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Frøslev Camp (Danish:Frøslevlejren,German:Polizeigefangenenlager Fröslee) was aninternment camp in German-occupiedDenmark during World War II.
In order to avoid deportation of Danes to Germanconcentration camps, Danish authorities suggested, in January 1944, that an internment camp be created in Denmark. The German occupation authorities consented, and the camp was erected near the village of Frøslev in the south-west of Denmark, close to the German border. From mid-August until the end of the German occupation in May 1945, 12,000 people had been imprisoned there. Most of them were suspected members of theDanish resistance movement,Communists and otherpolitical prisoners. Living conditions in the camp were generally tolerable, but about 1,600 internees were deported to German concentration camps,[which?] where about 220 of them died.
Towards the end of the war, the Swedish countFolke Bernadotte tried to get all Scandinavian concentration camp prisoners to Sweden. Simultaneously, the Danish administration negotiated with the Germans about returning the Danish prisoners inGermany. As a result of these efforts, many Scandinavian prisoners came with theWhite Buses from the German camps. In March and April 1945, 10,000 Danish and Norwegian captives were brought home from Germany. Some of the returning prisoners came to Frøslev Prison Camp. Among those were some of the 1,960Danish policemen who had been arrested and deported on 19 September 1944.
When the German occupation ended, the prisoners were released, and suspected Nazicollaborators, among themFrits Clausen, former leader of theDanish Nazi party, were instead interned in the camp, whose name was changed toFårhus Camp (Fårhuslejren). The camp was now run by the Danish resistance movement. The Danish state later took over from the resistance movement, using the camp as the country's largest correctional facility for convicted collaborators.
By 1949 most collaborators had served their sentences, and the camp was converted to army barracks under the name ofPadborg Camp (Padborglejren). TheFrøslev Prison Camp Museum (Frøslevlejrens Museum) was inaugurated in 1969. A 2001 agreement established that the camp would be preserved as a national memorial park. Some parts of the original 1944–45 prison camp which had been demolished, including a watchtower and a portion of the barbed-wire fence, were reconstructed. The area also houses a residentialcontinuation high school named Frøslevlejrens Efterskole.
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54°50′34.38″N9°19′41.70″E / 54.8428833°N 9.3282500°E /54.8428833; 9.3282500
