ir left arms. Any slip, outburst, or failure to comply with the guards resulted in immediate death. Because executions by gunfire were inefficient, expensive, and potentially identifiable, intoxication by poison gas--a method used by the Germans to kill over 50,000 mental patients since 1939--was agreed on as the method of choice. Zyclon was originally brought to Auschwitz as a disinfectant and vermin killer. On September 3, 1941, Fritzsch experimented with Zyclon B. on 600 Russian prisoners of war and 250 tubercular patients. He was amazed at the number of people who could be killed at once. On October 15, 1941, a plan for the future camp of Birkenau, designed by one of the prisoners, was approved. The layout was meant to house 100,000 prisoners. Before construction began, however, the SS instructed that Birkenau should be built for double that amount. The first transports of Jews into the camp began on March 26, 1942 with the arrival of 999 Slovakian women. Since the crematoriums had not yet been built, women were housed in a newly established women's section in Auschwitz I, placed to work, and beaten daily at roll call. By the end of March there were 6,000 women prisoners in Auschwitz I. A third section of the camp, called Auschwitz III or Buna-Monowitz, was established to provide forced labor for the German industries that had plants at Auschwitz. The victims who were lucky enough to escape the fate of the gas chambers were taken to the "quarantine" where they were taken to a bath or "sauna". Their clothing was taken, hair shaven, and they were given striped prisoner garb. Most people only survived a few weeks in the quarantine and a few months in the labor camp itself. Every morning these prisoners had to endure roll call whereby they would stand for hours at attention outdoors in the cold, wind, and rain or snow. Anyone who fell was gassed. By the time the Auschwitz was destroyed and liberated in the summer of 1944 , over ...
