The Camp Terror System: Block 11 Basement Containing Cells Block
11 was strictly isolated from the rest of the camp. Here were
detainment, starvation, suffocation, and stand-up cells. For a
painting that brings this to life see [link]. "Trials of [the
poison gas, hydrogen cyanide] for killing people were begun in
the summer of 1941, in the basement of Block 11 (at the time
number 13). An unknown number of Soviet POWs were killed in one
of the windowless basement chambers. Here is Broad's
recollection of the event: 'One day corpses of Russian POWs were
dragged out of a dark cell. As they lay in the yard, they looked
strangely bloated and had a bluish tinge, though they were
relatively fresh. Several older prisoners who had been through
World War I remembered seeing corpses like that. Suddenly they
understood... gas!...' "* *Piper, F. (2000). Mass Murder.
Auschwitz 1940-1945. Oswiecim: Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum.
PP.117-118.