Treblinka photographs

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Introduction to the Treblinka site together with some photographs taken by deputy commandant Kurt Franz and discovered in his home and the time of his arrest in 1959 in West Germany.

Kurt Franz was born in 1914 in Düsseldorf. His father was a merchant and he also had a sister. After attending the elementary school in Düsseldorf for 12 years, he worked as a cook for the restaurant "Hirschquelle" before he gave his final exam.

He enlisted in the German army in 1935 and eventually entered service in the SS. He was sent into the Buchenwald concentration camp before being transferred in 1939 of the Action T4 'euthanasia' project.

In late 1941 or early 1942 he was sent to the Belzec death camp. Later he assumed the post of deputy commandant at the Treblinka camp under Franz Stangl. Stangl later suggested that he was frightened of Franz.

Franz was known for his unusual amount of cruelty and sadism. Franz had a dog Barry which had originally belonged to Stangl. The dog was a Saint Bernard which is usually a very friendly breed. This dog however had a mixture of another breed which may have been the cause for its violence. The dog was trained to bite the genitalia of the prisoners under the command 'Man get that Dog'. However once out of Franz's possession the dog behaved normally and died in 1948 in the care of a doctor in Ostrów Mazowiecki..
During the revolt in Treblinka on 2 August 1943, Franz was visiting a lady friend in Kosów Lacki and was too drunk to do anything about the escape.
He was also drunk when arrested in 1959 when these photographs were found by the police. In 1965 he was sentenced to life. During his imprisonment he complained that he got a life sentence whilst others got off and was very bitter that he had not been released for his wife's funeral in 1992. He was released in 1993 for health reasons. Kurt Franz died in Wuppertal in June 1998.
Franz along with Wagner from Sobibór and their superior Christian Wirth are amongst the most cruel sadists of the war.


My channel is one of the most prolific from Poland, although not amongst the most visited. With almost one film per day, one may be forgiven for thinking I do nothing else but I do have a day job as well. I have produced around 1,000 original films, most in English but also in Polish, French, Italian, Spanish and the occasional hint of German and Hebrew. My big interest in life is travel and history but I have also placed films on other subjects

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There are a number of films here on the packaging industry. This is because I am the publisher of Central and Eastern European Packaging -- http://www.ceepackaging.com - the international platform for the packaging industry in this region focusing on the latest innovations, trends, design, branding, legislation and environmental issues with in-depth profiles of major industry achievers.

Most people may think packaging pretty boring but it possibly effects your life more than you really imagine!

Central and Eastern European Packaging examines the packaging industry throughout this region, but in particular in the largest regional economies which are Russia, Germany, Poland, Czech Republic, Ukraine and Austria. That is not to say that the other countries are forgotten, they are not, but obviously there is less going on. However the fact that there are so many travel related films here is not from holidays but from business trips attending trade fairs around the region. Every packaging trade fair is a new excuse to make another film!

In 1997 I founded Polish Business News http://www.pbn.com.pl .There are a number of business related films here and I intend to do many more on CRM (customer relations management).

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