The Methods of Execution and the Medical Experiments at Auschwitz My report will deal with the ways the prisoners of the Auschwitz concentration camp were executed, and also the medical experiments that took place. Accurate statistics were not kept, but the estimation of deaths that took place at Auschwitz ranged from 1.5 million to 4 million. Jews were the largest number of people who were killed. Poles and Soviet prisoners were also killed.The principle sites of Auschwitz, were the executions took place, were in the courtyard, and also block 11. The methods of execution were hangings, shootings, starvation, and being gassed. The decision to shoot a prisoner could be made by the Gestapo, or by the SS. Suspects of resistance activities would be held in block 11 and the Gestapo would conduct an investigation. The investigations would always result in shootings that would take place in block 11, or in ditches near the camp. Prisoners were hanged during the evening roll call to make an example out of them. The last public hanging that took place in the men's camp was on December 30, 1944, and in the women's camp was on January 6, 1945. Often prisoners were selected to die by starvation. The prisoners would be held in a single cell in block 11. Food and water were withheld from them. Each day an SS officer would look through a peephole to see if the prisoners were still alive. About every other day the dead bodies would be removed. Auschwitz had gas chambers that were made to resemble showers. The unskilled people that arrived were told that they would be cleaned and to go to the showers. When they got in the doors they were immediately locked and the gas was turned on. In the gas chambers up to 1,500 people could be killed at one time, and it took from 10-20 minutes for the people to die. The Nazis used a cyanide gas, which was called Zyklon-B. This type of gas was manufactured by a pest-control company. Medical expe...
