Before deportation to Auschwitz, Poles were concentrated in the large, central district prisons of the General Government: Pawiak (Warsaw) in the Warsaw District; Montelupich (Cracow) and Tarnów prison in the Cracow District; Na Zamku (Lublin) in the Lublin District; the Radom Gestapo prison in the Radom District; and the Gestapo prison in Lwów in the Galicia District. From the Polish land annexed by the German Reich and from the Reich itself, Poles arrived in Auschwitz by way of the prisons in Katowice, Sosnowiec, Mysłowice, Opole, Opawa, Wrocław, Szczecin, Inowrocław, Poznań,  Bydgoszcz, Legnica, and Łódź.

They were transported by special trains or, more frequently, in train cars added to passenger trains. New prisoners boarded as the trains stopped in cities along the way. These were referred to as collective transports (Sammeltransport).