Table of Contents
Map of Belgium during World War II vi
Definitions of Terms Used in This Book ix
Introduction xii
The First Prisoners: September-December 1940
1 The Arrest of Israel Neumann 8
2 Building Breendonk 15
3 Facing the Wall 24
4 The First Prisoners of Room 1 34
5 The Artist of Room 1 42
6 Watching the Prisoners 47
7 The Zugfuhrer of Room 1 53
8 A Day at Breendonk 59
The First Deaths: January-June 1941
9 Changes 72
10 The First Escape 77
11 Despair 84
12 A Picture-Perfect Camp 91
Camp of the Creeping Death: June 1941-June 1942
13 Operation Solstice 100
14 Prisoner Number 59 105
15 A Substitution 111
16 The Rivals 117
17 The Plant Eaters 124
18 My 24, 1941 133
19 The Hell of Breendonk 139
20 The First Transport 146
21 A Temporary Lull 152
A Second Camp: July-August 1942
22 The Sammellager in Mechelen 162
23 Transport II to Auschwitz-Birkenau 171
Camp of Terror: September 1942-April 1944
24 The Postal Workers of Brussels 188
25 The First Executions 198
26 The Arrestanten 204
27 The Bunker 213
28 January 6,1943 223
29 The Winter of 1942-43 229
30 Transport XX 235
31 The Chaplain of the Executions 242
32 Two Heroes of Breendonk 248
33 The Twelve from Senzeilles 253
The Many Endings of Auffanglager Breendonk: May 1944-May 1945
34 Evacuating Breendonk 261
35 Journey from Mauthausen 267
36 End of the Supermen 273
37 The Final Transport from Neuengamme 280
After the War: 1945-Present
38 The War Crimes Trials 290
39 The Final Death 298
40 Breendonk Today 303
Afterword: What Happened to Some Breendonk Prisoners and Their Families 312
Appendixes
1 Main Deportations from Auffangtager Breendonk 319
2 Deportations from SS-Sammellager Mechelen 320
Quotation Sources 321
Bibliography 327
Acknowledgments 332
Illustration Credits 335
Index 337
