SOBIBÓR - Holocaust Handbooks

160 J. GRAF, T. KUES, C. MATTOGNO, SOBIBÓR
racks. Kola even stresses the fact that no traces of bricks, rubble, or
mortar were discovered at the excavation site. 467 As for the dimensions,
the larger barrack, having a width of 6 meters and a length of at least 60
(possibly 80-85) meters, covers an area almost three times as large as
that of the alleged gas chambers, while the relatively small width of the
barrack does not allow for the supposed structure with two rows of gas
chambers placed alongside a central corridor. The length alone is more
than three times that described by Hödl and five times that implied by
Arad.
Second, at the northern end of the barrack, corresponding to where
the witnesses place a small shed housing the gassing engine, we have
another wooden barrack, measuring 14 × 4 m, wherein Kola apparently
found no traces of an engine room, only spent ammunition.
Third, no witness has ever mentioned the presence in camp III of a
structure the size of the larger barrack. But how could such a huge
building have gone unnoticed?
The area in the smaller barrack containing numerous spent bullets
can be explained in two ways. On one hand one may accept Kola’s hypothesis
of a site where handicapped and sick deportees were shot. This
notion, however, contradicts eye witness statements that such shootings
were carried out at a pit (the “Lazarett”) near the old chapel during the
first phase of operations and that they were later (during late summer
1942) moved to the edge of one of the mass graves. 468 Moreover, if one
posits that the alleged gas chambers were located within Object E, or
else in an unidentified structure close to it, then it makes little sense that
said deportees were brought all the way to the immediate vicinity of the
gas chambers and shot there. Why waste ammunition on victims who
467 One may recall here that the Central Commission for the Investigation of German
Crimes in Poland discovered “a certain amount of rubble” at a location identified by witnesses
as having been “the site of the building with the gas chambers.” The Polish word
translated as rubble, gruz, denotes remnants of brick or concrete; it is never used for describing
the remains of wooden structures. Since it is extremely unlikely that the investigators
removed all the rubble from the site, it is clear that the supposed “gas chamber”
remnants mentioned in the 1947 report are not identical with Kola’s Object E. The rubble
must therefore have come from another structure, most likely Object A, which Kola describes
as containing “some internal brick elements.” Because of its dimensions
(2.75×2.75 m), this structure can safely be ruled out as the remains of the alleged homicidal
gas chambers. The witnesses’ likely identification of the remains of Object A as the
“gas chambers” is significant in the light of our hypothesis on the purpose of that structure,
which will be presented in chapter 9.1.
468 Cf. Y. Arad, op. cit. (note 49), p. 77; J. Schelvis, op. cit. (note 71), pp. 64f.