Treblinka rail spur.

[GregSingh]

That rail link to gravel pit at Kosowski Majdan was a narrow-gauge up to 1914 (under Russian Imperial rule).
Later maps show it connected to Małkinia - Siedlce link. So at some point it was converted to normal gauge.
Connection was near Majdan Kupietyński. There is no sign of any parallel tracks on any maps.

German 1914 map (narrow-gauge track):

1914.jpg (107.62 KiB) Viewed 1710 times

German 1944 map and Polish Army 1957 map:

[PrudentRegret]

That rail link to gravel pit at Kosowski Majdan was a narrow-gauge up to 1914 (under Russian Imperial rule).
Later maps show it connected to Małkinia - Siedlce link. So at some point it was converted to normal gauge.
Connection was near Majdan Kupietyński. There is no sign of any parallel tracks on any maps.

This is not correct. There are images confirming the existence of a parallel railway, i.e.:



Furthermore, the 1944 photograph quite clearly shows a narrow gauge rail running along Treblinka II and towards the labor camp:



To remove any doubt, the rails of the Treblinka spur were preserved by the road construction in this photograph I analyzed previously:



The rails in this photograph also correspond to a narrow gauge railway. There was no conversion to a normal gauge, at least there is no evidence for such a conversion. If such a conversion took place, it must have been reverted before the end of the war. The post-war evidence uniformly suggests that this railway was a narrow, probably a metre-gauge railway that led to the Treblinka I & II camps.

[GregSingh]

Yes, I've seen those photos, but what is the date and exact location?

Just by looking at the first photo, if "branch line" is 1000mm and "main line" is 1435mm, even considering the angle of "main line", I don't buy it.

[PrudentRegret]

The source for the photograph is the Ghetto Fighter's House archive.

The description reads:

The junction of the railroad track where a rail spur branches off toward the Treblinka camp. To the left: the track leading to the town of Siedlce. The track on the right turns off into the forest and the site of the camp. Photographed in September 1962.

So 1962 is the date given for the photograph.

The picture was taken at this location, at the right arrow next to "Location of Ground Photos":



The exact location of that photograph is the point at which the road intersects the Malkinia-Siedlce line. You can see the road was what preserved the Treblinka spur in that 1962 photograph.

This rail is quite clearly narrow-gauge, but we do not have to guess, because there are other pictures of the Main Malkinia - Siedlce line taken from the same angle at this exact location. For example, here is a 1945 picture of the Siedlce line also from this point where the road intersects the railway:



The road up on ahead is the very same road as the image of the Treblinka spur. You can still see the Treblinka spur on the right side of this image, which is right where the other image was taken in 1962.

Looking at that photo of the Siedlce line it is abundantly clear that the Treblinka spur was a narrow gauge. Just scroll up and compare those rails to this picture.

We can also see a view of this exact location in the photograph in a video. At 2:15 the camera person is standing at the precise location these photographs were taken. You can obviously see how much wider the gauge of the Siedlce line is compared to the Treblinka spur. I have pulled a still from that video for comparison purposes:



This shows quite clearly that the spur to Treblinka was a narrow gauge railway.

[GregSingh]

Thank you for the photos and sources.

Here are just some fragments from Edward Kopówka, Paweł Rytel-Andrianik "I will give them an Everlasting Name".

About transports from Warsaw Ghetto:

A typical transport consisted of up to 60 wagons, including at least two wagons for guards. An average of 80-120 people were placed in a freight car. The entire transport at the Treblinka train station was divided into three parts and each was delivered to the camp separately. A locomotive was attached at the end, so it pushed the wagons in front of it.

Looks like the same, normal gauge wagons, were used all the way from Warsaw to the camp.
There was no getting off the normal track wagons and getting on into narrow gauge wagons at Treblinka train station for further 5km trip to the camp itself.
I couldn't find any witness statement which confirmed such undertaking.

And here how the work at the gravel pit looked like:

The prisoners did the hardest work of extracting gravel and loading it into the gravel wagons. The wagons ran on narrow tracks and were pulled out of the gravel pit by a small locomotive. On the loading ramp outside the pit, gravel was reloaded from small gravel wagons into wide wagons. From here all transport was sent to the train station at Treblinka.

So the track from the gravel pit ramp all the way to Treblinka train station was normal gauge.

[PrudentRegret]

There is indeed a contradiction between the accepted interpretation of where the Warsaw transports went, and the narrow-gauge railway that appears in these pictures of the Treblinka spur.

On the other hand, it is simply not possible that 60 wagons of fully-loaded, standard-gauge rolling stock (20 at a time) could have reached Treblinka II on a narrow-gauge railway. That raises only three possibilities:

• The railway captured in the 1944 & 1962 photographs of the Treblinka spur is a standard gauge railway. This possibility can be totally discounted because image analysis proves the gauge between the rails is narrower than a standard gauge. According to my analysis of the images it corresponds to a meter gauge railway.
• The spur was converted from standard gauge to narrow gauge in between the dismantling of the Treblinka II camp and the first known photograph of the narrow-gauge Treblinka spur by investigators/journalists in 1944.
• Those 60 wagons which left Warsaw did not reach Treblinka II. Any transports to TII would have required a transfer in train of goods or passengers.

These are the only three possibilities, one of which can be discounted due to image analysis of existing evidence. So practically, that leaves two possibilities, and so the evidence for a conversion of this railway from standard gauge to narrow gauge in between September 1943 and the 1944 photograph of the Treblinka spur should be considered since that is the only remaining alternative.

[GregSingh]

That sounds quite resonable.

Actually converting 5-6km of track would take less than half a day for a skilled crew, a bit longer perhaps if force labour was used.
Perhaps after Warsaw Ghetto was liquidated - there was no need for a normal track to the camp anymore and reloading at gravel pit loading ramp wouldn't be needed as well as small locomotive would be able to work all the way from gravel pit to Treblinka train station on narrow track.

Interestingly main Małkinia - Siedlce link had it's own conversions.
Soviets documents revealed link was damaged as Germans withdrew in 1944. It was rebuild quickly as a Russian wide one - 1520mm.
Once it was returned to Polish authorities late in 1945, it was converted to 1435mm sometime in 1946.

[PrudentRegret]

Here is a higher quality capture of the image in question of the Treblinka spur:



By my estimation it's a metre-gauge railway which would have been created for industrial use.

More information and source:

Event date: 08/01/1944
Receipt date: 09/22/2015
Author: Alexander Kapustyansky
Credit: RIA News
Original: A66-6653, 35 mm slide

[PrudentRegret]

That rail link to gravel pit at Kosowski Majdan was a narrow-gauge up to 1914 (under Russian Imperial rule).
Later maps show it connected to Małkinia - Siedlce link. So at some point it was converted to normal gauge.
Connection was near Majdan Kupietyński. There is no sign of any parallel tracks on any maps.

German 1914 map (narrow-gauge track):


1914.jpg


German 1944 map and Polish Army 1957 map:


1944.jpg

1957.jpg

These maps are very interesting, do you happen to have a source where they can be viewed (especially the 1914 one), or more images which show more context with the surrounding area (i.e. to Malkinia)? Where did the narrow-gauge Treblinka spur branch from in the pre-WWII period for example? How did it connect to the surrounding area? That's unclear from your first screenshot.

[GregSingh]

Where did the narrow-gauge Treblinka spur branch from in the pre-WWII period for example? How did it connect to the surrounding area? That's unclear from your first screenshot.

As I wrote before unfortunately none of the maps show any parallel tracks to Treblinka, as on your post war photo.

Pre-WWI (1914) map I attached shows Treblinka spur not connected to main line, as you can see it just reaches the road and stops there.

1914.jpg (108.65 KiB) Viewed 1415 times

WWII map shows Treblinka spur connected to the main line just after passing the road, again no parallel track to Treblinka.
Connection was at Majdan Kupietyński.

which show more context with the surrounding area (i.e. to Malkinia)

You already have Malkinia - Treblinka on the map I posted earlier.
Click on map to load it in full resolution.

[PrudentRegret]

Where did the narrow-gauge Treblinka spur branch from in the pre-WWII period for example? How did it connect to the surrounding area? That's unclear from your first screenshot.

As I wrote before unfortunately none of the maps show any parallel tracks to Treblinka, as on your post war photo.

Pre-WWI (1914) map I attached shows Treblinka spur not connected to main line, as you can see it just reaches the road and stops there.


1914.jpg

Thanks,

The 1914 map is the one I'm curious about if you have a broader view. The spur just ends at the road? That might make sense for that period, but here is what Wikipedia has to say:

Before World War II, it was the location of a gravel mining enterprise for the production of concrete, connected to most of the major cities in central Poland by the Małkinia–Sokołów Podlaski railway junction and the Treblinka village station. The mine was owned and operated by the Polish industrialist Marian Łopuszyński, who added the new 6-kilometre (3.7 mi) railway track to the existing line

So if Marian Łopuszyński added 6 kilometers of railway to the existing line, where did that railway run? It certainly didn't connect to the Malkinia-Siedlce line from the end of the existing line. An additional 6km of railway would have been necessary because it would have been narrow-gauge and so it could not have connected to the main line.

Where, then, did this railway run? It either would have been a track parallel along the Malkinia-Siedlce line, or it could have run through the Poniatowo road and connected to Treblinka station and therefore Malkinia by this path in red (Fall 1944 aerial photograph, the bottom-left is the apparent end of the Treblinka spur in the 1914 map, the top is Treblinka station):



I favor the latter interpretation due to the apparent lack of parallel railway that you have mentioned. The path in red also seems to branch off and connect to other quarries in the area. I would suspect that this is part of a network of industrial-gauge railways, and if it's not, it begs the question of where exactly the pre-war Treblinka spur extension was built.

[PrudentRegret]

Here's the 1944 photograph without my drawing blocking features of the photograph:

[GregSingh]

industrialist Marian Łopuszyński, who added the new 6-kilometre (3.7 mi) railway track to the existing line

Source for this was his own post-war testimony. That company went bust before WWII.
I couldn't find any record of this line actually beeing completed. It does not show on any map either.

Why do you think it went like you marked it in red ? Clearly your post war photo shows parallel link from road crossing towards Treblinka?
Red markings from Treblinka to Malkinia do not have much sense. He'll have to build a bridge over Bug river to get there....
There was not even a road bridge.

[PrudentRegret]

He'll have to build a bridge over Bug river to get there....
There was not even a road bridge.

There wasn't in 1914, but there was by May 1944:



So it seems that he did build a bridge over the Bug river to get there.

[GregSingh]

So it seems that he did build a bridge over the Bug river to get there.

Unlikely.

First photo shows bridge of the main Malkinia - Treblinka normal wide line.
Second photo shows a Soviet build bridge next to a damaged bridge.