Editing Extermination camp (section)

=== Corpse disposal ===
After the gassings, the {{lang|de|Sonderkommando}} removed the corpses from the gas chambers, then extracted any gold teeth. Initially, the victims were buried in mass graves, but were later [[Cremation#World War II|cremated]] during {{lang|de|[[Sonderaktion 1005]]}} in all camps of [[Operation Reinhard]].

The {{lang|de|Sonderkommando}} was responsible for burning the corpses in the pits,{{sfn|Höss|1959|p=168}} stoking the fires, draining surplus body fat and turning over the "mountain of burning corpses&nbsp;... so that the draft might fan the flames", wrote Commandant Höss in his memoir while in the Polish custody.{{sfn|Höss|1959|p=168}} He was impressed by the diligence of prisoners from the so-called Special Detachment who carried out their duties despite their being well aware that they, too, would meet exactly the same fate in the end.{{sfn|Höss|1959|p=168}} At the Lazaret killing station they held the sick so they would never see the gun while being shot. They did it "in such a matter-of-course manner that they might, themselves, have been the exterminators", wrote Höss.{{sfn|Höss|1959|p=168}} He further said that the men ate and smoked "even when engaged in the grisly job of burning corpses which had been lying for some time in mass graves."{{sfn|Höss|1959|p=168}} They occasionally encountered the corpse of a relative, or saw them entering the gas chambers. According to Höss, they were obviously shaken by this but "it never led to any incident". He mentioned the case of a {{lang|de|Sonderkommando}} who found the body of his wife, yet continued to drag corpses along "as though nothing had happened".{{sfn|Höss|1959|p=168}}

At Auschwitz, the corpses were incinerated in [[crematorium|crematoria]] and the ashes either buried, scattered, or dumped in the river. At [[Sobibór extermination camp|Sobibór]], [[Treblinka extermination camp|Treblinka]], [[Bełżec extermination camp|Bełżec]], and [[Chełmno extermination camp|Chełmno]], the corpses were incinerated on pyres. The efficiency of industrialised murder at [[Auschwitz-Birkenau]] led to the construction of three buildings with crematoria designed by specialists from the firm [[J. A. Topf & Söhne]]. They burned bodies 24 hours a day, and yet the death rate was at times so high that corpses also needed to be burned in open-air pits.<ref name="B/G-199">{{cite book |title=Anatomy of the Auschwitz Death Camp |last1=Berenbaum |first1=Michael |author-link=Michael Berenbaum |first2=Yisrael |last2=Gutman |year=1998 |publisher=Indiana University Press |isbn=978-0-253-20884-2|page=199|url =https://books.google.com/books?id=ZrU2oS8fP3cC&pg=PA199 }}</ref>