Here are some of the names and brief details of child victims of the Holocaust:
- Judith Schwed from Hungary, died at age 12 in Auschwitz concentration camp.
- Herta Scheer-Krygier from Germany, died at age 21 in Auschwitz concentration camp.
- Peter Winternitz from Czechoslovakia, died at age 21 in Auschwitz concentration camp.
- Henoch Kornfeld from Poland, died at age 31⁄2.
1. The Holocaust
In 1933 nine million Jews lived in the 21
countries of Europe that would be occupied by
Nazi Germany during World War 2. By 1945
two out of every three European Jews had been
killed.
2. Anti -Semitism
This is the term given to
political, social and
economic agitation against
Jews. In simple terms it
means ‘Hatred of Jews’.
Aryan Race
This was the name of what Hitler
believed was the perfect race. These
were people with full German blood,
blonde hair and blue eyes.
3. For hundreds of years Christian Europe had regarded the Jews as the
Christ -killers. At one time or another Jews had been driven out of
almost every European country. The way they were treated in
England in the thirteenth century is a typical example.
AT
In 1275 they were made to wear a yellow badge.
GO
SC APE
In 1287 269 Jews were hanged in the Tower of London.
wer ea
This deep prejudice against Jews was still strong in the twentieth
Jews
century, especially in Germany, Poland and Eastern Europe, where
the Jewish population was very large.
After the First World War hundreds of Jews were blamed for the
defeat in the War. Prejudice against the Jews grew during the
economic depression which followed. Many Germans were poor
and unemployed and wanted someone to blame. They turned on the
Jews, many of whom were rich and successful in business.
4. “Until September 14, 1939 my life
was typical of a young Jewish boy
in that part of the world in that
period of time.
I lived in a Jewish community
surrounded by gentiles. Aside
from my immediate family, I had
WHY?
many relatives and knew all the
town people, both Jews and
gentiles. Almost two weeks after
the outbreak of the war and
shortly after my Bar Mitzvah, my
world exploded.
In the course of the next five and a
half years I lost my entire family
and almost everyone I ever knew.
Death, violence and brutality
became a daily occurrence in my
life while I was still a young
teenager.”
Leonard Lerer, 1991
7. 19
• Hitler comes to Power
33
• New legislation set to exclude Jews from
the life of Germany.
– Laws were passed banning Jews from working
in professional capacities; schools were
established exclusively for Jewish children and
quotas limited their entry into Universities.
– They could neither join the army nor participate
in the artistic life of the country.
8. • This Nazi propaganda
poster from 1932 links
Jews with the
development of
capitalism, communism,
& socialism.
9. NUREMBERG LAW FOR THE PROTECTION OF
GERMAN BLOOD AND GERMAN HONOUR,
SEPTEMBER 15, 1935
• Moved by the understanding that purity of the German Blood is the essential
condition for the continued existence of the German people, and inspired by
the inflexible determination to ensure the existence of the German Nation for
all times, the Reichstag has unanimously adopted the following Law, which is
promulgated herewith:
– §1
1. Marriages between Jews and subjects of the state of German or related blood are forbidden.
Marriages nevertheless concluded are invalid, even if conducted abroad to circumvent this
law.
2. Annulment proceedings can be initiated only by the State Prosecutor.
– §2
1. Extramarital intercourse between Jews and subjects of the state of German or related blood is
forbidden.
– §3
1. Jews may not employ in their households female subjects of the state of German or related
blood who are under 45 years old.
10. – §4
1. Jews are forbidden to fly the Reich or National flag or to display the Reich colours.
2. They are, on the other hand, permitted to display the Jewish colours. The exercise
of this right is protected by the State.
– §5
1. Any person who violates the prohibition under § 1 will be punished by a prison
sentence with hard labour.
2. A male who violates the prohibition under § 2 will be punished with a prison
sentence with or without hard labour.
3. Any person violating the provisions under § § 3 or 4 will be punished with a prison
sentence of up to one year and a fine, or with one or the other of these penalties.
– §6
1. The Reich Minister of the Interior, in co-ordination with the Deputy of the Führer
and the Reich Minister of Justice, will issue the Legal and Administrative
regulations required to implement and complete this Law.
– § 7 The Law takes effect on the day following promulgation except for
§ 3, which goes into force on January 1, 1936.
11. Why was this allowed?
• "Since we have no racial problem, we are not desirous
of importing one."
– Australian delegate, Evian Conference.
• "I can only hope and expect that the other world, which
has such deep sympathy for these criminals, will at least
be generous enough to convert this sympathy into
practical aid. We, on our part, are ready to put all these
criminals at the disposal of these countries, for all I
care, even on luxury ships"
– Adolph Hitler March 1938
From 1938 onwards, it was obvious to Jews that they should leave Germany as soon as
possible. The stage of expulsion had started. Although half of the Jews left Germany before
1941, over half a million remained, at the mercy of Hitler and the Nazis.
12. • Germans invaded Poland 19
• The millions of Jews who had fled to Poland to 39
escape the Nazis now suddenly came under
Germany's control.
• Over three million Jews lived in Poland
• The Nazi's first act was to round up all Jews and
send them into ghettos.
– These were small areas of towns which were sealed
off and allocated to the Jews.
– Life within the ghetto was intolerable
• overcrowding, hunger and disease
Despite this, many Jews survived, thinking and
hoping that their suffering must one day cease.
13.
14. Between 1939 and 1945
six million Jews were
murdered, along with
hundreds of thousands of
others, such as Gypsies,
Jehovah’s Witnesses,
disabled and the
mentally ill.
16. A MAP OF THE CONCENTRATION CAMPS AND DEATH CAMPS
USED BY THE NAZIS.
17. ch au
D a• KZ Dachau was the first concentration camp established in
Nazi Germany - the camp was opened on March 22, 1933.
• First inmates were primarily:
Political prisoners Habitual Criminals
Social Democrats Homosexuals
Communists Jehovah’s Witnesses
Trade unionists Beggars
• "On Wednesday the first concentration camp is to be opened in Dachau with
an accommodation for 5000 persons. 'All Communists and—where necessary
—Reichsbanner and Social Democratic functionaries who endanger state
security are to be concentrated here, as in the long run it is not possible to
keep individual functionaries in the state prisons without overburdening these
prisons, and on the other hand these people cannot be released because
attempts have shown that they persist in their efforts to agitate and organise
as soon as they are released.”
18. Types of Camps
• Hostage camps (or death camps)
– Hostages were held and killed as reprisals.
• Labor camps
– Had to do hard physical labor under inhumane conditions and cruel treatment.
• POW camps:
– Prisoners of war were held after capture
– Endured torture and liquidation on a large scale.
• Camps for rehabilitation and re-education of Poles:
– Intelligentsia of the ethnic Poles were held, and "re-educated" according to Nazi
values as slaves.
• Transit and collection camps:
– camps where inmates were collected and routed to main camps, or temporarily held
(Durchgangslager or Dulag).
• Externmination Camps
19. Road to Death Camps
• In the late 1930's the Nazis killed thousands of
handicapped Germans by lethal injection and poisonous
gas. After the German invasion of the Soviet Union in
June 1941, mobile killing units following in the wake of
the German Army began shooting massive numbers of
Jews and Gypsies in open fields and ravines on the
outskirts of conquered cities and towns.
• Eventually the Nazis created a more secluded and
organized method of killing. Extermination centers were
established in occupied Poland with special apparatus
especially designed for mass murder.
Giant death machines.
20. Part of a stockpile of Zyklon-B poison
gas pellets found at Majdanek death
camp.
Before poison gas was used ,
Jews were gassed in mobile gas
vans. Carbon monoxide gas
from the engine’s exhaust was
fed into the sealed rear
compartment. Victims were
dead by the time they reached
the burial site.
22. Auschwitz
• Largest numbers of European Jews were killed.
• By mid 1942, mass gassing of Jews using Zyklon-B began
– where extermination was conducted on an industrial scale with
some estimates running as high as three million persons eventually
killed through gassing, starvation, disease, shooting, and burning.
– 9 out of 10 were Jews.
– Gypsies, Soviet POWs, and prisoners of all nationalities died in
the gas chambers.
• Private diaries of Goebbels and Himmler (developers of
Auschwitz) unearthed from the secret Soviet archives
show that Hitler personally ordered the mass extermination
of the Jews - as Goebbels wrote "With regards to the
Jewish question, the Fuhrer decided to make a clean sweep
..."
23.
24. In 1943, when the number of murdered Jews exceeded 1 million. Nazis
ordered the bodies of those buried to be dug up and burned to destroy all
traces.
Soviet POWs at forced labor in 1943 exhuming bodies in the ravine at
Babi Yar, where the Nazis had murdered over 33,000 Jews in September
of 1941.
25. Children
• The number of children killed during the Holocaust is
not fathomable and full statistics for the tragic fate of
children who died will never be known. Estimates range
as high as 1.5 million murdered children. This figure
includes more than 1.2 million Jewish children, tens of
thousands of Gypsy children and thousands of
institutionalized handicapped children.
• Plucked from their homes and stripped of their
childhoods, the children had witnessed the murder of
parents, siblings, and relatives. They faced starvation,
illness and brutal labor, until they were consigned to the
gas chambers.
26. 16 of the 44 children taken
from a French children’s
home, sent to Auschwitz and
killed immediately upon
arrival.
ONLY 1 SURVIVED*
The Jewish Children Of Izieu
A group of
children at a
concentration
camp in Poland.
27. Jewish women, some holding infants, are forced to wait in a line
before their execution by Germans and Ukrainian collaborators.
28. A German policeman shoots individual Jewish women who remain alive
in the ravine after the mass execution.
29. Portrait of two-year-old
Mania Halef, a Jewish
child who was among the
33,771 persons shot by
the SS during the mass
executions at Babi Yar,
September, 1941.
30. Nazis sift through a huge pile of clothes left by victims of
the massacre.
31. Bales of hair shaven
from women at
Auschwitz, used to
make felt-yarn.
After liberation, an Allied
soldier displays a stash of
gold wedding rings taken
from victims at Buchenwald.
32. Aftermath
• American army units were the first to
discover the camps, when on 4 April 1945
they liberated the recently-abandoned slave
labor camp at Ohrdruf, in Thuringia,
Germany.
• Then, on 11 April, American forces
liberated the camps at Buchenwald, near
Weimar, and the V2 rocket slave-labour
camp at Nordhausen in the Harz Mountains.
33. Problems with Liberation
• The first task for the liberators was to tackle this medical nightmare.
• Limited: Roughly 50,000 inmates still living, 20,000 were seriously or
critically ill.
• With those prisoners who seemed to stand some chance of living, the
medical teams first washed and deloused them, before disinfecting
them with DDT powder. I
• nmates were then admitted to a makeshift hospital established in the
camp.
• Here, the doctors attempted to rehydrate and feed them, while treating
their illnesses. Even so, many were just too ill to be saved.
– ... 13,000 Belsen inmates died after liberation.
• Some inmates had been starved for so long that they had lost the
ability to digest the rations that well-meaning British soldiers offered
them; within minutes of taking a biscuit, some inmates just passed
away.
34. What to do with the bodies?
• Another task was to dispose of the 20,000 diseased bodies, in order to
contain the spread of typhus.
• The British forces made the surrendered German and Hungarian SS
camp guards carry the corpses into mass graves that had been dug by
British bulldozer teams.
– As punishment for their crimes, the camp guards were prevented from using
protective gloves, and consequently some of them contracted typhus and died.
• This method of burial soon proved too slow, and subsequently the
bulldozers simply shoveled the corpses into the graves.
• As the weeks went by the British steadily relocated the recovering
inmates to local housing commandeered from German civilians.
– As this process unfolded, the local populace were forced to inspect the camp, to see
for themselves the evils committed in their name.
35. Survivors
• Feared to return to their former homes because of the
anti-semitism they had suffered before.
– Some who returned home feared for their lives.
– In postwar Poland, for example, there were a number of violent
anti-Jewish riots.
• With few possibilities for emigration, tens of thousands
of homeless Holocaust survivors migrated westward to
other European territories liberated by the western
Allies.
• There they were housed in hundreds of refugee centers
and displaced persons (DP) camps such as Bergen-
Belsen in Germany.
– The United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration
(UNRRA) and the occupying armies of the United States, Great
Britain, and France administered these camps.
36. Problems
• Opportunities for legal immigration to the
United States above the existing quota
restrictions were still limited.
• The British restricted immigration to
Palestine.
• Many borders in Europe were also closed to
these homeless people.
37. M
ov
• With the establishment of the State of Israel in May 1948, Jewish
displaced persons and refugees began streaming into the new sovereign ing
state.
– Possibly as many as 170,000 Jewish displaced persons and refugees had immigrated
to Israel by 1953.
• December 1945, President Truman issued a directive that loosened
quota restrictions on immigration to the U.S. of persons displaced by
the Nazi regime.
– Under this directive, more than 41,000 displaced persons immigrated to the United
States; approximately 28,000 were Jews.
– In 1948, the U.S. Congress passed the Displaced Persons Act, which provided
approximately 400,000 U.S. immigration visas for displaced persons between January
1, 1949, and December 31, 1952.
– Of the 400,000 displaced persons who entered the U.S. under the DP Act,
approximately 68,000 were Jews.
• Other Jewish refugees in Europe emigrated as displaced persons or
refugees to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, western Europe, Mexico,
South America, and South Africa.
38. Age of
Name From Death
Camp
Judith Schwed Hungary 12 Auschwitz
Herta Scheer-Krygier German 21 Auschwitz
Peter Winternitz Czechoslovakia 21 Auschwitz
Henoch Kornfeld Poland 3½ Belzec
Henny Schermann Germany 30 Ravensbrueck
& Bernburg
Thomas Elek Hungary 20 POW in Paris
Eva Heyman Romania 13 Auschwitz
Erzsebet Markovics Katz Hungary 40 Bergen-Belsen
Esther Morgansztern Poland 15 Treblinka
Smiljka Ljoljic Visnjevac Yugoslavia 30 Banjinca
39. Age of
Name From Death
Camp
Shulim Saleschutz Poland 12 Belzec
Hela Szabszevicz Poland 43 Lodz ghetto
Barbara Kertesz Nemeth Hungary 34 Strasshof
Ilona Karfunkel Kalman Hungary 38 Auschwitz
Welwel Wainkranc Poland 24 Kaluszyn ghetto
Ethel Stern Poland 24 Trawniki
Yves Oppert France 35 POW at Etercy
Zuzana Gruenberger Czechoslovakia 11 Auschwitz
Eva Brigitte Marum Germany 26 Sobibor
Fischel Felman Poland 31 Treblinka
40. NAME From Date of Birth Life during War
Jeannine Burk Belgium 9/15/1939 Hidden Child
Shep Zitler Lithuania 5/27/1917 Polish Soldier and
Prisoner of War
Eva Galler Poland 1/1/1924 Escaped a Death
Train
Solomon Radasky Poland 5/17/1910 Warsaw Ghetto and
Auschwitz
Isak Borenstein Poland 5/5/1918 Prisoner of War
Joseph Sher Poland 7/27/1917 Labor Camps
Esther Raab Poland 1922 Sobibor
Joseph Bau Poland 18 June 1920 Plaszow
Rivka Yosselevka Belarus Unknown Zagrodski
Ghetto
41. NAME From Date of Birth Life during War
Ernest Domby Czechoslovakia March 9, 1925 Theresienstadt
ghetto,
Auschwitz, Gross-
Franz Wohlfahrt Austria January 18, 1920 Rosen Rodgau
Rollwald
Ruth (Huppert) Czechoslovakia October 6, 1922 Theresienstadt
Elias ghetto, Auschwitz
Saul Ingber Romania April 16, 1921 Dachau
Arthur Karl Heinz Germany January 13, 1921 Theresienstadt
Oertelt and Flossenbürg
Thomas Czechoslovakia May 11, 1934 Auschwitz
Buergenthal
Wolfgang Munzer Germany February 26, 1920 Auschwitz
Wolf Himmelfarb Poland June 19, 1927 Theresienstadt
Szlamach Poland May 17, 1912 Auschwitz
Radoszynski
42. To find out more on your
Victim or Survivor go to…
• http://go.fold3.com/holocaust_stories/
• http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/survivor
s.php
• http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/su
rvivor/index.html
Hinweis der Redaktion
THIS PICTURE IS IMPORTANT BECAUSE IT SHOWS A FAMILY WHOSE LIVED THROUGH THIS AWFUL TIME. WE WILL BE LOOKING AT A BOOK CALLED THE SOAPMAKER WHICH TELLS THE STORY OF A YOUNG POLISH BOY'S LIFE THROUGHOUT THE WAR. AFTER ALL THAT HORRIFIC EVIDENCE OF WHAT HAPPENED THERE SHOULD ONLY BE ONE QUESTION ON YOUR MINDS. A QUESTION WHICH WE WILL TRY TO ANSWER OVER THE NEXT FEW LESSONS.... (MOUSE CLICK) WHY.
Most Nazi propaganda was directed at Jews. This early image appeared in the Nazi magazine Der Stürmer in 1930, before the Nazis came into power. It states “The year has ended, the struggle continues”. In such propaganda, Germans are shown as a strong, handsome and superior race. Jews are shown as ugly, weak, deceitful and conniving.
No criticism Nazi propaganda was used to make Germans feel proud of themselves but also superior to others, as a country and also as a race. No criticism was allowed, so all “un-German” books, art, and culture were banned. The Jews are described everywhere as a threat to Germany and the German way of life that had to be dealt with quickly and harshly. They were even compared to rats and cockroaches. Other groups such as Gypsies, Socialists and Blacks were also described in the media as a danger to Germany. Lies and myths The Nazi’s established a special ministry of Propaganda, called the Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. With only one source of information, the German people come to believe many of the lies and myths that the government broadcasts day after day. After years of economic hardship and a sense of loss, it is hard to resist the wave of pride that was promoted by the Nazis.
This slow process increased in tempo in 1935. Following a gigantic rally of the Nazi Party in Nuremberg, laws were passed which removed the right of Jews to be citizens of Germany. They had effectively become non-people.
In 1938 further laws were introduced which removed citizenship from any Jews who was from Polish descent. Several thousand Jews were taken to the Polish border but were refused entry into Poland . Herschl Grynszpan, a Jewish émigré in Paris, as a protest at the treatment of German Jews shot and killed a Nazi diplomat in Paris. This was the excuse that the Nazis had been waiting for. Shortly after the assassination, a night of violence was launched across Germany - synagogues and Jewish shops were attacked, destroyed and burnt down and Jews were beaten and murdered. Ninety Jews were killed and thousands put into concentration camps. Also the Jews were made to pay for the damagae which had been caused to their houses and shops. The night, November 9/10 November 1938, became known as Kristallnacht - the night of the shattered glass. Look at the two sources below: - As Hitler's speech preceded the Evian Conference, why do you think that the delegates from around the world did not pay serious attention to the threats of Hitler? - Why did these countries not want to take in additional Jewish refugees? - What do the comments of the Australian delegate say about atitudes towards Jews around the world?
Major ghettos in occupied Europe During World War II, the Germans established ghettos mainly in eastern Europe (between 1939 and 1942) and also in Hungary (in 1944). These ghettos were enclosed districts of a city in which the Germans forced the Jewish population to live under miserable conditions. The Germans regarded the establishment of Jewish ghettos as a provisional measure to control, isolate, and segregate Jews. Beginning in 1942, after the decision had been made to kill the Jews, the Germans systematically destroyed the ghettos, deporting the Jews to extermination camps where they were killed.
How did they manage to get together all these Jews to kills them? How did they kill them when they had them? To begin with there were concentration camps.
There were concentration camps and death camps. If you went to a death camp the chances of coming out alive were virtually nil. Even at concentration camps though you were likely to die from the appalling conditions. Or, if you were very young, old, or incapable of hard labour, it was likely you would be transferred to a death camp too. Anne Frank died at Belsen from Typhoid. Leonard Leher's mother and sisters were sent to Sobibor. YOU MAY ASK "WHO WERE THESE PEOPLE WHO WERE SENT TO PLACES LIKE THIS?" THEY WERE CHILDREN JUST LIKE YOU. THE ONLY DIFFERENCE WAS THEIR RACE AND THE RELIGION THEY FOLLOWED.
THIS IS THE GAS THAT WAS INTRODUCED IN 1942. JEWS WERE SENT INTO SEALED SHOWER UNITS ON THE PRETENCE THAT THEY WERE GOING TO BE SHOWERED. PELLETS WERE THEN PLACED INTO THE SHOWER HEADS AND GAS CAME FROM THE SHOWERS INSTEAD OF WATER. 15 MINUTES LATER THE SHOWER ROOM WOULD BE EMPTIED, BODIES WERE ALWAYS IN A PYRAMID SHAPE, PEOPLE TRIED TO CLIMB ON TOP OF ONE ANOTHER TO ESCAPE THE GAS. BEFORE THIS TYPE OF KILLING METHOD WAS INTRODUCED THOUGH A MORE PRIMITIVE GASSING METHOD WAS USED.... I DON'T KNOW HOW, OR EVEN WHY THIS PHOTO WAS TAKEN, BUT IT SHOWS SOME MEN AWAITING DEATH ON THEIR WAY TO THEIR BURIAL PLACE. DID THEY ALWAYS BURY THE DEAD?
NO. MORE OFTEN THAN NOT, ESPECIALLY WHEN THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE MURDERED GREW ESPECIALLY HIGH, NAZIS BURNED THE BODIES. SO WHAT OTHER METHODS WERE USED TO SYSTEMATICALLY MURDER THESE PEOPLE?
OBVIOUSLY TOWARDS THE END OF THE WAR THEY TRIED TO COVER THEIR TRACKS. IT WAS NOT GUILT THOUGH AND THEY DID NOT DO THE WORK THEMSELVES. THEY MADE JEWS AND OTHER PRISONERS OF WAR DIG UP THE BODIES AND BURN THEM INSTEAD.
HOW DID THEY KILL THESE INNOCENT CHILDREN, ALONG WITH THEIR PARENTS, GRANDPARENTS, FRIENDS ETC.. YOU WILL ALL HAVE PROBABLY HEARD OF THE WAY NAZiS GASSED THE JEWS.
MASS EXECUTION USING A FIRING SQUAD WAS COMMON. THESE WOMEN HAVE BEEN ORDERED TO REMOVE EVERYTHING, CLOTHES, JEWELLERY, EVEN WEDDING RINGS AND ARE BEING FORCED TO LINE UP AND WAIT FOR THEIR TURN TO BE KILLED. SOME TIME LATER...
THEY HAVE BEEN ORDERED TO LIE, FACE DOWN ON THE GROUND AND HAVE BEEN SHOT. THE GERMAN POLICEMAN IS SHOOTING INDIVIDUALS WHO HAVE ESCAPED DEATH FROM THE INITIAL ROUND OF BULLETS. THIS IS HORRIFIC BUT WE CANNOT SEE THE INDIVIDUAL FACES OF THOSE KILLED, WE DON'T REALLY KNOW WHO THEY ARE OR WHAT THEY REALLY LOOKED LIKE. SO TAKE A LOOK AT THIS NEXT PICTURE...
THIS PICTURE TELLS US A LOT. HER PARENTS ARE OBVIOUSLY WEALTHY ENOUGH TO HAVE HAD A PORTRAIT DONE, SO IT SHOWS US THAT THE STATUS OF THE JEWS DID NOT MATTER TO THE NAZIS. IT WAS NOT JUST THE POOR WHICH WERE KILLED. THEY WERE KILLED REGARDLESS OF WEALTH OR STATUS, THEIR DEATH WAS DETERMINED BY RELIGION AND RACE.
GIVES SOME IDEA OF THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE. BUT WHY DID THE NAZI WANT THEM TO REMOVE THEIR CLOTHES? WHAT DID THEY WANT WITH THEIR JEWELLERY, CLOTHES, EVEN HAIR?
THESE PICTURES SHOW WHAT THEY WANTED. WERE THE NAZI'S NOT WORRIED ABOUT THE CONSEQUENCES OF THEIR ACTIONS? DID THEY NOT THINK ABOUT WHAT MIGHT HAPPEN IF ALLIED COUNTRIES DISCOVERED WHAT WAS HAPPENING?