Laurahütte to Mauthausen

Members of the Boys were held in Nazi labour and concentration camps and used as slave labourers.

From 1933-1945 Nazi Germany operated over 1,000 concentration camps and subcamps in its own territory and across German occupied Europe. Among them was the Auschwitz concentration camp complex.

As the camps were evacuated thousands of people among them members of the Boys endured horrific evacuations from the camps on foot, in freight wagons and open top trains, as well as perilous journeys across the Baltic Sea. 

The Boys were teenage and child-Holocaust survivors, who were brought to the UK after the war for rest and rehabilitation.

^{The former Auschwitz concentration camp.}

The Laurahütte camp was at the Laura steel mill in Siemianowice Śląskie in Poland. It was located just north of Katowice in Upper Silesia. The main Auschwitz I camp was further south in the town of Oświęcim.

On 23 January 1945, all the prisoners were loaded onto a train and taken to the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria.

On the war the train stopped in the forest at Rzędówka near Rybnik (marked B on map) and the bodies of other prisoners were taken on board. The journey took five days, and 134 prisoners died en route.

Some prisoners remained in Mauthausen and its subcamps, while others were moved to Hannover-Linden a sub camp of Neuengamme concentration camp.

Kurt Klapphotlz had already been moved out of the camp when it was evacuated but Simon Lecker was among those who endure the journey to Mauthausen.