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

The Wehrmacht established Stalag 367 (map 5) on October 17, 1941, in Defense District (Wehrkreis) VIII, from the staff of Oflag VIII B in Silberberg.¹ From November 1941 to July 1944, the camp was located in Tschenstochau (today Częstochowa, Poland), in the Generalgouvernement. Stalag 367 had two sub-camps (Zweiglager). The first, known as Stalag 367/Z, was established on September 2, 1942, on the site of the former Stalag 237 in Petrikau (today Piotrków Trybunalski, Poland). The second, in Kielce was transferred from Stalag 319 to Stalag 367 in April 1944.² In August 1944, the main camp of Stalag 367 was relocated to Tillowitz (today Tułowice, Poland) in Upper Silesia.³ While deployed in Tschenstochau, the camp was subordinate to the Commander of Prisoners of War with the Armed Forces Commander, Generalgouvernement of Poland (Kommandeur der Kriegsgefangenen beim Wehrmachtsbefehlshaber Generalgouvernement Polen). Stalag 367 received the field post number (Feldpostnummer) 18 392 between July 19, 1941, and February 14, 1942. The number was struck on October 6, 1944.

The first commandant of Stalag 367 was Major Kubalek, who was previously the commandant of Oflag VIII B. His successor was Oberstleutnant Hugo von der Marwitz, who was in turn followed by Oberstleutnant Hölzinger. The counterintelligence (Abwehr) officer in the camp was Hauptmann Jankowski. The adjutant was Hauptmann Lang and his deputy was Oberleutnant Zwinger. The camp staff comprised about 60 men in total. The camp was guarded by about 100 men from the 561st Reserve Battalion (Landesschützenbataillon).

From November 1941 to August 1943, Stalag 367 held only Soviet prisoners of war (POWs). In September 1943, Italian military prisoners were sent to the camp. The maximum population of the camp was 10,468 prisoners in April 1944.⁴ Stalag 367 consisted of two separate camp facilities: the “northern camp” (Nordlager), which was located near the city, and the “Warthe camp” (Warthelager)—named for the Warta River (German: Warthe), which flows through Tschenstochau—located about 4 or 5 kilometers (2.5–3 miles) outside the city. The northern camp, established on the site of the former Zawady barracks, had stone buildings, while the Warthe camp was composed of wooden barracks.⁵

The conditions in both sections of the camp were similar to those in other camps for Soviet POWs. The camp was badly overcrowded and the prisoners faced malnutrition and disease due to inadequate food supplies and medical care. In addition, they had to perform forced labor and were abused by the guards. The terrible conditions in the camp resulted in a high mortality rate, mainly due to starvation and diseases such as typhus and dysentery, particularly in the winter of 1941–1942.⁶ As in other camps for Soviet POWs, newly arrived Soviet prisoners were screened to separate out “undesirables,” such as Jews and political commissars, who were executed near the camp by a Security Service (Sicherheitsdienst, SD) commando led by Kriminal-Oberassistent Othmar Fleckl.⁷ According to a Polish commission for investigation of Nazi crimes, 16,393 Soviet prisoners and 20 Italian prisoners perished in the camp at Tschenstachau.⁸ The same Polish commission estimated that about 11,200 prisoners died in the subcamp in Kielce, although this figure includes deaths at the camp prior to its incorporation into the Stalag 367 complex.⁹ The camp was dissolved shortly after its relocation to Tillowitz, on August 17, 1944.¹⁰