Nunez 1

Holocaust Research Assignment

Luke Nunez

ENG 102: Holocaust

Mr. Neuburger

4 April 2011
 Nunez 2

Nazis come to power

In 1919, with the end of World War I, and the defeat of Germany, the German sense of

national pride was absolutely destroyed. The Treaty of Versailles, Germany was disarmed and

forced to pay reparations to France and Britain for the huge costs of the war. This creates the

perfect situation for someone who knows what they’re doing to raise up through the turmoil as a

hero to the Germans. Later on that year a political party formed, they called themselves the

Germans’ Worker Party.

By 1920 Hitler, with his motivating speeches, had become the leader of this party. He

changed the party name to the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, or Nazi party for short.

At the end of the year the party had grown to about three thousand members. He encouraged

party views and beliefs, such as national pride, militarism, a racially pure Germany, and

commitment to the Volk, a reference to the German speaking people of Europe.

Beer Hall Putsch

In 1923 Hitler tried to overthrow the government

in the city of Munich, his Beer Hall Putsch was easily

suppressed by local authorities. The consequences of the

Beer Hall Putsch were more significant in the success of

the Nazi party than the uprising itself. When Hitler was put on trial; it provided him with a stage

from which he could pitch his ideas to the public. It transformed him from little known politician

into a leader of the right wing. He was sentenced to five years in prison, with eligibility for early
Leaders of the Beer Hall Putsch
parole; he was released on parole after nine months. (The
http://bit.ly/38ggdX

Munich Putsch)
 Nunez 3

During his imprisonment, Hitler wrote Mein Kampf, meaning my struggles in German; in

this book he wrote about his radical ideas of German nationalism, and anti-Semitism. This book,

not published until 1925, became the ideological basis of the Nazi party. After Hitler was

released from prison he strategically maneuvered his way to be sole leader of the Nazi party.

(Holocaust Timeline: The Rise of the Nazi Party)

Hitler created a military arm in his party called the Storm Troopers in English but they

were called the SA for short. Within his military arm was an elite group with special duties, this

group was called SS for short, they were the equivalent of the U.S. navy seals mixed with the

Secret Service.

Hitler becomes chancellor

In 1932 as president Hindenburg’s term was coming to an end, the Nazi’s were looking

like they were going to win the election. Hindenburg

didn’t want Hitler to be president with the Reichstag

being primarily Nazis, so he decided to run again at age

84. He won the election and appointed Hitler as

chancellor. Hitler created the first concentration camp,

Hitler inspecting his new army
Dachau, within his first months as chancellor. The
http://bit.ly/fet1HZ
Reichstag passed a law, called the Enabling Act, giving

the German government the right to paws laws without the consent of the Reichstag. Two years

later when Hindenburg died Hitler appointed himself as chancellor and president, giving him

total power of the German government. (Holocaust Timeline: The Rise of the Nazi Party)
 Nunez 4

Nuremberg Laws
1935 brought about sad times for the Jewish people; this is the year the Nuremburg Laws

were put into action. These laws took away all the civil rights of the Jews, forbidding marriages

or sexual relations between Jews and Germans. Jews

were required to carry identity cards with a red "J"

stamped on them and new middle names for all those

Jews who did not possess recognizably "Jewish" first

names -- "Israel" for males, "Sara" for females.

(Nuremberg Laws) Such cards allowed the police to

Jews protesting the Nuremberg Laws

http://bit.ly/fet1HZ identify Jews easily. Jewish workers and managers were

dismissed, and the ownership of most Jewish businesses was taken over by non-Jewish Germans

who bought them at bargain prices fixed by Nazis. Jewish doctors were forbidden to treat non-

Jews, and Jewish lawyers were not permitted to practice law. Jews were now also banned from

entering museums, public playgrounds and swimming pools. Hitler warned darkly that if this law

did not resolve the problem, he would turn to the Nazi Party for a final solution (The Nuremberg

Race Laws).

Kristallnacht
 Nunez 5

On the night of November 9, 1938 anti-Semitic

violence broke out all across Germany. Jewish

businesses were vandalized and their windows broken,

Jewish synagogues were burned and destroyed, Jewish

cemeteries, hospitals, schools, and homes were looted, Burning synagogue during the night of broken
glass
all while police and fire brigades stood by and
http://bit.ly/e1GK3k

watched. The morning after 30,000 Jewish men were

arrested for the crime of being Jewish and sent to concentration camps, where hundreds of them

died (Krystallnacht). Businesses owned by Jews were not allowed to re-open unless they were

managed by non-Jews. Curfews were now placed on Jews, limiting the hours of the day they

could leave their homes, and Jewish children were banished from school (Kristallnacht: A

Nationwide Pogrom).

Wannsee Conference – The Final Solution

On January 20, 1942, fifteen high-ranking Nazi party and

German government leaders gathered for an important meeting.

The conference was organized by Adolf Eichmann, at the order

of Reinhard Heydrich, Chief of the SS. The conference was held

in large house by a lake known as Wannsee. The goal of this

conference was to find the “final solution to the Jewish question”,

and then outline the newly planned Final Solution. Heydrich

wanted to harmonize the implementation of that "Final Solution" with every one that was to

participate in the rounding up of all Jews throughout Europe

Reinhard Heydrich, Chief of the SS

(http://bit.ly/hnRpv5)
(House of the Wannsee Conference). They would then be
 Nunez 6

transported and organized into labor gangs. Work and living conditions would be extremely

harsh as to kill large numbers by natural reduction. What was to be done with the remaining Jews

was never mentioned at the Wannsee Conference, but within a few months after the meeting, the

first gas chambers were built in Poland. (The Minutes of the Wannsee Conference)

Rounding up Jews – ghettos

The ghettos weren’t Hitler’s idea, but he modified them to work perfectly in his plan.

Hitler set up ghettos in Poland, the Soviet Union, the Baltic States, Czechoslovakia, Romania,

and Hungary. Nazi authorities were told that Jews were natural carriers of all types of diseases

and that it was necessary to isolate Jews from the Polish community. Many ghettos were set up

in cities and towns where Jews were already concentrated. Jews as well as Gypsies also known

as Romas were brought to ghettos from surrounding regions and Western Europe. The Germans

usually marked off the oldest, most run-down sections of cities for the ghettos. They sometimes

evicted non-Jewish residents from the buildings to make room for Jews. Many of the ghettos

were enclosed by barbed-wire fences or walls, with entrances guarded by local and German

police and SS members. During curfew hours at night the residents were forced to stay inside

their apartments. Jewish neighborhoods were then virtually transformed into prisons. There were

five major ghettos, were located in Warsaw, Lodz, Krakow, Lublin, and Lvov.

Warsaw ghetto uprising

The Germans announce the establishment of a ghetto in Warsaw on October twelfth of

1940. All Jewish residents of Warsaw are ordered into the designated area, which will be sealed

off from the rest of the city by November. The wall would be more than 10 feet high and topped

with barbed wire. The Germans guard the ghetto boundary closely to prevent movement between

the ghetto and the rest of Warsaw. The Warsaw ghetto is the largest of the ghettos. More than

Image from the Warsaw ghetto uprising

http://bit.ly/gmXKt6
 Nunez 7

500,000 Jews are confined in a very small area.

According to the article Ghettos in Poland, about 45,000

Jews died as a result of overcrowding, hard labor, lack of

sanitation, insufficient food, and disease, in 1941 alone.

On April 19, 1943 the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto battled

for a month, using weapons smuggled into the ghetto.

The Nazis answered back by burning blocks of buildings, destroying the ghetto, bringing in tanks

and machine guns, and ultimately killing many of the last 60,000 Jewish ghetto residents. The

Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was the first large uprising by an urban population in German-occupied

territory. In august of 1943, about seven hundred Jews torched parts of the Treblinka death camp,

most of those rebelling were killed within the compound and of the 150-200 who escaped, only a

dozen survived (The Camps).

The Six death camps

There were six extermination sites, these six camps were Belzec, Birkenau (also known

as Auschwitz II or Auschwitz-Birkenau), Chelmno, Majdanek, Sobibor, and Treblinka were in

operation in Poland. Chelmno was the first Nazi extermination camp in Poland, 37 miles from

the Lodz ghetto. Estimates of the number of people

killed at Chelmno vary from 170,000 to 360,000,

virtually all Jews; most authorities agree on the higher

estimate. Despite this large number, not many people in

Poland or abroad ever knew of its existence until its

liberation by Soviet troops.

Operating crematory at Auschwitz
Perhaps the biggest, most symbolic, and well-
http://bit.ly/gP4bFd

known extermination camp was Auschwitz, at its peak,

 Nunez 8

more than 20,000 people could be murdered and their bodies burned in a single day, the highest

output was 24,000 in a single day. At least one-third of the estimated five to six million Jews

killed by the Nazis during World War II died at Auschwitz. Combined with Hitler's quest for

world domination, and World War II as a cover, the Nazi regime was able to carry out the

greatest crime in human history (The Munich Putsch). The total death tolls for the camps were:

Treblinka at seven hundred fifty thousand Jews, Belzec at five hundred fifty thousand Jews,

Sobibor at two hundred thousand Jews, Chelmno at one hundred fifty thousand Jews, and Lublin,

also called Majdanek, with fifty thousand Jews. Auschwitz with its final death total was at about

one million Jews and one million non-Jews. (Holocaust Timeline: The Camps)

Selection – selektion
When the Jews were sent to the death camps, such as Auschwitz-Birkenau, they were

ordered by guards to get out and form a line. The victims then went through a selection process.

Men were separated from women and children. A Nazi

looked quickly at each person to decide if he or she was

healthy and strong enough for forced labor. The officer

then pointed to the left or the right. The individuals did

not know that they were being selected to live or die.

Picture of selection
Babies, young children, the elderly, handicapped, and

http://bit.ly/gNgR39 sick had little to no chance of surviving selection.

Those who had been selected to die were led to

gas chambers. In order to prevent panic, camp guards told the victims that they were going to

take showers to rid themselves of lice. The guards instructed them to turn over all their valuables

and to undress. Then they were driven naked into the showers. Within minutes after entering the

gas chambers, everyone inside was dead from lack of oxygen. Under guard, prisoners were
 Nunez 9

forced to haul the corpses to a nearby room, where they removed hair, gold teeth, and fillings.

The bodies were burned in ovens in the crematory or buried in mass graves. (At the Killing

Centers)

Mengele
Some prisoners weren’t fortunate enough to die quickly as the ones previously

mentioned. Twins and pregnant women, for instance were sent straight away to Dr. Mengele,

also known as the “angel of death.” He was not the highest ranking doctor, but he is one of the

most remember. He performed nasty, horrific, and terrifying

experiments on his “patients.” He is most known for his

experiments on twins. He would leave one as a control and use

the other sibling to test immunization mixtures and compounds

for the prevention and treatment of diseases, like malaria, typhus,

tuberculosis, typhoid fever, yellow fever, and hepatitis. Other

Twins Mengele sewed together patients were subjected to phosgene and mustard gas in order to
http://bit.ly/gzrNZ6
test possible antidotes for Axis Powers troops. Mengele evaded

capture for thirty four years, he was never found until after his death. (Holocaust Timeline: The

Camps)

Extermination methods
In the beginning of the mass murder of Jews, Nazis used mobile killing squads. The

squads consisted of four units of between five hundred and nine hundred men; their job was to

kill all Jews as well as Gypsies, and others considered undesirable by the Nazis. Their victims

were executed in mass shootings and buried in unmarked mass graves. The bodies were later

dug up and burned to cover evidence of what had occurred. By the time Himmler ordered a halt
 Nunez 10

to the shooting in the fall of 1942, they had already murdered approximately 1,500,000 Jews.

(Holocaust Timeline: The Camps)

The next form of mass killing of the Jews was via asphyxiation. This proved to be a

faster, less personal method for killing the German

“undesirables”, one that would spare the shooters,

emotional suffering. Jews were forced into vans, where

the doors were closed and latched and the motors were

started. A hose carried the fumes into the van. The driver

then drove the bodies to the pre-dug graves in the forest

Gassing van

where Jewish workers unloaded the bodies into the http://bit.ly/fcMOAI

graves. It usually required 10 or 15 minutes to asphyxiate

all who were in the vans. The van then returned to the camp and the operation was repeated.

In the death camps, stationary gas chambers began at Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka, all

in Poland. As victims were unloaded from cattle cars, they were told that they had to be

disinfected in showers. The Nazi guards sometimes shouted at and beat the victims, who were

ordered to enter the showers with raised arms to allow as many people as possible to fit into the

gas chambers. The Nazis were constantly searching for more efficient means of extermination.

The first experimental usage of Zyklon B was at the Auschwitz camp in Poland, in September

1941, some 600 Soviet prisoners of war and 250 ill prisoners were killed with this lethal gas.

This proved to be the most effective and efficient way to exterminate mass quantities of human

beings.

Liberation
With the Allied forces about to take over; the

Nazis began dismantling the concentration and death

 Nunez 11

camps, hoping to cover up their crimes. By the late winter to early spring of 1945, the Nazis

marched prisoners to camps in central Germany, thousands died in what became known as death

marches. The total number of the Jewish genocide,

including shootings and the camps, was between 5.2 and

5.8 million, roughly half of Europe's Jewish population,

the highest percentage of loss of any people in the war.

About 5 million other victims were killed at the hands of

Nazi Germany. As Allied troops entered Nazi-occupied

territories, the final rescue and liberations occurred. Allied troops who stumbled upon the

concentration camps were shocked at what they found; large ditches filled with bodies, rooms of

baby shoes, and gas chambers with fingernail marks on the walls all testified to Nazi brutality.

General Eisenhower ordered pictures to be taken and be documented so that future generations

would know what happened to these people. He didn’t want something like this to ever happen

again. He also made villagers neighboring the death and concentration camps to view what had

occurred in their own backyards, most had no idea what had been happening.( Holocaust

Timeline: Rescue & Liberation)

After liberation - until 1948 when Israel is formed

After the Allied forces liberated the Jews from the Nazi rule, they had nowhere to go.

Shop owners went back to their shops or stores to find them having new owners or demolished.

Jewish home owners were in the same predicament. The Jews were just refugees lost in Europe;

they had nothing, no rights, no possessions, nothing. They campaign for the British to give them

Palestine. Finally on November 29, 1947, the United

Nations adopted a plan that divided Palestine into an Arab

Jewish refugees after liberation

http://bit.ly/gsUBdx
 Nunez 12

state and a Jewish state, with Jerusalem under international control. The Jews proclaimed the

independent State of Israel as theirs, in 1948, and the British withdrew from Palestine. The next

day, neighboring Arab nations attacked Israel. It seems that the Jewish people will never be free

from war and persecution.

Works Cited

"At the Killing Centers." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Web. 20 Mar. 2011.

"Ghettos in Poland." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Web. 20 Mar. 2011.

"Holocaust Timeline: Rescue & Liberation." Florida Center for Instructional Technology.

Web. 20 Mar. 2011

"Holocaust Timeline: The Camps." Florida Center for Instructional Technology. Web. 18

Mar. 2011.
 Nunez 13

"Holocaust Timeline: The Rise of the Nazi Party." Florida Center for Instructional

Technology. Web. 18 Mar. 2011

"House of the Wannsee Conference." Haus Der Wannsee-Konferenz . Web. 20 Mar. 2011.

"Kristallnacht: A Nationwide Pogrom, November 9-10, 1938." United States Holocaust

Memorial Museum. Web. 18 Mar. 2011.

"Krystallnacht." Shoah Education Project-Web: Holocaust or Shoah Education for the Church

and General Public: An Online Curriculum. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum,

2002. Web. 25 Feb. 2011.

"Nuremberg Laws." Encyclopedia of The Holocaust. Ed. Isreal Gutman. Vol. 3. New York:

Macmillan, 1990. 1076-077. Web. 23 Feb. 2011.

"The Camps." Middle Tennessee State University. 21 Feb. 1996. Web. 03 Apr. 2011.

"The Minutes of the Wannsee Conference Http://www.HolocaustResearchProject.org."

"The Munich Putsch." The Seeds of Evil: The Rise of Hitler. Web. 21 Mar. 2011.

"The Nuremberg Race Laws." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Web. 20 Mar. 2011.

Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team. Web. 03 Apr. 2011.