International Roma and Sinti Holocaust Remembrance Day, celebrated on August 2, commemorates the Porajmos – the extermination of the Gypsy population by the Third Reich. On the night of August 2-3, 1944, the Germans liquidated the Gypsy camp, known as the Zigeunerlager, in Auschwitz-Birkenau, murdering approximately 4,300 people.
“Racially impure”
Porajmos, meaning “devouring” in the Romani language, is a term used to describe the extermination of Roma and Sinti during World War II. The German Nazis, considering the Gypsy community to be “racially impure,” exterminated between 220,000 and 500,000 Roma—up to half of their European population. From 1941, Roma were sent to ghettos in Łódź (Litzmannstadt) and Warsaw, as well as to extermination camps such as Kulmhof, Treblinka, and Auschwitz-Birkenau. Persecution included forced sterilization, medical experiments, and ultimately mass executions. Between January 2 and 9, 1942, approximately 4,300 Roma and Sinti from the Austrian provinces of Burgenland and Styria were murdered in mobile gas chambers at the Kulmhof camp (Chełmno on the Ner River). A few months earlier, they had been displaced to the so-called Gypsy Camp in the Litzmannstadt Ghetto. The bodies of the victims were buried in a mass grave with their clothes and belongings.
Zigeunerlager: Gypsy camp in Auschwitz
In February 1943, the Zigeunerfamilienlager – “Family Camp for Gypsies” – was established in Auschwitz-Birkenau. On the orders of Heinrich Himmler, Sinti and Roma were deported there, mainly from Germany, Austria, the Czech Republic, and Poland. In total, the Germans deported about 23,000 Roma to Auschwitz. Of this number, 2,000 people were murdered without being registered in the camp records. Twenty-one thousand Roma were registered in the camp, of whom about 19,000 died – from starvation and disease, or murdered in the gas chamber when the “Gypsy camp” was liquidated. Thus, the 21,000 Roma victims of the German camp constitute the third largest group of murdered people, after Jews and Poles.
The Roma uprising: An act of courage
In the spring of 1944, following rumors that they would be taken away to work and fearing extermination, some Roma locked themselves in barracks with tools that could be used as weapons (knives, shovels, etc.). They resisted, refusing to obey orders – they believed that instead of being sent to work, they would be sent to the gas chambers. The Germans decided not to attack the barracks, but later convinced the prisoners that it was indeed about work. A group of about 200 young Roma was selected. They were sent to work in other camps, and about 1,500 were transferred to KL Auschwitz I. Some of them survived.
Memory of the Porajmos
The Day of Remembrance for the Genocide of the Roma and Sinti, established in Poland in 2011, commemorates the victims of the Porajmos. The main commemorations take place at the monument in Auschwitz-Birkenau, where representatives of the Roma community, authorities, and state institutions gather. Since 2024, the Center for Roma History and Culture, a cultural institution of the Małopolska Province, has also been operating in Auschwitz.
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