Minox Photographs Smuggled from a Soviet Camp

In 1999, an exhibition opened at the Culture Museum in the town of Osnabruck. Germany. The photographs attracted a lot of attention, because they were taken between the years 1945 – 1947 by a German officer of the Wehrmacht, in 3 locations of Soviet POW camps in Russia: Selenodolsk, Jelabuga and Kolstau. More interesting was the fact that the officer, Klauss Sasse, took all the 90 images with his Minox Riga camera, smuggled in the camp by himself, together with the film.

Minox Riga, belonging to Klaus Sasse – the camera he used in the prisoner’s camp 

During his time as a prisoner, Sasse managed to take pictures of fellow prisoners, images of the camps, of his captors, and many other places and people, shooting a number of 4 rolls containing 50 exposures each, the films packed by the Latvian factory VEF in Riga, the one responsible for the apparition of the Minox Riga.

His book “Bilder aus russischer Kriegsgefangenschaft: Erinnerungen und Fotos aus Jelabuga und anderen sowjetischen Lagern 1945-1949” is well worth of reading, because apart form the photographs and daily life notes, it speaks volumes about the tens of thousands of German prisoners who never got back home. Klaus Sasse was a fortunate man, he made it back to Germany and lived a long life thereafter.

It beggars belief that a German prisoner of war, being interned in a Soviet war camp known for their lack of respect for human life, was so bold and (to some point, so lucky) to engage in covert photography with a smuggled camera AND not been discovered. The Minox Riga or the films, if found on him, would’ve meant certain death, probably immediate without any hearing. The fact that he lived to tell the tale and to publish his photographs says a lot about luck, courage and, at some point probably, danger of life forfeiture.

With the appropriate observation of the copyright where is due, I am publishing some of the photographs, retrieved from the online medium. All photographs here are copyrighted to the rightful owners.

It is but a stroke of luck that these photographs were taken and the films smuggled for them to survive and be presented to us today. This is but one example (and a brilliant one at that) about how the Minox cameras have been witnesses to the history in the making. This is what I would call a true historical camera.

This here is a video made by me. It contains copyrighted material, I only made them a bit more viewable, and published it on my YT channel. Do enjoy!

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