History of Sorts

The Political Department was the representative of the RSHA( Reich Main Security Office)in the camp, and its main objectives  were

• Identification documentation
• Keeping files on individual prisoners
• Investigations
• Interrogations
• Intelligence service
• Surveillance
• Camp registrar (sometimes in conjunction with supervision of the crematorium)

Wilhelm Friedrich Boger who had the nickname ‘the tiger of Auschwitz’, was an officer of Political Department ,which were a part of the Gestapo. He was notorious for the crimes he committed.

He also invented a torture device called the ‘Boger Swing’

After the war, Boger’s secretary,Frau Braun, gave a vivid description how the Boger Swing was used.

“It was a meter-long iron bar suspended by chains hung from the ceiling(the drawing above is from a different version of the Boger Swing)… A prisoner would be brought in for “questioning,” stripped naked and bent over the bar, wrists manacled to ankles. A guard at one side would shove him—or her—off…