KZ Gross-Rosen was set up in the summer of 1940 as a satellite camp of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp from Oranienburg . Initially , the slave labour was carried out in a huge stone quarry owned by the '' SS-Deutsche Erd - und Steinwerke GmbH '' ( SS German Earth and Stone Works ) . In the fall of 1940 the use of labour in Upper Silesia was taken over by the new Organization Schmelt formed on the orders of Heinrich Himmler . It was named after its leader '' SS-Oberführer '' Albrecht Schmelt . The company was put in charge of employment from the camps with Jews intended to work for food only . The Gross-Rosen location close to occupied Poland was of considerable advantage . Prisoners were put to work in the construction of a system of subcamps for expelees from the annexed territories . Gross Rosen became an independent camp on 1 May 1941 . As the complex grew , the majority of inmates were put to work in the new Nazi enterprises attached to these subcamps
expelees from the annexed territories
Expulsion of Poles by Nazi Germany
Gross-Rosen concentration camp