Will Vernon, Skinners School

Will Vernon, Skinners School

"The first thing that I noticed when we went through the 'Gates of Death', at Auschwitz Birkenau, was the loud sound of silence. The air lay still and close to your skin as there was just an open space with nothing else except for a few hundred people walking the mass grave site.

"Almost instantaneously as we walked through the gates a chill struck us with strong winds and a sprinkling of snow. This in turn with the silence made the huge complex more harrowing and overwhelming. As we walked into a 'barrack' with wooden slatted beds we were told to imagine a hundred people laying in these cramped conditions with no more than pyjamas to wear and paper covering the slats to sleep on. Just for the mind to grasp the awful conditions in one 'barrack' then multiply this by a few hundred it was just too much to absorb and realise the enormity of it. As we walked up along the tracks we were told by our guide that 90% of all people that came here were immediately sent to the infamous gas chambers. When a picture was shown of this there was a small family with young children walking merrily to what would be there death. It was horrific yet somehow soul enriching. The place filled everyone with a sense of guilt and regret that this was allowed to happen and that it still happens today.

"Auschwitz is one place that words cannot describe. You cannot simply write down in text what it is. You have to go there and feel for yourself the pain and anguish which will be left there throughout eternity."