- The concentration camp Majdanek was built between August to September 1941. The planning of the construction camp had already started in the summer. Originally the camp was not designated as a concentration camp but as a POW camp of the Waffen-SS Lublin. This title of the camp held till April 1943. In reality, the name of the camp could have been anything, as the title of the camp made little difference to the camps that had been titled as concentration camps.

- The first prisoners to the camp arrived in November to December 1941. This group of people held peasants from the Lublin area, Jews from the Lublin ghetto as well as from the nearby small villages. At that time, the camp was already occupied by the Soviet POW's. The next bigger group of Jews from Lublin arrived to the camp in April 1942. From the approximately 2 500 people that arrived, some 120 to 200 young men were selected to work and the rest of the people were shot in the Krepiec Forest. The execution site was located some 11 kilometers from the camp. 

- The biggest execution in Majdanek took place on 3rd of November 1943. During that day, some 16 000 to 18 000 people were machine-gunned by the Germans. This mass shooting was part of the liquidation of Jews in the Lublin area. The bodies of those murdered, were cremated on pyres and the ashes which remained, were mixed with kitchen scraps and earth to make compost. When the camp was liberated, some 1 300 cubic meters of this compost was found. Today, the remains of the people in this compost are located in the memorial which can be found from the camp area.

- On the eve of the liberation of the camp 22nd of July 1944, when the General Siemion Bogdanow's Second Armoured Army and the General Konstantinow's 7th Cavalry Corps were already at the outskirt of the city, some 1 000 prisoners from Majdanek, were forced to march deeper into the shrinking Reich. Only 1 500 prisoners were left to the camp.

- The actual battle for Lublin started on the night of 22nd and 23rd of July 1944. The Red Army was also joined by the Polish Home Army in the fight for Lublin. The fighting in Lublin continued till 24th of July 1944, when the German General Moser surrendered the German garrison in Lublin. Several guards and other functionaries were captured during the battle. In November 1944, first trial of war criminals was held. The first accused were: Anton Thernes, Hermann Vogel, Wilhelm Gerstenmeier, Theodor Schöllen, Heinrich Stalp and Edmund Pohlmann. All of the accused were sentenced to death and the sentences were carried out

- After the liberation of Majdanek and Lublin area, the camp was taken over by the Russian army and by the Polish army. German POW's were located in Majdanek as well as Poles who had been captured by the feared Stalin's  secret police NKVD. The Poles who had been imprisoned in Majdanek were members of the Home Army and the Peasants Battalion. After few weeks in Majdanek, they were sent to the vast system of Soviet Gulag's. In November 1944, the Majdanek camp area was declared as a museum and thus it became the first museum to operate in the area of a former concentration camp.

- After the war three commandants of Majdanek were convicted for crimes done in Majdanek or in other camps. Max Koegel received death sentence from the British court, Martin Weiss received the same sentence from the American court and Arthur Liebehenschel was convicted during the trial of the former SS functionaries of Auschwitz.

- During the over 35 months of the camps existence, hundreds of thousands of victims and stories about suffering...you cannot hide behind your camera here.

- The place does not need any empty words.