Samuel Willenberg, last survivor of the Treblinka death camp revolt, dies at 93

(Image credit: Janek Skarzynski/AFP/Getty Images)

last updated 22 February 2016

The last known survivor of the Treblinka death camp revolt, Samuel Willenberg, has died. He was 93.

Willenberg was one of only 67 people known to have survived the Nazi concentration camp in Poland, making his escape in August 1943 by climbing over bodies piled up by a fence during a mass breakout, the BBC reports. He was 19 when he arrived at the camp in October 1942, and because he worked as a bricklayer, Willenberg was assigned manual labor duties. One of his tasks was to go through the belongings of people sent to the gas chamber.

An estimated 870,000 people died in the gas chambers at Treblinka, including Willenberg's two sisters. After World War II, Willenberg moved to Israel and became a surveyor, and he returned to Treblinka in 2013 to mark the 70th anniversary of his escape. "I live two lives, one is here and now and the other is what happened there," he said. "It never leaves me. It stays in my head. It goes with me always."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Explore More

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

Subscribe to The Week

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox