Man's Search For Meaning - Viktor E. Frankl

EXPERIENCES IN A CONCENTRATION CAMPIt is very difficult for an outsider to grasp how verylittle value was placed on human life in camp. Thecamp inmate was hardened, but possibly became moreconscious of this complete disregard of human existencewhen a convoy of sick men was arranged. Theemaciated bodies of the sick were thrown on twowheeledcarts which were drawn by prisoners formany miles, often through snowstorms, to the nextcamp. If one of the sick men had died before the cartleft, he was thrown on anyway - the list had to becorrect! The list was the only thing that mattered. Aman counted only because he had a prison number.One literally became a number: dead or alive - thatwas unimportant; the life of a "number" was completelyirrelevant. What stood behind that number andthat life mattered even less: the fate, the history, thename of the man. In the transport of sick patients thatI, in my capacity as a doctor, had to accompany fromone camp in Bavaria to another, there was a youngprisoner whose brother was not on the list and thereforewould have to be left behind. The young manbegged so long that the camp warden decided to workan exchange, and the brother took the place of a manwho, at the moment, preferred to stay behind. But thelist had to be correct! That was easy. The brother justexchanged numbers with the other prisoner.As I have mentioned before, we had no documents;everyone was lucky to own his body, which, after all,was still breathing. All else about us, i.e.. the ragshanging from our gaunt skeletons, was only of interestif we were assigned to a transport of sick patients. Thedeparting "Moslems" were examined with unabashed73