Alderney Concentration Camp: Luton News photographer shares chilling photos taken at the site as Government announces investigation

As the Government prepares to investigate the death toll at the only Nazi concentration camps on British soil, Luton News photographer Tony Margiocchi has shared these harrowing photos – taken during a visit to the site.

It had been reported that just eight Jews died there, despite many hundreds being sent there from Paris, as slave labour. And there has been considerable speculation in recent years over numbers of individuals murdered by the conditions in the camps.

Tony said: “Among the camps on Alderney was, Lager Sylt, run by the infamous SS (the Schutzstaffel) the only Jewish concentration camp on British soil.

"In 2017, I was tasked by Colonel Richard Kemp, CBE, with documenting some of the remains of Lager Sylt, showing the hand dug tunnels, where the Jewish prisoners had to dig through rock, with just hand tools. Underground bunkers, again dug through rock by hand, and the camp in general. Lager Sylt was a part of Hitler’s ‘Atlantic Wall’ construction, and was/is on British soil.

“In trying to ascertain how many died there, the investigation may look for graves. However, with the sea just a few hundred yards away, it is known that the Nazis often threw the bodies of the dead and even the dying off of the cliffs, letting the powerful currents and tides hide their dirty work.

“I also travelled deep underground, inside more slave dug tunnels, this time the slaves came from Russia and the Ukraine. These massive tunnels even had a narrow gauge railway. Two huge concrete-lined chambers had been made to the side of the railway, believed to be for the storage and assembly of V1 bombs, which would have been used to attack England.

“Alderney was the last of the Channel Islands to be liberated. Giving their Nazi occupiers many days to destroy much of what was there. No one was ever convicted of the atrocities committed on British soil, there is also no proper memorial at SS lager Sylt.

“What I saw will remain with me for the rest of my days, the extremely dangerous tunnels are now permanently blocked up, as there are continuous rock falls inside them, no further access is permitted.”

He added: “While we, the British, finally liberated Alderney, (May 15, 1945, seven days after Gurnsey and Jersey) I feel that not properly investigating what had occurred on our soil, was a betrayal of so many. All those who died there, worked to death, at the hands of the Nazis, deserved so much more. Slaves from all over Europe died there, French, Eastern Europeans, Spanish and more. However, there was just one religious concentration camp, Lager Sylt. Once again we let down our Jewish cousins. As a nation, we should be ashamed, we let the perpetrators of this evil get away.”

Colonel Richard Kemp CBE, and Tony Margiocchi are both former members of The 2nd Battalion The Royal Anglian Regiment, ‘The Poachers.'

The investigation will be headed by the United Kingdom’s Post Holocaust Issues Envoy and Head of UK Delegation to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, Lord Eric Pickles.

Lord Pickles said: “Numbers matter because the truth matters. The dead deserve the dignity of the truth; the residents of Alderney deserve accurate numbers to free them from the distortion of conspiracy theorists. Exaggerating the numbers of the dead, or even minimising them, is in itself a form of Holocaust distortion and a critical threat to Holocaust memory and to fostering a world without genocide.

“The review will give historians, journalists, residents, and anyone with a theory an opportunity to explore their thoughts with eleven of the world’s leading experts, in an atmosphere that combines openness with academic rigour. All are welcome.

“I hope this review will put to rest conspiracy theories on numbers and provide lasting dignity to the dead and some peace to the residents of Alderney who continue to remember them at the Hammond War Memorial every year in May.”