Elie Wiesel
Biography
Sixteen years old when an evacuation transport brought him to Buchenwald with his father in January 1945, liberated there on 11 April, and afterwards the writer who made the camps legible to people who had not been in them.
Sighet, Auschwitz, Buchenwald, 1928–1945
He was born at Sighet in Romania on 30 October 1928. In the spring of 1944 Sighet was declared a ghetto, the Wiesel family was put to forced labour and then taken to Auschwitz-Birkenau and to Buna, Auschwitz III. His mother and younger sister were murdered. At the end of January 1945 an evacuation transport brought Elie Wiesel and his father to Buchenwald, into the Small Camp — the worst quarter of a camp already overwhelmed by the transports coming west.
11 April 1945
He was liberated at Buchenwald on 11 April 1945,[1] at sixteen. The same afternoon the International Camp Committee's armed prisoners held the gate and more than 900 children and young people were among those still alive on the hill. What that day was for the people it happened to is the thing his later work spent decades trying to put into a language other people could read.
The book, and the twelve years before it, 1945–2016
He went to Paris and studied philosophy and literature. His testimony appeared in Yiddish in 1956 as "Un di Welt hot geschwign" — And the World Kept Silent — and a shortened version published in 1958 as "Night" made his name. In 1986 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his commitment to human dignity, peace and understanding between peoples.[1] He died in New York on 2 July 2016.
Questions visitors ask
- What is Elie Wiesel's connection to Buchenwald?
- An evacuation transport brought him and his father to Buchenwald at the end of January 1945, into the Small Camp. He was liberated there on 11 April 1945,[1] at sixteen.
- What did Elie Wiesel write about his experience?
- His testimony appeared in Yiddish in 1956 as "Un di Welt hot geschwign" — And the World Kept Silent — and a shortened version published in 1958 as "Night" made his name.
- Did Elie Wiesel win a Nobel Prize?
- Yes, the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986,[1] for his commitment to human dignity, peace and understanding between peoples.
- Can I learn more about Elie Wiesel at Buchenwald?
- Yes, at the Buchenwald Memorial, which preserves the camp where he was held in the Small Camp and liberated on 11 April 1945.
Sources
- Elie Wiesel — Gedenkstätte Buchenwald, retrieved 30 August 2026
Connected Places in Weimar
Buchenwald, 99427 Weimar
He was a prisoner in the Small Camp of the camp this memorial preserves, and was liberated here at sixteen.
Historical Context
Brought to Buchenwald at the end of January 1945 on an evacuation transport from Auschwitz.
The regime wanted Weimar for what its name meant, and it built a concentration camp on the hill above the town. Both facts belong to the same twelve years.
Read more about this period →Quick Facts
1928
2016
Romanian-American
In Weimar's history
In Weimar's history
From July 1937 the SS had prisoners build a camp on the Ettersberg, the wooded hill above the town. 277,800 people from more than fifty countries were held there; 56,000 did not survive.
One of the 277,800 the memorial counts, arriving in the last winter of the camp's existence.
On 11 April 1945, with armoured divisions of the US Third Army approaching, the SS were ordered out and armed prisoners took the camp gate.
He was liberated on 11 April 1945.