the camp of huts near fallingbostel became known as stalag xi-b and was to become one of the "wehrmacht"s largest pow camps, holding up to 95,000 prisoners from various countries. in june 1940, belgian and french pows were housed in the former bergen-belsen construction workers' camp. this installation was significantly expanded from june 1941, once germany prepared to invade the soviet union, becoming an independent camp known as stalag xi-c (311). it was intended to hold up to 20,000 soviet pows and was one of three such camps in the area. the others were at oerbke (stalag xi-d (321)) and wietzendorf (stalag x-d (310)). by the end of march 1942, some 41,000 soviet pows had died in these three camps of starvation, exhaustion, and disease. by the end of the war, the total number of dead had increased to 50,000. when the pow camp in bergen ceased operation in early 1945, as the "wehrmacht" handed it over to the ss, the cemetery contained over 19,500 dead soviet prisoners.