At the same time, the region was discovered as a holiday destination. After the National Socialist seizure of power, the granite deposits and castle became the site’s key locational factors.

The quarry industry shaped social relations in the village and influenced the culture and self-perception of its inhabitants.

Flossenbürg remained a destination for day trippers. The border region increasingly drew nationalist and völkisch groups, which stylized the ruins as a bastion of resistance to the “Slavic peoples.”

The National Socialist state construction program created a boom in the demand for granite. As a result, quarry owners and workers welcomed the National Socialist seizure of power.

Rather, the SS now also aimed to profit from the exploitation of prisoner labor. Prisoners were put to work in SS-​owned economic enterprises for the production of building materials. To this end, the SS founded new camps, and deported ever larger numbers of people to the camps.

The construction of new camps began in 1936-37 with the founding of the Sachsenhausen and Buchenwald camps. SS economic interests played an increasing role in the selection of new camp sites. The large granite deposits around Flossenbürg attracted the attention of the SS.

The decision on the Flossenbürg site was reached in March 1938. The first SS guards arrived in late April. On May 3, the first transport of 100 prisoners arrived at the construction site from the Dachau concentration camp. By the end of 1938, the initial intake of the camp had increased to 1,500 prisoners.

Two years after the camp’s founding, the main buildings of the camp were all complete. An SS company, the German Earth and Stone Works (DESt), mercilessly exploited the prisoners to excavate granite. Over 300 inmates had already perished since the founding of the camp.

The first inmates of the camp were Germans, victims of the arrests of so-called “criminals” and “asocials.”

In late 1938, the first political prisoners arrived. After the start of the war, Flossenbürg housed prisoners from across occupied Europe. The first Jewish prisoners arrived at the camp in 1940.

By this time the first phase of camp construction had been largely completed and the quarry was in full operation. The camp housed over 2,600 prisoners, and the death rate began to rise. To dispose of the bodies of the dead, the SS ordered the construction of a crematorium in the camp.

The SS established a system of violence and terror in the camp, and attempted to exploit the political, national, social and cultural differences among prisoners.

Between 1938 and 1945, approximately 84,000 men and 16,000 women from over thirty countries were imprisoned in the Flossenbürg camp and its subcamps.

All inmates were forced to wear prisoners’ garb bearing a number and colored triangle.

Living conditions deteriorated drastically over the course of the war. There was a steady rise in the number of accidents, illnesses and deaths. The ability to work increasingly determined a prisoner’s chance of survival. In late 1943, large transports began to arrive at Flossenbürg, overcrowding the main camp. Many prisoners were subsequently transported to subcamps. For most inmates, the decisive question became “How will I survive one more day?”

A work day in the quarry lasted twelve hours, interrupted only by a single break when a thin soup was served. The SS forced prisoners to walk in circles for hours, hauling rocks.

Only a few prisoners survived these penal detachments. At the end of the work day, the prisoners carried the bodies of the dead back to the camp.

The camp quarry was the largest industrial operation at Flossenbürg. By mid-1939, approximately 850 camp inmates labored in the quarry daily; by 1942, the number had increased to nearly 2,000. DESt employed up to 60 civilian staff, administrators, stoneworkers, drivers and apprentices. Many of them had regular contact with the inmates.

Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer SS, developed the SS into a complex organization, involved in matters ranging from settlement policies to “combating enemies” and systematically killing members of so-called “inferior races.” In addition, the SS ran its own business enterprises.

In the concentration camps, the Death’s Head Divisions were organized into the command staff and the guard units. Each camp was headed by a Kommandant. Along with his subordinate departments, the Kommandant determined the prisoners’ fates.

The SS staff were responsible for guarding the prisoners.

Approximately ninety SS members worked in the command staff at Flossenbürg. By spring 1940, the guard units had grown to a force of nearly 300. By 1945, with the construction of subcamps, the guard units expanded to approximately 2,500 men and 500 women. After the start of the war, many younger SS men were sent to the front. The SS leadership then engaged older men, air force soldiers, women, and foreign nationals for duty in the camps.

After the war, the majority of SS members received only light punishment for the crimes they committed at Flossenbürg.

Beginning in 1940, regional businesses, administrative agencies, and private individuals applied to the Flossenbürg headquarters for prisoners. The prisoners carried out agricultural work and manual labor under guard for limited periods.

By 1942, the German leadership began to prepare for a protracted war. In February 1942, the SS established the Economic and Administrative Main Office. This centralized office was harged with ensuring that prisoners would be allocated only to the armaments industry. Many companies transferred production to concentration camps. In 1943, Flossenbürg also became an armaments site. In the quarry grounds, prisoners worked on the production and assembly of the Me 109 fighter plane.

By the end of the war, over 5,000 prisoners worked for Messerschmitt. Quarry operations were largely suspended.

At this point, concentration camp prisoners were the final reserve labor force for the armaments industry. Conditions in the camp continued to deteriorate due to permanent overcrowding. At the end of 1943, over 3,300 prisoners were incarcerated at Flossenbürg; one year later, the number exceeded 8,000. On February 28, 1945, the Flossenbürg camp held 14,824 prisoners.

Due to the evacuation of the Auschwitz, Groß-Rosen and Plaszow concentration camps, thousands of Jewish prisoners were deported to Flossenbürg for the first time since 1942. A further 3,000 Poles arrived at Flossenbürg after the Warsaw uprising was crushed.

New arrivals to Flossenbürg were first confined to quarantine blocks. Each of these barracks housed up to 1,500 prisoners. Inmates assigned to work details worked for Messerschmitt in Flossenbürg or in one of the many newly erected subcamps. The SS moved anyone unable to work to the death barracks 22 and 23. In the winter of 1944, disease, starvation, and exhaustion resulted in a rapid increase in death rates. During the final year of the war, more inmates died than during any other phase.

On April 23, the US Army reached the Flossenbürg concentration camp, where they found 1,500 critically ill inmates. The majority of prisoners had departed on death marches. The last death march prisoners were finally liberated by Allied troops on May 8.

In addition to the thousands of prisoners who had just been evacuated from the Groß-Rosen and Buchenwald camps, the SS also removed “special prisoners” to Flossenbürg. Some of these special prisoners, including pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, were singled out for execution.

Before the SS evacuated the camp, it erased the traces of its murderous activities. Beginning in mid-April, the SS “evacuated” over 40,000 prisoners from the main camp and numerous subcamps to the south. On chaotic marches that lasted for many days and transports in open freight cars, the SS attempted to herd prisoners away from the approaching Allies. Some guards killed entire groups of prisoners. Others deserted their posts. In many areas, the dead were left behind. Many prisoners died of exhaustion and disease even after liberation.