Fenced in with barbed wire, the prisoner of war camp included six and later only three wooden barracks. In late October 1941, the SS transferred the first 2,000 Soviet prisoners of war to Buchenwald. The forced labour planned for them did not take place. The SS isolated the prisoners and withheld rations. Within a few months one in three had perished from disease or hunger. Beginning in 1942, the prisoners of war were forced to work in the quarry or on the construction of the Buchenwald railroad line. The SS also leased them as workers to companies in the surrounding area. The Soviet prisoners of war had different uniforms than the other inmates in the concentration camp. They formed small units, military style, and made up the core of the underground resistance organization.
The prisoner of war camp was maintained through April 1945. An average of several hundred inmates were held at the camp.
