H5 GELSENKIRCHEN (D)

In 1937, after persistent harassment and threats, Sinti and Roma families in Gelsenkirchen were persuaded to move to a municipal traveller site overseen by SA squads and where they were charged for the use of the land. In April 1939, the local police “45 families with 237 persons in 51 caravans” in the camp. The families were later forced to move to the traveller site in Beginenstrasse shown in the photograph. Some fl ed to Cologne, from where most were deported to Poland in 1940. The remaining residents of the Gelsenkirchen Camp were deported to Auschwitz in 1943.