I too visited Auschwitz a few years ago. The story of the human hair had a deep impact on me.

When the camp was liberated, 7000 kilos of human hair were found awaiting shipment to factories to be converted into fabric.

In November 1943, the U.S. Congress held hearings concerning the U.S. State Department's total inaction regarding the plight of European Jews. President Franklin Roosevelt responded to the mounting political pressure by creating the War Refugee Board (WRB) in January 1944 to aid neutral countries in the rescue of Jews.



The WRB also advocated the aerial bombing of Auschwitz, although it never occurred since it was not considered a vital military target. The U.S. and its military Allies maintained that the best way to stop Nazi atrocities was to defeat Germany as quickly as possible.


In April 1944, two Jewish inmates escaped from Auschwitz and made it safely into Czechoslovakia. One of them, Rudolf Vrba, submitted a detailed report to the Papal Nuncio in Slovakia, which was then forwarded to the Vatican, received there in mid-June. Thus far, Pope Pius XII had not issued a public condemnation of Nazi maltreatment and subsequent mass murder of Jews, and he chose to continue his silence.