[WW2] - Auschwitz

Ha, ha, ha! Ezzelino har blivit expert på bildandet av berlinerblått

Ventilationen har förstås inget med det att göra.

Kristaller var det inte heller. Något poröst gipsaktigt material i form av små kuber du kanske menar, mättade med HCN.

Så, vilken kemi krävs det för att berlinerblått ska bildas?

"Zyklon-B gas 'crystals'. Deadly cyanic acid was soaked into these bits of diatomaceous earth. Such 'crystals' were taken out of their tins by SS wearing gas masks, and dropped through small openings into sealed rooms of trapped prisoners, allowing the gas to escape, killing all within."

"We are only concerned, in this connection, with how Iron Blue arises from hydrogen cyanide and iron compounds in building materials. In building materials, the iron is generally present in trivalent form (Fe3+), in the form of 'rust'.

For the formation of Iron Blue, therefore, a part of this iron must be reduced to bivalent form (Fe2+). The subsequent combination of these different iron ions with CN- to Iron Blue occurs spontaneously and completely.[336] The most probable mechanism[337] is one in which the cyanide ion itself acts as a reducing agent. The starting point in so doing is an Fe3+ ion, largely surrounded (complexed) by CN- ions: [Fe(CN)4-6](1-3)-. A slightly alkaline environment is favorable to the final reduction of the iron(III)-ion to iron(II).[338]

The pigment formation in the case under consideration here is then organized in 5 steps:

Ad-/absorption of hydrogen cyanide (HCN);[313]
Ionic splitting (electrolytic dissociation)[339] of hydrogen cyanide in water to the cyanide ion, which alone can form complexes with iron;
Complexing of trivalent iron (Fe3+) to the complex iron(III)-cyanide,[340] that is, the displacement of oxygen and/or OH- ions in rust by cyanide ions;
Reduction of iron(III)-cyanide to iron(II)-cyanide;
Precipitation of iron(II)-cyanide with trivalent iron as Iron Blue.
The velocity of formation of the pigment can be influenced by various factors, which will be considered:

Water content of the reaction medium;
Reactivity of the iron;
Temperature;
Acid content.---"

ON A RETROUVÉ le Bunker 1, la première chambre à gaz du camp de Birkenau, près d'Auschwitz. Derrière un bois de bouleaux, en dehors du périmètre actuel du camp devenu patrimoine mondial de l'Unesco, la maison d'une famille de paysans polonais d'Oswiecim avait été réquisitionnée par les nazis en mars 1942 et aménagée en chambre à gaz. Elle a fonctionné jusqu'en avril 1943, date à laquelle ont été construits les quatre « complexes de la mort » (chambre à gaz et crématoire), dont on peut voir aujourd'hui les restes. L'emplacement du premier bunker restait inconnu.

"That family could not have lived in a gas chamber, because the Germans tore down the Little Red House in 1943. Not a trace of it remained; the Germans did not leave even a bit of its foundation there," explains Dr. Franciszek Piper of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum. "Only in 1955 did the owners of the property build a new house at the site of the gas chamber and move in." Piper recounts the history of the Little Red House: the site was chosen personally by Adolf Eichmann of the Reich Main Security Office, who was in charge of the operational and administrative side of the Holocaust. Eichmann was accompanied by Rudolf Höss, commandant of Auschwitz Concentration Camp. It was a one-story red-brick village farmhouse. The owners had already been evicted. The house measured about 19 by 46 feet. The Nazis made its four rooms into two, removed the windows, sealed the doors, and knocked holes in the walls for the introduction of Zyklon B. Concealed among the trees, situated somewhat off to the side of Auschwitz II Concentration Camp, or Birkenau, the provisional gas chamber was used by the Nazis for only a year, from spring 1942 to spring 1943. It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were gassed there. The Little Red House was demolished when it became unnecessary, upon the completion of the four massive gas chambers and crematoria in the Birkenau camp.

"When the boundaries of the Museum were set in 1957," reflects Jerzy Wróblewski, director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, "the property where the first gas chamber stood in 1942-1943 was unfortunately left outside, but adjacent. I do not know why they took the decision at the time. Perhaps it was because a new house had already been built there, and in the years of universal reconstruction after the wartime devastation, nobody dared demand that it be torn down."

...

Marcello Pezzetti appeared in O?wi?cim several years ago and joined in the deliberations over how to settle the problem of the site of the Little Red House. Pezzetti found a sponsor, Richard Prasquier. After protracted negotiations, the Museum managed this year to purchase the property and move its occupants to another house, which was remodeled. Teams of technicians from the Museum dismantled the structure on the site of the gas chamber, and landscaped the area. "In the spring," says Wróblewski, "we want to fence off the property, sow grass, plant thuja, and place a commemorative plaque in the middle bearing a brief history of the site and a floor plan of the first gas chamber."

Today, Dr. Piper notes bitterly that "we had been so happy that we would finally be able to do something at Auschwitz in a planned, deliberate way, without outside pressure or any sensationalism. Once again, however, it turns out that not even the noblest initiative connected with the history of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi Death Camp - and there have been many - can be taken without misunderstandings and falsification."