Volume IV: Camps and Other Detention Facilities under the German Armed Forces
Encyclopedia

LUFTWAFFE SONDERLAGER OST

Alexander Kruglov
Translated by Kathleen Luft

The Wehrmacht established Luftwaffe Sonderlager Ost with an order on October 22, 1943, and it remained in operation [End Page 542] until December 1944. It was located in Sudauen (today Suwałki, Poland), in Defense District (Wehrkreis) I (map 4c).

The camp was subordinated to the commander of Air District (Luftgau) I.

The table below shows the number of prisoners in the camp on selected dates in 1943 and 1944:1

Date Prisoners Officers
December 1, 1943 26 18
January 1, 1944 30 20
February 1, 1944 27 18
April 1, 1944 26 14
May 1, 1944 28 18
June 1, 1944 21 12
July 1, 1944 21 12

The camp held Soviet Air Force officers. On January 1, 1944, there were 30 prisoners in the camp.2 Specific information on conditions in the camp is not available, but indications are that they were generally good.

SOURCES

Primary source material about Luftwaffe Sonderlager Ost is located in BA-MA (RL 23); and BArch B 162/18251.

Additional information about Luftwaffe Sonderlager Ost can be found in the following publications: Gianfranco Mattiello and Wolfgang Vogt, Deutsche Kriegsgefangenen- und Internierten-Einrichtungen 1939–1945. Handbuch und Katalog: Lagergeschichte und Lagerzensurstempel, vol. 2 (Koblenz: self-published, 1987); Czesław Pilichowski, Obozy hitlerowskie na ziemiach polskich 1939–1945. Informator encyklopedyczny (Warsaw: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, 1979), p. 482.

NOTES

1. The table is based on the following source: OKW/Kriegsgef. Org. (Id), Bestand an Kriegsgefangenen im Ost- u. Südostgebiet u. in Norwegen, 1942–1944, in BArch B 162/18251 (Bestandsmeldungen Kriegsgefangenen/Oflag-Stalag).

2. Pilichowski, Obozy hitlerowskie, p. 482.

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