WW2 SIPO Concentration Camp Blackjack

This item has a dark history — it was liberated by a US veteran from a concentration camp. The SIPO (Sicherheitspolizei, or Security Police) was the Nazi security apparatus that administered the concentration camp system alongside the SS. Items associated with SIPO personnel are among the most historically charged pieces of WW2 militaria.

A blackjack — also called a cosh or sap — is a weighted striking weapon, typically a leather-wrapped lead weight on a flexible handle. The presence of such a weapon in a concentration camp context speaks directly to the violence that was routine within the camp system.

This piece was brought back by an American soldier who liberated the camp — one of the hundreds of thousands of US servicemen who encountered the camps in the final weeks of the war in Europe. Items liberated by US veterans carry a particular historical weight: they are simultaneously evidence of the atrocity and a record of its liberation.