Footsteps of WWII · Czechia & Austria
Mauthausen Memorial
Camp memorial · 8 Aug 1938 – 5 May 1945
The story
The SS opened Mauthausen on 8 August 1938, five months after the Anschluss, on a hill above the Danube 20 km east of Linz, beside the Wiener Graben granite quarry owned by the SS company DEST. It became the centre of a system of about 100 subcamps, the largest at Gusen. About 190,000 people from across Europe were deported there; prisoners hauled granite blocks up the 186 'Stairs of Death', and many were killed by gas, shooting or deliberate starvation. In February 1945 about 500 escaped prisoners, mostly Soviet officers, were hunted down and murdered by the SS, police and local civilians in the 'Mühlviertel hare hunt'. A reconnaissance squad of the US 11th Armored Division under Staff Sergeant Albert Kosiek reached the camp on 5 May 1945.
What to look for
The granite walls and gate of the main camp, the roll-call ground, surviving barracks, the camp prison, gas chamber and crematorium, a large exhibition in the former infirmary, national memorials outside the walls, and the quarry with the Stairs of Death below.
Plan your visit
Open daily 9:00–17:30, last entry 16:45. Admission free, no registration needed; guided tours and audio guides charged and bookable online. The Stairs of Death are open 1 April to 26 October. Check the website before you go.
Things change, so check opening times before you travel.
Nearby sites
- Gusen Memorial · 3 km
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Footsteps of WWII: Europe 1939–1945
A free field guide for your phone: the route, the maps and the stories built in, even with no signal. The whole Second World War in Europe, from the first shots at Westerplatte on 1 September 1939 to the German surrender in May 1945: Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, Normandy, Arnhem, Bastogne, Stalingrad, Berlin and the camps, in 15 areas from Britain to Russia.
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