The Testimony of Edmund Weiss a Jewish prisoner of Camp Tibor
Many of the prisoners who laboured on the Jew's Road were imprisoned in Camp Tibor at Dannes. This is the testimony of another Jewish prisoner as to the conditions at the camp for Jews after the main deportations of Jews in October 1942. Weiss stayed on because Jews who were born in Belgium were not deported with the other Belgian Jews who had been born out-side of Belgium. Weiss was interrogated in England by British Intelligence who processed POWs and displaced persons of interest for intelligence or to collect evidence for war-crimes.
One further valuable account of Lager Tibor is given by prisoner Edmund Weiss, a Czech Jew, who describes the camp towards the end of the War. He also notes the temporary improvement of conditions for prisoners in 1943 (something that is also evidenced at Camp Sylt in the Channel Islands when temporary controls were exerted over the SS by the Wehrmacht ).
The ITS records show that Edmund Weisz [sic] was born in Presov [Presovice?] in the Czech Republic (14.11.1909) and was part of the Belgian cohort of deportees. He had initially been encamped in Boulogne Sur Mer (working for Ph. Holzmann), then Isques (for Leonard Hanbuch & Sohne) and finally Dannes and Condette (for Julius Berger), before he was liberated after being marched to Samer and Boulogne, making his escape from the latter location.
'About the same time all Jews, in the other four concentration camps of Northern France, were deported to Poland. All the remaining inmates were then collected in one camp at Dannes-Camiers nr Boulogne and were employed on road-making and fortification etc. The Officer in charge of this camp was [...] Kohler who excelled in brutality. In April 1945 a transport of 350 Russians, including children, arrived from Smolensk bringing the number of inmates at the camp up to 750. The Following transports also arrived:
May 1943: 200 Spaniards
Jun 1943: 250 Frenchmen
Dec 1943: 500 Frenchmen
After the invasion, the guards were reinforced, and the Camp Cammandent was arrested for 'mild treatment of the Jews'. This man had replaced Koehler in Dec 1943. His name was Truppenfuh. Rutter, a non-party member and he was succeded by Obertruppenfuh. Ullrich, an exceptional brutal type, notorious for his brutal treatment of Jews in Germany. At the end of August 1944 he decamped with all the valuables belonging to the inmates, leaving his guards (2 Germans and 14 Dutchmen) behind.
At the beginning of Sep 1944, we were all marched in the direction of Samer where we were put into a camp and left for 2 days without food and water. On Sept 5th we were marched to Boulogne and it was intended to entrain us from there to Germany. It was here I found an opportunity to escape and I remained eight days in hiding with the Stationmaster Eugene Streibig, 68, Rue Felix Adam and during the armistice, I left Boulogne with the population and surrendered to the English. (19 May 45) (WO 208/3638 and WO 208/3656 - London Cage Statement)
