Video: 'Auschwitz II Birkenau Crematorium II'

(Wednesday, March 31, 1943, part of The Holocaust during World War II) — Crematorium II, with the capacity to burn 1440 corpses a day, became operational today at the Auschwitz II–Birkenau extermination camp in Nazi-occupied Poland.

Originally designed as a mortuary, with morgues in the basement and ground-level furnaces, Crematorium II was converted to increase greatly the gassing capacity of Birkenau by placing a gas-tight door on the morgues and adding vents for Zyklon-B and ventilation equipment to remove the gas.