Stalag VIII-F

Stalag VIII-F (318) was a German prisoner of war camp set up to handle exclusively Soviet Red Army prisoners. It was located at the northern end of the huge Germany Army training area at Lamsdorf Silesia and just north of Stalag VIII-B. It was built in June 1941 and existed until the advancing Soviet forces liberated it 17 March 1945. The camp was renumbered Stalag 318 in 1943.

Physical and sanitary conditions were terrible and of the estimated 300,000 Soviet prisones who passed through this camp, about one third died of starvation, mistreatment and disease. The Germans did not apply the provisions of the Third Geneva Convention to Soviet prisoners because the Soviet Union was not a signatory.

On October 11, 1944, after a five days train trip, about 5,000 imprisoned after the Warsaw Uprising Polish soldiers of the Armia Krajowa arrived in the STALAG 318, aka VIII F, aka Stammlager 344, from the assembly point at Ozarow. Several days later the German Army, Wehrmacht brought about 400 Armia Krajowa women soldiers. They were held in a compound adjacent to the men,s compound, but in a few days they were transported to a concentration camp in the north.

Sources

* [http://www.um.oswiecim.pl/rocznica/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=60&Itemid=103 Camps in Silesia] (in Polish)
* [http://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/Gliederungen/Kriegsgefangenenlager/Kriegsgefangenenwesen-R.htm German documentation] (in German)