Hartheim Castle gas chamber The photo above shows the metal ramp which goes through the inside of the gas chamber, looking back towards the admission chamber inside the northeast tower in the background. The opening was cut into the wall when the castle was converted into a Memorial Site. The original entry into the gas chamber was through a door on the other side of the gas chamber room.  The photo above shows the west side of the Hartheim Castle gas chamber, opposite the window and the gas pipe shown in the photo below. The original entrance into the gas chamber was through the door on the right which opens into the courtyard of the castle. The door on the left, which goes into the adjacent room, called the "technical room," was walled up with bricks by the Nazis in 1945, but was opened up again when the gas chamber was previously shown to visitors before the new Memorial Site was constructed. Now it has been walled up again to show how the Nazis left it.  On the right in the photo above is the reconstructed gas pipe through which carbon monoxide was pumped into the room. Note the thickness of the castle wall where the window is located. The window was there when this room was used as a gas chamber.  The photo above shows the metal walkway that has been built through the gas chamber and the adjoining rooms. On the left, you can see the reconstructed gas pipe inside the gas chamber, and on the right, the other side of the gas chamber room. The gas chamber is 192 square feet in size. It has a vaulted ceiling, about 9 feet high at the highest point.  The carbon monoxide gas pipe shown in the photo above is a reconstruction. The Nazis brought concentration camp prisoners from Mauthausen to remove all the gassing apparatus and the fake shower heads from the ceiling in December 1944 and by January 1945, the gas chamber room was restored to its original condition. The brick wall where the gas pipe enters the room is at least two feet thick.  The gas chamber at Hartheim Castle was disguised as a shower room, but all the shower fixtures were removed by the Nazis and the room was restored to its original condition by January 1945. This photo shows what the ceiling looks like today; some of the plaster has been removed to show what it looks like underneath. Technical RoomPreviousBack to Hartheim indexHome |