Pustków-Szebnie 

Members of the Boys were slave labourers in the Pustków-Szebnie labour camp in Poland.

The Pustków-Szebnie labour camp was set up and run by Nazi Germany.

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

The labour camp was located close to group of small villages located in south-eastern Poland that were forcibly evacuated by the Germans in order to build a huge SS training camp for units recruited in Ukraine and Estonia.

History

Pustków was a village along the Debica-Mielec railway 37km from Rzeszow. The Polish government began a large military industrial project in the area in 1937. After the German invasion forced labourers, mostly Jews were brought in to construct the camp in 1940, most of whom died or were shot. The camp was then used for Soviet prisoners of war and the death toll remained shockingly high.

In the spring of 1943, the camp was reinstated as a forced-labour camp for Poles, Jews, Roma and Ukrainians.  In November 1943, Jews from Szebnia, Huta Komorowska, and military workshops from Rzeszów were brought to several Jewish barracks. Among them was one of the Boys Simon Lecker.

Structure

The camp covered an area of about 10 hectares with some 35 barracks. The camp was surrounded by barb-wire fences with six guard towers and search lights around the perimeter.

In August 1943, the Jews were separated from the rest of prisoners in a special Jewish zone on the north side of the camp behind a barb-wire fence. The Jewish camp, with its 465 inmates, consisted of two barracks.

The prisoners were used in armaments factories including plants that produced V-1 and V-2 parts for German rockets. Both camps were guarded by Ukrainian S.S. 

Dissolution

In July 1944, Jewish prisoners were transported to Auschwitz II-Birkenau among them Simon Lecker. They were then sent to various factories in Upper Silesia. Lecker was moved to the Laurahütte subcamp, and in January 1945 most of those who had survived Pustków were taken on death marches to Mauthausen, and Gusen concentration camps in Austria.

In August 1944, the camp was evacuated and destroyed. It is believed about 15,000 died at Pustków.

Aftermath

Today there is a museum on the site. The commandant’s house is offices and there is a sign posted walk way.