Children in Ravensbrück
The arrival lists of Ravensbrück named 881 children aged two to 16 years from 18 different nations committed to the camp between 1939 and 1945. Among them were 263 Jewish children and 162 “gypsy” children. Most of them came with their mothers, fathers or other relatives.
Larger groups of mothers with children arrived after the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising in late 1944 and in connection with the deportations of Hungarian and Slovak Jewish women starting at the turn of the year 1944-45.
The children had to line up for the roll calls together with the women, which often required them to stand for hours. During the day, they had to stay indoors. When they were 12, they had to work in the workshops. Boys at the age of 12 were moved to the men’s camp.
The camp administration regarded the children as superfluous ballast and useless eaters. Yet the children were especially tormented by hunger, and the memory of it is unforgotten to this day.
There are numerous reports about “camp mothers”, women who took charge of children left alone, trying to help them survive.
Some, indeed, managed to do so.
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