Gurs internment camp

Gurs
Gurs
Concentration camp
	Gurs c. 1939
	Location of Gurs within France
Coordinates	43°15′53″N 0°43′54″W / 43.26472°N 0.73167°W
Known for	The only westward deportation of German Jews
Location	Gurs, Pyrénées-Atlantiques
Built by	French Third Republic
Operated by	French Third Republic, Vichy France
Original use	Internment of Spanish Republican refugees
Inmates	German Jews, French political prisoners
Number of inmates	64,000 total, of whom 5,500 Jews deported via Drancy, mostly to Auschwitz
Liberated by	Free French
Notable inmates	Hannah Arendt; Horst Rosenthal; Charlotte Salomon; José Solchaga;
Notable books	Mickey au Camp de Gurs

Gurs internment camp (French: Camp de Gurs, pronounced [kɑ̃ də ɡyʁs]) was an internment camp and prisoner of war camp constructed in 1939 in Gurs, a site in southwestern France, not far from Pau. The camp was originally set up by the French government after the fall of Catalonia at the end of the Spanish Civil War to control those who fled Spain out of fear of retaliation from Francisco Franco's regime. At the start of World War II, the French government interned 4,000 German Jews as "enemy aliens", along with French socialist political leaders and those who opposed the war with Germany.^[2]

After the Vichy government signed an armistice with the Nazis in 1940, it became an internment camp for mainly German Jews, as well as people considered dangerous by the government. After France's liberation, Gurs housed German prisoners of war and French collaborators. Before its final closure in 1946, the camp held former Spanish Republican fighters who participated in the Resistance against the German occupation, because their stated intention of opposing the fascist dictatorship imposed by Franco made them threatening in the eyes of the Allies.^[3]

^ ^a ^b Chute, Hillary L. (2016). "Maus's Archival Images and the Postwar Comics Field". Disaster Drawn. Harvard University Press. p. 174. doi:10.4159/9780674495647-006. ISBN 978-0-674-49564-7 – via De Gruyter.
^ "Gurs". www.ushmm.org. Retrieved 27 April 2017.
^ ORT, World. "Music and the Holocaust". holocaustmusic.ort.org. Retrieved 27 April 2017.

[Chute-1] Chute, Hillary L. (2016). "Maus's Archival Images and the Postwar Comics Field". Disaster Drawn. Harvard University Press. p. 174. doi:10.4159/9780674495647-006. ISBN 978-0-674-49564-7 – via De Gruyter.

[:0-2] "Gurs". www.ushmm.org. Retrieved 27 April 2017.

[3] ORT, World. "Music and the Holocaust". holocaustmusic.ort.org. Retrieved 27 April 2017.

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