concentration camp, noun phrase

Forms:
Also with initial capitals.
Origin:
English, SpanishShow more English concentration, here probably from English reconcentration, formed on reconcentrate translation of Spanish reconcentrar to detain together in one place, used in the context of the system of detention instituted by the Spanish military in Cuba in 1895 + camp encampment.
historical
A camp in which non-combatants were detained by the British during the Anglo-Boer War of 1899–1902; burgher camp, see burgher sense 3 b; camp noun1 sense 2; refugee camp.
Note:
Now in international use, designating a camp for the internment of aliens, political prisoners, or prisoners of war.
1901 J. Chamberlain in C. Headlam Milner Papers (1933) II. 228The mortality in the concentration camps has undoubtedly roused deep feeling among people who cannot be classed with the pro-Boers.
1911 E. Prov. Herald 25 Oct.Mr Botha gave it as his opinion that the death rate in the concentration camps in the first place was due to ‘an entire want of proper accommodation’ and ‘want of proper food’.
1926 M. Nathan S. Afr. from Within 102Kitchener..brought all the Boer women and children into concentration camps, where..there was terrible mortality.
1946 V. Pohl Adventures of Boer Family 158Most people left on farms during the latter half of the Boer War either were put into concentration camps by the British or, to avoid that fate, they followed in the wake of the commandoes.
1955 D.L. Hobman Olive Schreiner 117Concentration camps..originated in the Boer War, a fact which, without the necessary qualifications, was of the greatest value to the late Dr Goebbels, both as a stimulus to anti-British feeling and as an apologia for Nazi policy.
1965 C. Van Heyningen Orange Days 73All the women and children and old and ill men were taken to large camps and had to live in tents with very little comfort or food...These camps were called ‘concentration’ camps, but they were really prison camps.
1979 T. Pakenham Boer War (1982) 495Today, Kitchener is not remembered in South Africa for his military victories. His monument is the camp — ‘concentration camp’, as it came to be called.
1990 Sunday Times 8 July 18More than 14 000 blacks died in British concentration camps, as did 28 000 Boer women and children.
A camp in which non-combatants were detained by the British during the Anglo-Boer War of 1899–1902; burgher camp, see burgher sense 3 b; camp noun1 sense 2; refugee camp.
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comtsotsi, nounn.concertina, nounn.
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