Holocaust Liberator Unit

The 103rd Infantry Division played a critical role in the liberation of the Kaufering sub-camp. In March 1945, the division crossed the Rhineland and moved southward into Bavaria. In late April 1945, American GIs discovered the Kaufering Complex during their advance.

The Kaufering Complex was a network of subcamps and industrial sites for the infamous Dachau Concentration Camp. Operating between June 1944 and April 1945, inmates were forced to construct subterranean facilities for fighter aircraft production in the Landsberg region. The conditions in the camp were brutal as disease, malnutrition, and overwork took an immense toll on the inmate population. Historians estimate that over half of the three thousand inmates did not survive their imprisonment. As the SS guards evacuated Kaufering in April 1945, they forced many of the prisoners on death marches towards Dachau and abandoned the infirm and near-dead.

On April 27, 1945, the 103rd Division liberated Kaufering sub-camp I. The soldiers of the 103rd worked to provide food and comfort to the freed prisoners. In a letter to a 103rd veteran, a former prisoner named Edward Gruzin described the experience of liberation, “We could not believe that we were free. They gave us fresh bread. I never saw such white bread in my life. When I was imprisoned, I was praying to be free and have enough bread to eat. My prayers came through.” Gruzin also described how an unnamed 103rd GI helped him recover a modicum of justice. Gruzin wrote, “I noticed an SS officer who was taken prisoner by the US Army in his shiny boots. I told him to take off those boots and give them to my father in exchange for my father’s wooden clogs. The Nazi did not comply with my order; an American soldier pointed his rifle in the Nazi’s direction, that took care of my request.” The liberation of the Kaufering sub-camp represents one of the greatest services rendered by the 103rd Division.

During the liberation of the Kaufering sub-camp, the 103rd Division confronted the unspeakable evils perpetrated by the Nazi regime. In 1985, the National Holocaust Museum in Washington DC and the U.S. Army Center of Military History officially recognized the 103rd Division as an official liberator unit. A memorial at the site was constructed to honor the men of the 103rd Division who liberated the Kaufering sub-camp.