Oranienburg - Klinkerwerk

In the summer of 1938, prisoners from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp began to build a brick work (Klinkerwerk) at Lehnitz-Schleuse, about two kilometers northeast of Sachsenhausen. It was intended to manufacture and produce bricks and other building materials for the planned reconstruction of Berlin into the new reichs and world capital Germania. About 2000 prisoners from Sachsenhausen were used as slave labor in the production. The prisoners marched in the morning to Klinkerwerke to slave labor and then after the end of the working day marched back to Sachsenhausen. The SS also built a shooting range adjacent to Klinkerwerke in 1938. Sporadically, the shooting range was used as a place of execution.

In April 1941, Klinkerwerk became a satellite camp subordinated Sachsenhausen but with its own administration and the prisoners were housed in specially built barracks. The camp was located next to a canal that made it possible to easily transport the building material to Berlin. In 1943 production was changed to produce war material. Thousands of prisoners died as a result of slave labour and lack of food, lack of medicine, diseases and ill-treatment caused the death of thousands of prisoners. Prisoners who were too sick to work were murdered on the spot or sent to Sachsenhausen where they were murdered. On April 10, 1945, Klinkerwerk was heavily bombed by allied bombers in which many prisoners were killed. At the end of April 1945, the remaining prisoners were evacuated to Sachsenhausen.