapters to Paris via the International Committee of the Red Cross.²² There was a Polish Catholic priest who conducted religious services in the camp. The prisoners also requested additional sports equipment.²³ By October 1942, the prisoners had built up a library in the camp that totaled 5,775 volumes and a number of sports had been organized, including lawn bowling, table tennis, and boxing.²⁴ [End Page 265]

Oflag X C was liberated by British forces on May 9, 1945.²⁵ The prisoners were gradually repatriated over the following weeks.²⁶