Sinti and Roma
The Sinti and Roma are an ethnic minority with a long history of social exclusion and persecution. In the 1930s, Sinti and Roma were discriminated against, isolated and disenfranchised as part of the persecution of “antisocial elements“. Between 1940 and 1942, these initial measures were followed by deportations to Eastern Europe. Some Sinti and Roma were also deported to the Warsaw ghetto. Their systematic extermination started with Himmler’s decree from 16 December 1942, in which he ordered the deportation of Sinti and Roma to Auschwitz. Several hundred thousand Sinti and Roma from all over Europe died at the hands of the National-Socialist regime. There is very little reliable information about their fate at Neuengamme concentration camp. A total of several hundred Sinti and Roma were imprisoned here.

Sulejka Klein was born on 17 October 1926 in Hamburg. At 17, she was deported to Auschwitz together with her mother, where she suffered a still-birth after having been raped by a Kapo. Her mother was murdered in Auschwitz. Just before the liquidation of the “Gipsy camp”, Sulejka Klein was transferred to Neuengamme satellite camp Hamburg-Sasel via Ravensbrück concentration camp. She died of exhaustion in Sasel at the age of 18.