A final thought...

I learned a lot in studying the Holocaust.  Not just the details of why and how it happened, but also the dangers that appear to lurk in so-called modern societies.  The Holocaust may be the worst example, but let’s not forget the “ethnic cleansing” of the 1990’s in Bosnia or the more recent genocide in Darfur.  The Holocaust may be an item of history from 60+ years ago, but the ability of societies to commit such atrocities is not.  Studying these events can only lead to a better understanding of their causes and, hopefully, ways in which to help avert them before they occur. 

Holocaust on the Internet

Throughout my current course work and while working on this project, I have come across a lot of interesting things on the internet.  I thought I would share some of these things as another resource for learning about this horrible time in history.


1.  Virtual Tour of Auschwitz/Birkneau:  Here you can take of virtual tour of the actual Auschwitz and Birkneu camp.  It is a 360 tour with real images of the different areas of each camp.  You can move around and zoom in and out as well as enter different parts of the camp.  This is cool because it gives you an idea of where a lot of the things that we read about occurred.  It paints a picture for these horrific stories and facts that we have learned about during this time.  You can access this tour at: http://remember.org/auschwitz/info.php?topic=info&start=yes&size=l&fmt=qtvr&ex=aus

2.  Holocaust Survivors Stories:  Here you can select different Holocaust survivors and read their story or listen to them tell their stories.  You can select to hear their whole story or pick specific parts.  There are also galleries with each survivor that allows you to get a better idea of their overall experience during this time.  You can access these stories at: http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/survivors.php

3. Holocaust Timeline:  Here you can find a detailed timeline of events leading up to the Holocaust, events during the Holocaust, and events that occurred after the Holocaust.  Not only does it give a detailed idea of what happened, there are also links within many of the events to get further information.  You can access this timeline at:  http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/holocaust/timeline.html

4.  Jewish Virtual Library:  Here you can find lots of different photographs from the time of the Holocaust and after.  Many of the pictures are graphic but they all help you understand how bad this time really was.  You can access these pictures at:  http://dev.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/phototoc.html

5.  Holocaust Statistics:  Here you can find an estimation for the number of people involved in the Holocaust, where they were from, how many survived and how many were killed.  It allows you to get a better idea of how many were killed and where they came from.  You can access these statistics at: http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/holocaust/h-statistics.htm

6.  Holocaust Survivors Holocaust Gallery: Here you can find dozens of pictures that are all Holocaust related.  You can access these photos at: http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/data.show.php?da=photos&di=list&so=title  Some examples of the photos from this website:

Survivor's Tattoo
[http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/data.show.php?di=record&da=photos&ke=80]

Stairs of death-prisoners were forced to
carry heavy loads of rocks up this
staircase.
[http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/data.show.php?di=record&da=photos&ke=50]

Electric Fencepost at Auschwitz
[http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/data.show.php?di=record&da=photos&ke=93]

Surviving the Holocaust

I think what has been most influential on me throughout my learning on the Holocaust is the survivor's stories.  I think that reading the history of the Holocaust is can be intense but  the personal stories that are filled with real emotion allows you to understand this time on a whole different level.  In my class we watched a Spielberg documentary called The Last Days which documented 5 different survivors’ stories.  This was so emotional to watch, not only did you hear their tragic stories of the most unimaginable things but you saw such a emotion while they spoke about it.  These people cried and spoke with clear pain while telling their story even after so many years.  I just find some of the stories so amazing and at the same time very hard to hear.  I decided to look for other survivor's stories to summarize and share on here.

Hanna Cohen:

Hanna with daughter Julianne 1947
[http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/ar/belzec/belzecescape.html]

Her family had lived in Lublin, Poland for centuries.  When the Nazis came to town she escaped to Warsaw but during this escape she was caught by the Germany railway police.  She was thrown into jail with many of other Jewish people for a week and thrown on a train to Lwow.  Taken on to a freight train with many other people, she was asked to remove all of her clothes, belongings and shoes.  The train she was in was one of ones that were thought to be taken straight to the gas chambers.  One of the people in charge let her keep her shoes because she was pretty.  She took the shoe and knocked out the iron grid in the window.  She climbed out and was shot at over and over without ever getting hit.  She then ran into the woods near the track to a field where a peasant was working.  The peasant brought her food and she just kept on walking.  She would only walk during the nights and stay hidden during the days.  She made it back to Lwow where she entered a labor camp.  The Soviet Army librated Lwow from the Nazis and she returned to Lublin as soon as possible.  She slowly learned that her grandmother, father, brother, and mother had been murdered. 

Sonia Lewkowicz:

Remains of Treblinka Camp #1
[http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/survivor/sonialewkowicz.html]

Sonia grew up in the city of Dombrowa in Poland. Dombrowa became a temporary camp May 1942 to November 1942.  At age 20, she was taken to the Treblinka camp.  In line on her way to the crematory she was told by a Jewish prisoner to tell the guards that she was a qualified laundress.  The SS man believed her and she was removed from the line along with only one other person.  She was then brought to camp one and given the job of a laundress and never saw any of the people from that line again.  She lived with 25 other women in one room for a while until she was moved to camp #2.  Here she worked in the kitchen and then with laundry again.  The gas chambers and crematories were located on this same camp and she would regularly hear screaming and crying.  On August 2, 1943 she escaped during the uprising.

Fanny Wald:

Fanny Wald
[http://www.wsherc.org/center/survivorstories/FannyW.aspx]

Fanny grew up in South-western Poland.  When the Nazis took over her town she tried to stay at home as much as possible to try and avoid being abused or assaulted.  One day when her sister did not come home she went and found her at the jail.  She was in jail for not having a work card, Fanny gave her sister her own work card and took her place.  At age 14, Fanny was taken from jail to a camp called Oberalstadt in Czechoslovakia.  Here she was just a number and this was the number on the dog-like tags they were given.  She survived 5 ½ years in camp where she was beaten regularly and given very little food.  One day she was caught bringing food to some of the sick prisoners and was beaten so badly that she severely injured one of her kidneys.  One of the other guards who was much more sympathetic saved her life by getting her treatment by saying she was only have Jewish.   The camp was liberated in 1945 by English Prisoners of War.  Every single one of her family members had been murdered during these 5 ½ years.  After being liberated she went to a displaced persons camp where she met her husband Ziegmund Wald and immigrated to America.

George Elbaum:

George with his mother after the war was over.
[http://www.wsherc.org/center/survivorstories/GeorgeE.aspx]

George grew up in Warsaw and was 1 years old when Hitler invaded Poland and the war began.  A few weeks after the invasion his father left with the army and he never saw him again.  Within just a few years dozens of his family members were killed.  He was left with his Mother who died her hair and got fake identification to protect herself.  George himself did not look Jewish so his mother was able to get him out of the Warsaw Ghetto and paid different families to take care of him.  His mother would visit him time to time to make sure he was okay.  He spent 4 years living back and forth with different Polish families.  Then he was to be sent to Palestine but only made it to France because of a broken leg.  He was sent back to Poland and was able to leave with his Mother in 1949 to move to the United States.  Even though he was not placed in a concentration camp, he says that those young years of his life brought him much pain and still bring him pain.  He now writes a blog about his life including his experiences during this time, you can access this blog at: http://neitheryesterdays.com/

Resources:

Web, Chris. "Sonia Lewkowicz - Holocaust Survivors Stories Www.HolocaustResearchProject.org." Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team. H.E.A.R.T, 2009. Web. 10 Dec. 2011. http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/survivor/sonialewkowicz.html.

 

"WSHERC: Stories of Local Holocaust Survivors." Washington State Holocaust Education Resource Center. WSHERC, 2010. Web. 9 Dec. 2011. <http://www.wsherc.org/center/survivorstories/survivorstories.aspx>.

A Personal Thought

One of the more interesting questions about the Holocaust is its cause.  Why did Hitler and his henchmen dedicate valuable resources to the rounding up and murder of millions of civilians?  Was it motivated only by a hatred of the Jewish people as a race or religion?

The answer is a lot more complicated that simple racism.  Yes, Hitler hated the Jews.  He blamed them publically and privately for all of the problems in Germany.  But, we need to remember that people of Germany had just experienced a horrible war (WWI) and were punished after that war for being the aggressor (and the loser).  Hitler’s hatred played on the post-war fears and prejudices of the German people, so it was relatively easy for him to justify the confiscation of Jewish property and, later, the imprisonment of the Jews themselves. 

He wasn’t alone -- other institutions and nations played roles in the Holocaust.  State churches and institutions of German society were anti-semitic.  Jews were denied immigration into other countries (including the United States).  So, while Hitler’s madness was the primary cause of the Holocaust, a lot of other factors made the Holocaust more likely to happen.

It is good to understand the causes behind something as barbaric as the Holocaust because it should, hopefully, help societies from allowing something like this to occur again (but even today, this is not always enough). 

Adolf Hitler



I thought it would be interesting to look into some more information about the man whose leadership and planning caused the death of nearly 6 million innocent people. Before looking up this information I personally knew very little about Hitler or his life. After looking at various websites I was able to find information about his life and a lot of which was somewhat surprising to me.

A young Hitler
[http://www2.dsu.nodak.edu/users/dmeier/Holocaust/Hitler99.jpg]

Overview of Hitler’s Life:



For the first 14 years of Hitler's life, he was controlled by his very strong-willed Austrian father.  Shortly after his father passed away, Hitler went to boarding school where he struggled and this struggling caused him to continuously get in trouble for bad behavior and receive poor grades.  At age 16 he left school for good and wandered around different towns and various woods, reading and painting and dreaming of becoming a famous artist one day.  When Hitler was 17 his mother was fighting breast cancer, Hitler was overcome with his desire to become a famous artist and took his inheritance and left his sick mother to go to Vienna.  He took various tests and was   rejected from the Academy of Arts.  With this rejection along with the death of his mother, Hitler fell into a deep depression.  Through this depression Hitler began his obsession with anti-Semitism, propaganda, and mass political manipulation.   After years of moving around and dealing with his depression he joined the Army.  While in the army he maintained only a corporal status which lasted only for about a year until he was injured multiple times.  These injuries led him to receive Iron Cross Award which was a very respectable award at that time.  After leaving the army, he became the head of the SA (storm troopers).  He then became known for his speeches and propaganda that was increasing the number of people within this German working party very quickly. He began the Nazi group and continued to gain followers. This growth of followers led Hitler to plan to overtake the German government.  This plan failed and Hitler ended up receiving a five year jail sentence.  This didn't hold Hitler back though; he took his time in jail to mature his ideas, tactics and plans for his future in Germany.  When released from jail after only 9 months he then spent a few "quiet years" living in the mountains and planning his German Reich. He used these new ideas to increase his following even more than he had previously and very quickly.  The poor economic conditions and depression in Germany along with his many followers led Hitler to gain chancellorship in the German government.  Through his two years at this position, Hitler gained a lot of political allies and control.  Hitler with his storm troopers created a plan to take over the government by faking the finding of a communist uprising in the making and even went to the extent of burning down the Reich and pretending it was done by the communists.  Using the fire as a way to work with the newspapers to print elaborate stories about the communists and a plan to take them down.  Within the new elections, the communists lost many votes but still maintain a majority. Hindenburg who was the leader at this time was old and not mentally stable, Hitler used this to his advantage.  He was able to get Hindenburg to sign an emergency decree after the fire.  This decree allowed the Nazi group to systematically take over the state by using the decree as an excuse to remove office holders and replace them with commissioners of the Nazi Reich.  After this Hitler was able to get Hindenburg to sign even more documents.  These documents along with Hitler's use of speeches and propaganda, allowed Hitler and the Nazi group to take over the government entirely.  Hitler now took the title of Fuher.  As Fuher, Hitler used Germany’s resources, unemployed population and propaganda to begin racial domination that led to war and the “final solution.”   During Hitler’s reign more than 6 million Jewish and other non-Jewish men, women and children were murdered.  When Germany lost power in 1945, Hitler gave up on Germany and the German people.  On April 30^th 1945 at the age of 56, Hitler committed suicide by shooting himself in the head with a gun.

Facts you may not have known about Hitler:

-He was one of 4 children.  He had two younger siblings (brother Edmund and sister Paula) and two older half siblings (brother Alois Jr. and sister Angela)
-His father was a very strict and angry man who took his frustration out on Alois Jr. with physical and verbal abuse.  This abuse let Alois Jr. to run away at age 14.  With Alois Jr. gone, Hitler’s father started abusing Hitler at age 7.
-When Hitler was a child he idolized priests and even dreamed of becoming one when he was older.
-Hilter’s younger brother Edmund died at age 6 from measles.  Edmunds death had a big impact on Hitler.
-After Hitler’s mothers death he moved to Vienna with his only friend August Kubizek.  He was unemployed for quite some time and then even became homeless living in a park for some time.
-He used any donation money given during his speeches for propaganda and flyers to be made.
-While in prison, Hitler wrote a book called Mein Kampf which spoke about a divide of humans into categories based on physical appearance creating lower and higher orders or types.

-Hitler was in love with his niece Geli who was half his age.  She had the entire physical characteristic that appealed to him.  He considered Geli the love of his life and had a relationship with her that was not socially acceptable.  They had a relationship that consisted of a lot of jealousy and fighting.  Geli ended up committing suicide and this put Hitler into a horrible depression once again.
-Hitler originally planned on killing himself with liquid cyanide poison.  Those he was with on the day of his death, including his wife Eva all killed themselves this way.  Hitler ended up shooting himself in the head.

-Hitler married his wife Eva only one day before they both committed suicide.

Hitler
[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/Adolf_Hitler.png]

Resources:





"Adolf Hitler Biography - Life, Children, Name, Death, School, Mother, Young, Son." Encyclopedia of World Biography. Advameg, Inc. Web. 10 Dec. 2011. http://www.notablebiographies.com/He-Ho/Hitler-Adolf.html.

"The Rise of Adolf Hitler: Chapter Index." The History Place. The History Place, 1996. Web. 10 Dec. 2011. http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/index.htm.