Mauthausen Memorial
Mauthausen was a Nazi concentration camp established in 1938 on a hill above the town of Mauthausen in Upper Austria, and the main camp of a network that eventually comprised nearly one hundred subcamps across Austria and southern Germany. Between 1938 and its liberation by US forces in May 1945, at least 90,000 prisoners died there. Today the site is preserved as the Mauthausen Memorial, a place of historical documentation and remembrance administered by the Austrian Ministry of the Interior.
At a glance
- Type
- Nazi concentration camp · Memorial site · Museum
- Period
- Camp operational 1938–1945; memorial established post-1945
- Style
- Granite-quarry industrial complex; prisoner barracks; SS administrative buildings
- Location
- Mauthausen, Upper Austria, Austria
- Coordinates
- 48.2572° N, 14.5002° E
Overview
Mauthausen concentration camp was established by the SS shortly after the annexation of Austria in March 1938, exploiting a nearby granite quarry to provide building materials for Albert Speer’s plans for a monumental Berlin and Linz. The camp was classified as Grade III — the harshest category in the Nazi camp system — and held prisoners from across occupied Europe, including political opponents, Jews, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war, and Spanish Republican refugees. It was liberated by soldiers of the US 11th Armored Division on 5 May 1945.
History
The first prisoners arrived at Mauthausen in August 1938, and the camp grew rapidly to become the administrative centre of a vast network of forced labour installations. The notorious “Stairs of Death,” a 186-step stone staircase leading from the Wiener Graben quarry, became a symbol of the murderous conditions imposed on prisoners forced to carry granite blocks under physical abuse. After liberation, the site was gradually transformed into a memorial through initiatives by survivor organisations, the Austrian government, and international Holocaust remembrance bodies, with a major museum opened in 2013.
What you see
The memorial preserves the granite walls of the main camp, the original prisoner barracks, the central roll-call square, the gas chamber, and the crematorium. The “Stairs of Death” in the adjacent Wiener Graben quarry are accessible and are one of the most visited and emotionally powerful elements of the site. A modern museum building contains permanent and temporary exhibitions covering the history of the camp, the lives of individual prisoners, and the post-war memory of the site.
Cultural significance
Mauthausen is Austria’s most significant site of National Socialist crime and one of the most important Holocaust memorials in Central Europe. It serves as a centre for historical education, survivor testimony preservation, and international commemorative events, with an annual Liberation Commemoration held each May attended by survivors, dignitaries, and delegations from countries whose citizens were imprisoned there.
Practical information
- Address
- Erinnerungsstrasse 1, 4310 Mauthausen, Austria
- Opening hours
- Open year-round; check the official Mauthausen Memorial website for current hours and seasonal variations
- Admission
- Free; donations welcome
Getting there
Mauthausen is located approximately 25 km east of Linz. By rail, take a regional train from Linz Hauptbahnhof to Mauthausen station, then a local bus or taxi to the memorial (approximately 4 km). By car, take the A1 motorway towards Vienna and exit at Enns/Mauthausen. The memorial is signposted from the town centre.