HELL BEHIND THE PICTURE

© Jeff Gusky ‘Birkenau Silhouette’ Auschwitz, Poland 1996

A newly liberated prisoner stands beside a pile of human ashes and bones, Buchenwald, April 1945.

Buchenwald, April 1945

Prisoners at Buchenwald during the camp's liberation by American forces, April 1945.

Prisoners at Buchenwald gaze from behind barbed wire during the camp's liberation by American forces, April 1945.

Prisoners, too emaciated to walk, at Buchenwald during the camp's liberation by American forces, April 1945.

Survivors gaze at photographer Margaret Bourke-White and rescuers from the United States Third Army during the liberation of Buchenwald, April 1945.

Prisoners at Buchenwald display their identification tattoos shortly after camp's liberation by Allied forces, April 1945.

As German officers and Weimar civilians bear witness, after Buchenwald's liberation, to atrocities committed at the camp, a dummy in striped prisoner garb hangs from a gallows Ñ a gruesome demonstration of one of the many public ways that inmates were murdered at the camp.

The dead at Buchenwald, April 1945.

German civilians are forced by American troops to bear witness to Nazi atrocities at Buchenwald concentration camp, mere miles from their own homes, April 1945. 

German civilians are forced by American troops to bear witness to Nazi atrocities at Buchenwald concentration camp, mere miles from their own homes, April 1945.

The remains of an incinerated prisoner inside a Buchenwald cremation oven, April 1945.

Buchenwald, 1945

All images © MARGARET BOURKE-WHITE—TIME & LIFE PICTURES/GETTY IMAGES