 According to postwar testimonies, when transports were temporarily halted, then-deputy commandant Kurt Franz wrote lyrics to a song meant to celebrate the Treblinka extermination camp. In reality, prisoner Walter Hirsch wrote them for him. The melody came from something Franz remembered from Buchenwald. The music was upbeat, in the key of D major. The song was taught to the newly arriving Jews assigned to work in the Sonderkommando. They were forced to memorise it by nightfall of their first day at the camp. Survivor Samuel Willenberg remembered the song beginning: "With firm steps we march ..." Years later, Unterscharführer Franz Suchomel recalled the lyrics as follows: "We know only the word of the Commander. / We know only obedience and duty. / We want to keep working, working, / until a bit of luck beckons us some time. Hurray!"
