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Nazis choose the town of Oswiecen, Poland as the site of a new concentration camp.
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Quote from Nazi newspaper, Der Stürmer, published by Julius Streicher - "The time is near when a machine will go into motion which is going to prepare a grave for the world's criminal - Judah - from which there will be no resurrection."
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The Lodz Ghetto, in Poland, is sealed off from outside world with 230,000 Jews locked inside.
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The Krakow Ghetto is sealed off containing 70,000 Jews.
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The Warsaw Ghetto is sealed leaving 400,000 Jews trapped inside.
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Hans Frank, Gauleiter of Poland, states, "I ask nothing of the Jews except that they should disappear."
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Quote from Nazi newspaper, Der Stürmer, published by Julius Streicher - "Now judgment has begun and it will reach its conclusion only when knowledge of the Jews has been erased from the earth."
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Romanian troops conduct a pogrom against Jews in the town of Jassy, killing 10,000.
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Himmler summons Auschwitz Kommandant Höss to Berlin and tells him, "The Führer has ordered the Final Solution of the Jewish question. We, the SS, have to carry out this order...I have therefore chosen Auschwitz for this purpose." The purpose was to rid the earth of Jews.
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The first test use of Zyklon-B gas at Auschwitz.
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Mass killings of Jews using Zyklon-B begin at Auschwitz-Birkenau in Bunker I (the red farmhouse) in Birkenau with the bodies being buried in mass graves in a nearby meadow.
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Reinhard Heydrich, Himmler's second in command of the SS, convened the Wannsee Conference in Berlin with 15 top Nazi bureaucrats to coordinate the Final Solution (Endlösung) in which the Nazis would attempt to exterminate the entire Jewish population of Europe, an estimated 11 million persons. Europe would be combed of Jews from east to west," Heydrich stated.
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In occupied Poland, Belzec extermination camp becomes operational. The camp is fitted with permanent gas chambers using carbon monoxide piped in from engines placed outside the chamber, but will later substitute Zyklon-B.
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The start of deportation of Fench and Slovake Jews to Auschwitz
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At Auschwitz, a second gas chamber, Bunker II (the white farmhouse), is made operational at Birkenau due to the number of Jews arriving.
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Himmler grants permission for sterilization experiments at Auschwitz.
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Beginning of deportation of Dutch Jews to Auschwitz.
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Construction started for four large gas chamber/crematories.
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Beginning of deportations from the Warsaw Ghetto to the new extermination camp, Treblinka. Also, beginning of the deportation of Belgian Jews to Auschwitz.
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Himmler orders all Jews in concentration camps in Germany to be sent to Auschwitz and Majdanek.
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3 newly built gas chambers with daily capacity of 4,756 bodies.
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By the end of June, 381,661 persons - half of the Jews in Hungary - arrive at Auschwitz.
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Auschwitz records its highest-ever daily number of persons gassed and burned at just over 9,000. Six huge pits are used to burn bodies, as the number exceeds the capacity of the crematories.
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The chief surgeon at Auschwitz reports that 106 castration operations have been performed.
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Jews from Hungary arrive at Auschwitz. Eichmann arrives to personally oversee and speed up the extermination process. By May 24, an estimated 100,000 have been gassed. Between May 16 and May 31, the SS report collecting 88 pounds of gold and white metal from the teeth of those gassed. A tooth weighs around 0.55 grams.
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A revolt by Jewish slave laborers at Auschwitz results in complete destruction of Crematory IV.
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The last transport of Jews to be gassed, 2,000 from Theresienstadt, arrives at Auschwitz.
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Last use of the gas chambers at Auschwitz.
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Himmler orders destruction of the crematories at Auschwitz
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Nazis evacuate 66,000 from Auschwitz.
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Russian troops liberate Auschwitz. By this time, an estimated 2,000,000 persons, including 1,500,000 Jews, have been murdered there.
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Adolf Hitler commits suicide while American soldiers free 30,000 jews from concentration camps.
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General Alfred Jodl surrenders
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Himmler commits suicide while in British Custody.
