The Burning of the Treblinka II Death Camp (Photographs)

"The Burning of the Treblinka II Death Camp" is a series of two known photographs that were in the possession of Polish railway dispatcher Franciszek Ząbecki. One of the photos was donated in 1965 by Ząbecki to the Ghetto Fighters House Museum in Israel, while the other was printed in Ząbecki’s 1977 memoirs Wspomnienia dawne i nowe.

• 
  Donation photo
• 
  Memoirs photo

Photo Provenance

The photo with the larger perspective was donated by Franciszek Ząbecki to Miriam Novitch of the Ghetto Fighters House Museum at the Hotel Germania in Düsseldorf, Germany, on January 19, 1965. This was after Ząbecki testified in the trial of Kurt Franz.

The second photo is printed in Ząbecki's memoirs Wspomnienia dawne i nowe.

Photo Comparison

Comparing the photos side-by-side and isolating to the relevant portion of the landscape shared by each, it is clear these are separate and distinct photographs taken moments apart.

Key differences include the following:

• the shape and contour of the smoke cloud ascends and expands between photographs
• the photo from the memoirs includes more of the landscape to the right, showing more of the foreground bush and the background treeline, indicating the camera was slightly moved between shots
• the branches on the tree in the foreground alter in shape, most likely due to wind

Sources

Ząbecki, Franciszek. “Testimony about the Treblinka extermination camp.” January 19, 1965. Ghetto Fighters House Archives. http://www.infocenters.co.il/gfh/notebook_ext.asp?item=51626&site=gfh&lang=ENG&menu=1.

Ząbecki, Franciszek. Wspomnienia dawne i nowe. PAX, 1977.