or Belsen
Nazi concentration camp near Bergen and Belsen, villages in what was then Prussian Hannover, Germany.
Established in 1943 partly as a prisoner-of-war camp and partly as a Jewish transit camp, it was designed for 10,000 prisoners but eventually held about 60,000, most of whom lacked any food or shelter. It contained no gas chambers, but some 35,000 prisoners died there, including Anne Frank , between January and mid-April 1945. As the first such camp to be liberated by the Western Allies (April 15, 1945), it received instant notoriety. Some 28,000 prisoners died of diseases and other causes in the weeks after their liberation by British troops.