Secret note found within the violin built in the concentration camp:

During World War II, within the walls of the Nazi concentration camp in Dachaua Jewish prisoner secretly wrote a brief note and hid it inside a violin who had created in heartbreaking circumstances, a message for the future that would not be discovered for more than 80 years.

“Test instrument, performed in difficult conditions without tools and materials,” said the worn note. “Dachau. Anno 1941, Franciszek Kempa”.

The origins of the violin, built in 1941 by Franciszek “Franz” Kempa while they are imprisoned by the Nazis in Dachau In southern Germany, it remained unnoticed for decades. It was not until art merchants in Hungary sent the instrument instrument, after having stored it for years between a set of bought furniture, that its history came to light.

Although the handicraft of the instrument clearly pointed to an expert manufacturer, the professional reparation was perplexed by the poor quality of the wood and raw tools used to create it, which did not coincide with the obvious ability involved.

“If you look at their proportions and structure, you can see that he is a master violin, made by a man who was competent in his trade,” said Szandra Katona, one of the Hungarian art merchants who discovered the origins of the violin. “But the choice of wood was completely incomprehensible.”

Motivated by the contradiction, the professional dismantled the violin, revealing the hidden note of Kempa: an apparent explanation, even an apology, of a violin manufacturer forced by the brutal limitations of his captivity to build an instrument that did not reach his own standards.

Dachau, located near Munich, was the First concentration camp Established by the Nazis in March 1933. Initially he housed political prisoners, but then became a model for other fields, imprisoning Jews, Romanis, clergy, homosexuals and others attacked by the Nazi regime.

Over time, it became a forced labor site, medical experiments and brutal punishments, and remained in operation until it was released by US forces on April 29, 1945. It is believed that at least 40,000 people died there due to hunger, disease, execution or maltrato.

There is ample evidence that the musical instruments were present in the concentration camps throughout Europe in the center and this during World War II. For propaganda purposes, the Nazis often allowed or even encouraged the formation of musical groups to give a false impression to the outside world about life in the camps.

However, it is believed that all known instruments that survived Dachau were brought by prisoners. Kempa’s “violin of hope”, as it has been called, is the only instrument known really built within the camp.

It is unknown how the violin left Dachau and finally reached Hungary. But Kempa, according to documents provided to Hungarian art merchants by the Dachau Memorial Site Museum, survived the war and returned to his native Poland to continue making instruments before he died in 1953.

The documents also suggest that Kempa was known by the Nazis as an instrument manufacturer, something that Tálosi, one of the art merchants, believes that he may have saved him the fate of millions of people who perished in the camps.

“We call it the ‘violin of hope’ because if someone ends in a difficult situation, having a task or a challenge helps them overcome many things,” said Tálosi. “You do not focus on the problem, but on the task itself, and I think this helped the creator of this instrument to survive the concentration camp.”

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• Second World War
• Nazi