The Holocaust

Hitler’s Rise to Power

• 1913- Joined Military• 1919- Germany was

having political problems

• 1919-Hitler joined German’s Worker’s Party

• 1919- German’s Workers Party changed their name to National Sczialistische Deutsche Arbeiterspartei (National Socialist German Workers Party)

• They used the acronym, NAZI• 1923-Germany was in an economic

depression• Hitler staged a NAZI take over• He was arrested for treason and sent to jail• There he wrote Mein Kampf (My Struggle)

• Mein Kampf outlined Hitler’s plan for Germany

• This book became known as the NAZI bible

• It outlined a plan for killing Jews

• Outlined a plan for taking over Europe

• No one believed it

• It was considered just a madman’s diary

• 1924- Hitler was released from prison

• He began strengthening his party

• January 1933- Hitler was named Chancellor of Germany

• People believed Hitler could lead the nation out of its grave political and economic crisis

• Hitler moved quickly to end German democracy• He suspended individual freedoms of press,

speech, and assembly.• He established the Gestapo (secret police), Storm

Troopers, and the Security police.• These groups arrested and murdered leaders of

opposition political parties

• March 23, 1933- Hitler is declared Dictator of Germany

• 1933- Racial Ideology is put into practice

• Pure Germans were seen as “racially superior”

• Jews are seen as an “inferior race”

• Jews, Gypsies, and the handicapped were seen as a threat to the “master race”

Hate Propaganda

• Jews were the principal target of Nazi hatred

• They blamed Jews for the country’s economic depression

• They blamed Jews for Germany’s defeat in World War I.

• They blamed Jews for loss of jobs.

• They blamed Jews for weakening the Aryan race.

Nazi Propaganda: Mental Patients are “Idiots”

Nazi Propaganda: Racial Chart

Nazi Propaganda Slogans

• “Germany Awake, Jews Perish”

• “Don’t buy from Jews. Shop in German Stores!”

• “The Jews are our misfortune.”

• “Women and Girls, the Jews are your ruin.”

• “Jews enter this place at their own risk.”

Banning the Jews

• 1933

• April 1- Boycott of Jewish shops and businesses

• April 7-Jews barred from holding Civil Service, university, and state positions

• May 10-Burned books written by Jews

Nuremberg Laws

• 1935• Jews banned from serving

in armed forces• Anti-Jewish racial laws

enacted• Jews no longer considered

German citizens• Jews could not marry

Aryans • Jews could not fly the

German flag

Nuremberg Laws• Germany officially defines

a “Jew” as anyone with three Jewish grandparents; someone with two Jewsih grandparents who identifies as a Jew

• Jews must wear a yellow star of David on all clothing

• 1936• Jewish doctors barred from

practicing medicine• July: First concentration

camp opens• October: Forms Axis power

with Mussolini of Italy

• 1937• Buchenwald concentration

camp opens• Austria joins the Nazi

regime• 1938- • Austria and Italy

incorporate all Nuremberg laws

• Mandatory registration of all Jewish property

• Jewish passports are marked with a “J” to restrict Jews from leaving

• November-Kristallnact (Night of Broken Glass)

• Synagogues and Jewish shops are destroyed

• Many Jewish males are sent to concentration camps

• Jews must hand over all stores to Arayans

• Jewish children are expelled from school

• Jews are fined for Kristallnact

1939• Hitler promises if war

erupts, it will mean the extermination of all European Jews

• Germans occupy Czechoslovakia

• Germany invades Poland• Great Britain and France

declare war on Germany• Ghettos are established in

Poland• Germany begins

deportation of German and Austrian Jews

1940• April 9-Germany invades and

occupies Denmark and Norway

• May 10-Germany invades the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourgn and France

• May 20- Auschwitz concentration and death camp opens in Poland

• June 22- France surrenders

• Sept. 27- Germany, Italy, and Japan form Axis Powers

• Oct. 7- Romania is occupied

• November 16-Warsaw Ghetto is sealed

• Hungary joins Axis Powers

1941• April- Germany attacks

Yugoslavia and Greece

• June 22- Germany invades the Soviet Union

• July 31- Germany implements the “Final Solution”

• Birkenau death camp established

• December 7- Japanese attack Pearl Harbor

• United States declares war on Japan and Germany

(1889-1945)

Final Solution

• Jews receive deportation notice

• Notice tells Jews to report to train station on a certain date and time

• Jews are allowed to bring one suitcase of belongings

• At the train station, their suitcases are dumped in a pile

• 75 and over are forced into a boxcar with standing room only

• For days, prisoners travel with no water, food, or bathroom facilities

• The old and babies perish• When they arrive at the camp, they are divided

into two lines- men and women• They are forced to march a long distance to the

barracks• Those who chose to ride in trucks are never seen

again• This is the last time many people see their family

members

Prisoners were forced to undress and hand over all valuables

Clothes confiscated from victims

Gold Teeth of Prisoners

Glasses of Prisoners

Prisoners were taken to the showers/gas chambers

If prisoners survived the showers, hair was shaved and numbers

tatooed on arm.

Prisoners were sent to barracks.

Prisoners worked or were sent to the gas chambers and

crematoriums.

Women and children wait for their turn in the gas chamber

Roll Call

Medical Experiments performed by Dr. Josef Mengele

• Infected victims with diseases to study effects• Fluids from diseased animals were injected into

humans to observe the effect• Some victims were given only sea water to drink• Surgery was performed without anethestic• Sterilized over 1,000 women a day• Amputated parts of bodies• Submerged bodies in calcium chloride

Medical Experiments performed by Joseph Mengele

Many prisoners were forced to dig their own graves.

Heroes who helped

Oscar Schindler with Rescued Jews

1942

• Extermination begins with gas

• By the end of 1942, 600,000 Jews murdered

• Jews deported from Belgium, Croatia, France, the Netherlands, Greece, Norway, and Poland

1943

• April 19: Warsaw Ghetto revolt begins as Germans attempt to liquidate 70,000 inhabitants

• All other ghettos are liquidated

• Danes rescue their own Jews

1944

• Germany occupies Hungary

• June 6- D-Day; Allied invasion at Normandy

• July 20- Group of German officers attempt to assassinate Hitler

• Death marches begin as allies close in on camps

1945

• Camps begin being liberated

• April 30- Hitler commits suicide

• May 8- Germany surrenders; V-E Day

• August 6- Bombing of Hiroshima

• August 9- Bombing of Nagasaki

• September 2- Japan surrenders

Jewish Survivors

Survivors of Camp

Liberation

Liberation

General Eisenhower of US touring Camps

Commandant Eichelsdoerfer

Death TrainAmerican soldiers of the U.S. 7th Army force boys, believed to be Hitler youth, to examine boxcars containing bodies of prisoners

starved to death by the SS. Photo credit: National Archives, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives

German Civilians View CorpsesGerman civilians under U.S. military escort are forced to see a wagon loaded with corpses in Buchenwald.

Photo credit: National Archives, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives

German Civilians Tour BuchenwaldCivilians from nearby Weimar are forced by American soldiers to see the remains of prisoners in the crematorium ovens of

Buchenwald during their tour of the concentration camp.

German Civilians Bury Corpses German civilians from the town of Nordhausen bury the corpses of prisoners found in the Nordhausen concentration camp in mass

graves. Photo credit: USHMM

War Criminals

War Trials

Never Forget !!!

German Death Factories

Death Camp Number of Victims

Auschwitz 2,000,000

Belzec 850,000

Sobibor 250,000

Treblinka 700,000

Chelmno 300,000