2-611-828 - Keystone Archives/Heritage Images

Anniversary ceremony of the liberation of Buchenwald concentration camp, Paris, 20th century. Built in 1937, Buchenwald was one of the largest concentration camps on German soil. A number of prominent French politicians and resistance fighters were imprisoned at the camp during the Second World War. Although Buchenwald was not conceived specifically as an extermination camp, an estimated 56,545 prisoners died there before it was liberated by the Americans in April 1945. The main causes of death were starvation, illness and the effects of hard labour, as well as summary executions and horrific medical experiments.