A wooden obelisk produced in the wood shop of the camp served as a provisional monument. It bore the inscription "K.L.B. 51,000" (K.L.B stood for Konzentrationslager Buchenwald) – indicating the estimated number of the Buchenwald dead.
Organized by nations and assembling in block formations, the survivors marched onto the roll call square accompanied by the music of the camp orchestra. A previously prepared memorial address was read in Russian, Polish, German, French, Czech, and English. In view of the Nazi crimes and the ongoing war, the address concluded with a jointly spoken oath:
This vow is today known as the "Oath of Buchenwald."
A few days later, the oath was altered with this frequently quoted phrase to align with the aims of the communist inmates: "the destruction of Nazism, down to its roots," which represents the destruction of capitalism through class struggle and the establishment of communist rule.
