Dachau remembered - 80 years later

The Dachau concentration camp opened on March 22, 1933. It was the first SS-run camp for "political prisoners" under Hitler's regime and became a model for the many SS prison camps that followed. Located in southern Germany, Dachau remained open until 1945 when it was liberated by U.S. troops. Approximately 200,000 people were detained during these years and an estimated 41,500 died.

This group portrait of former political prisoners in the newly-liberated Dachau concentration camp was taken by Colonel Alexander Zabin, an American soldier from Long Island, New York who visited Dachau in mid-May 1945.

Credit: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Colonel Alexander Zabin