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Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach

German industrialist Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach was one of 24 leading German officials charged at the International Military Tribunal.

Albert Speer

Architect Albert Speer joined the Nazi Party in 1930, becoming Hitler's personal architect. He was later Minister of Armaments and Munitions in Nazi Germany.

Subsequent Nuremberg Proceedings, Case #7, The Hostage Case

The Hostage Case was Case #7 of 12 Subsequent Nuremberg Proceedings against leading German industrialists, military figures, SS perpetrators, and others.

Liberation of Ebensee camp

US forces under the command of General Omar Bradley reached the Ebensee forced-labor camp in Austria in early May 1945. The Germans had built Ebensee at the foot of the Austrian Alps as part of the Mauthausen system of camps. The Nazis employed Ebensee prisoners as forced laborers during the construction of an underground rocket factory. Thousands died from the harsh conditions and back-breaking labor.

Concentration Camp System: In Depth

The Nazi regime's extensive camp system included concentration camps, forced-labor camps, prisoner-of-war camps, transit camps, and killing centers.

David Birnbaum

David, known as Dudek by his family and friends, came from Radom, a city with a large Jewish population. David's family was involved in Zionist activities, and David attended a Jewish religious school every afternoon after returning from public school. His father owned a distillery. 1933-39: The Germans invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, and Radom was occupied on September 8, 1939. The Germans were seizing Jewish men to work as slave laborers, and the Birnbaum family knew that they might spare those who…

Tattoos and Numbers: The System of Identifying Prisoners at Auschwitz - ID Card/Oral History

The Auschwitz camp complex was the only location that issued identifying tattoos during the Holocaust. Only prisoners selected for forced labor were assigned serial numbers. Prisoners who were sent directly to the gas chambers were not registered...

Knife made by Yona Wygocka Dickmann

Yona Wygocka Dickmann fashioned this jackknife from aluminum and part of a saw after the SS transferred her from Auschwitz to forced labor at an airplane factory in Freiburg, Germany, in November 1944. She used the knife to extend her daily ration of bread by cutting it in half.

Martin Bormann

Martin Bormann, close assistant to Adolf Hitler, furthered an array of Nazi policies. He was tried in absentia during the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg.

Susan Strauss

Susan grew up in Vacha, a small Thuringian town where her family had lived for more than 400 years. Her father, Herman, owned a general store and her mother, Bertha, took care of the home and children. Susan had a younger sister Brunhilde. The Strausses were one of about 25–30 Jewish families living in Vacha. 1933–39: Soon after the Nazis took power, many of Susan's friends stopped playing with her. In 1938 she was forced to leave the public school. That November, the Nazis unleashed a wave of pogroms…

Moishe Krol

Moishe was born to Yiddish-speaking Jewish parents in Radom. The industrial city was known for its armaments factories in which Jews could not work and for its leather industry in which many Jews did. When Moishe was a teenager, he finished school and apprenticed to become a women's tailor. Moishe earned a certificate enabling him to be a licensed tailor and settled down in Radom. 1933-39: By 1939, Moishe had become a master tailor specializing in women's clothes. He remembers local antisemitic…

Lutz Haase

Lutz was one of two children born to religious Jewish parents living in Wrzesnia when it was still part of Germany. After World War I, Wrzesnia became part of Polish territory. Preferring to remain as German citizens, Lutz's family moved to Nuremberg. There, his father opened a kosher butcher shop. In 1926 the Haases relocated to Berlin and reestablished their butcher shop there. 1933-39: Like many of Berlin's Jews, Lutz was assigned by the Gestapo to a work detail in 1937. He laid electrical cable for…

Feige Schwarzfink

Feige was born to a religious Jewish family in the small village of Szydlowiec [in Poland]. She lived with her parents, six brothers and sisters, and elderly grandparents in a small house which, like many homes in the village, had no running water, indoor plumbing, or electricity. Feige's father was a shoemaker. 1933-39: In the afternoons after public school Feige studied at a Jewish religious school. Although her parents didn't know it, she attended meetings of the Bund, the Jewish Socialist party. Feige…

Faiga Grynbaum

Faiga was one of nine children born to religious Jewish parents in Starachowice, a town in east-central Poland. Their small one-story house served as both the family's residence and their tailor shop. Faiga worked in the shop sewing women's clothes; the tailoring was often done in exchange for goods such as firewood or a sack of potatoes. 1933-39: In 1935 Faiga married Haskel Ochervitch. She moved to Kielce, a larger town some 25 miles southwest of Starachowice, where her husband worked selling meat to…

Magda Rein

Magda was the oldest of two children born to observant Jewish parents. They lived in Satoraljaujhely, a town in northeastern Hungary on the Czechoslovakian border. Jews represented some 20 percent of the town's approximately 18,000 persons. Magda's father owned a bakery; her mother was a midwife. 1933-39: At 10 years of age, Magda began accompanying her mother when she attended to births nearby. Her mother helped all women--Jews, Roma (Gypsies) and peasants in the surrounding villages. When Magda was 12,…

Elsa (Eliska) Skutezka Kulkova

Elsa was the eldest of three children born to Jewish parents in Brno, the capital of Moravia, where her father ran a successful shipping company. In 1920 she graduated from a German-language secondary school. She married and moved to Bratislava, but the marriage was unsuccessful and Elsa returned to Brno in 1926, where she opened a millinery business. 1933-39: On May 24, 1933, Elsa married Robert Kulka and the couple settled in Robert's hometown of Olomouc. Their son, Tomas, was born a year and a day…

Liliana Guzenfiter

An only child of middle-class Jewish parents, Liliana was raised in a mixed neighborhood of Christians and Jews in Poland's capital. Her father ran a jewelry business and was a reserve officer in the Polish army; her mother was a housewife. Liliana dreamed of going to the Sorbonne and becoming Poland's second female district attorney. 1933-39: The worst part of going to school was being harassed and called a "filthy Jew." Liliana petitioned to enter a prestigious Catholic high school where she was…

Ita Grynbaum

Ita was the second-youngest of nine children born to religious Jewish parents in Starachowice, a town in east-central Poland. Their small one-story house served as both the family's residence and their tailor shop. The tailoring was often done in exchange for goods such as firewood or a sack of potatoes. Ita often helped her mother with chores around the house. 1933-39: Ita's father died at home on a Saturday in June 1939, shortly after returning from synagogue. He had lain down to rest, when suddenly…

Morris Zaidband

Morris was one of five children born to a Jewish family in the Polish town of Oswiecim, 33 miles west of Cracow [Krakow]. Morris' father sold ladies' undergarments. Morris worked as a jeweler. 1933-39: In September 1939 Germany invaded Poland. Morris's family started to flee eastward but two weeks later the Germans overtook them and they were sent home. When they returned, the Germans were already beating Jews who didn't show them "respect." One day, when German guards came to their house to deport…

Ruth Singer

Ruth was the only child of a Jewish family in the German town of Gleiwitz, near the Polish border. She attended public school until the fourth grade, when she transferred to a private Catholic school. Twice a week Ruth attended religious school in the afternoons. One of her favorite pastimes was playing table tennis. 1933-39: Ruth's father was born in Poland and the Nazi government considered him a Polish citizen. In October 1938 the Nazis expelled Polish Jews from Germany, allowing each deportee to leave…

Desider (Dezso) Nemeth

Desider and his sisters, Margit and Barbara, were born to a middle-class Jewish family. They lived in Szentes, a town in southeastern Hungary, located 30 miles from the city of Szeged. Desider had a dental practice in Szentes. He married Barbara Kertesz, who came from the neighboring town of Hodmezovasarhely. 1933-39: Desider and Barbara now have a baby daughter, Maria. Desider has a busy practice and his patients come from all walks of life. He is glad that he opened his practice in the town where he was…

Zelda Piekarska

Zelda was born to a close-knit Jewish family in Sosnowiec, a city in the coal-mining region of Poland. Her father owned a restaurant and also co-owned a chocolate and candy factory. Zelda loved to dance; she was an excellent tap dancer. 1933-39: On September 4, 1939, the Germans entered Sosnowiec. Zelda's family was at her father's store when the German tanks rolled down the street. She saw people lying on the ground but didn't understand why. Her mother told her they were dead. Later, the Germans forced…

Herschel Low

Herschel was the oldest of four children born to a Jewish family in the Polish town of Ulanow. His father was a landowner and cattle merchant who transported calves from the Ulanow area for sale in other towns. Herschel attended a religious school from the age of 3, and started public school at age 7. 1933-39: Since Herschel was skilled with his hands, his father got him a job weaving reed baskets after he graduated from high school. Herschel was also a member of a Jewish youth organization, Benei Akiva,…

Camps in North Africa

In Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, and French West Africa, French collaborationist Vichy authorities established a network of different types of camps: penal camps, labor camps, and internment camps.  These camps included Jewish and non-Jewish European...

Novaky camp

Entrance to the Novaky labor camp in Slovakia, 1942–44.

Rachel Lejzerowicz Rechnitz

Rachel, or Ruchla as she was called, was raised by Jewish parents in the small southwestern Polish town of Bedzin. In 1930 she moved with her husband, Bernard, to the nearby city of Katowice, where Bernard had a wholesale leather business. The couple lived with their two children, Moses and Genia, in a three-bedroom, upper-floor apartment on Jordana Street. 1933-39: Ruchla was active in Hadassah, a women's Zionist organization, and in 1939 she and her husband prepared to immigrate to Palestine [Aliyah…

Dezso Rozsa

Dezso was from a Jewish family in Hungary's capital, Budapest. His father had been a violinist. Dezso earned a university degree in English, and became a language teacher. He wrote a number of high school grammar textbooks. In 1914 he married Iren Hajdu, who was a mathematician. The couple had two children; a daughter, Eva, born in 1918, and a son, Pal, born seven years later. 1933-39: Dezso fears for the worst now that the antisemitic Prime Minister Teleki has taken power again. Nineteen years ago, in…

Kalman Goldberg

Kalman was one of seven children born to religious Jewish parents in the town of Tarnow. He attended public school in the morning and religious school in the afternoon. Kalman's father owned a factory that manufactured kosher soap, sabbath candles and candles for church altars. The Goldbergs lived above their factory, which was located in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood. 1933-39: The Germans occupied Tarnow on September 8, 1939. The next day, they burned the synagogues. One synagogue, built of stone…

Edit Grinsphun

Edit, the eldest of two children born to a Jewish family, was raised in Bulboaca, a Romanian village of 2,000 people. Her father was a farmer, and he also worked in the town's railway office. Edit attended public school for four years and then, at age 11, went to the nearby town of Bendery for high school. 1933-39: In Bendery, Edit's parents rented a room for her near the school. At school she studied several foreign languages, but she wasn't taught politics--the teachers said that politics was bad for…

Masza Tenenbaum

The youngest of three children, Masza was born to Jewish parents living 35 miles east of Warsaw in the small predominantly Jewish town of Kaluszyn. Her father owned a shop where he sold cosmetics and non-prescription medicines. Masza was close friends with a group of Jewish teenagers who went to the same public school and who spent much of their free time and vacations together. 1933-39: Majlich, Sara, and the rest of Masza's group have always liked discussing politics as they strolled down the main…

Moses Rechnitz

The younger of two children, Moses was born to Jewish parents living in the southwestern Polish town of Bedzin. When he was 7, his family moved to the nearby city of Katowice where his father had a wholesale leather business. The Rechnitzes lived in a three-bedroom, upper-floor apartment on Jordana Street. Moses attended a Polish elementary school and also received religious instruction. 1933-39: In secondary school, Moses was one of the only Jewish pupils. He first encountered antisemitism when a teacher…

Felix Krakauer

Felix was one of six children born to Jewish parents in a small Moravian town, where his father ran a dry goods and clothing store. The family spoke Czech and German at home and Felix attended German-language schools. As a youth, he belonged to a Zionist club and liked to ski. He graduated from an international trade school in Vienna before settling down in the Moravian capital of Brno. 1933-39: During the 1930s Felix married a Christian woman from the town of Hodonin. When Felix's father retired in 1938,…

Wallace Witkowski describes harsh living conditions for non-Jews in Poland

Wallace and his family were Polish Catholics. His father was a chemical engineer and his mother a teacher. The Germans occupied Kielce in 1939. Wallace witnessed pogroms against Jews in 1942. Wallace was active in the anti-Nazi resistance, acting as a courier between partisan groups. In 1946, in liberated Poland, Wallace witnessed the Kielce pogrom. He was reunited with his father in the United States in 1949; other family members followed. The Communist regime in Poland, however, denied his only sister…

Abraham Lewent describes conditions in Skarzysko camp

Like other Jews, the Lewents were confined to the Warsaw ghetto. In 1942, as Abraham hid in a crawl space, the Germans seized his mother and sisters in a raid. They perished. He was deployed for forced labor nearby, but escaped to return to his father in the ghetto. In 1943, the two were deported to Majdanek, where Abraham's father died. Abraham later was sent to Skarzysko, Buchenwald, Schlieben, Bisingen, and Dachau. US troops liberated Abraham as the Germans evacuated prisoners.

Beifeld album cover

Cover to György Beifeld's album, featuring a road sign with the Hungarian Labor Service company number 109/13 posted in a muddy wasteland. The Jewish labor servicemen were forced to construct roads on these muddy fields to accommodate the advance of the Hungarian 2nd Army toward the Don River.

Abraham Lewent recalls how, while ill with typhoid, he persuaded the Skarzysko doctor that he was fit to work

Like other Jews, the Lewents were confined to the Warsaw ghetto. In 1942, as Abraham hid in a crawl space, the Germans seized his mother and sisters in a raid. They perished. He was deployed for forced labor nearby, but escaped to return to his father in the ghetto. In 1943, the two were deported to Majdanek, where Abraham's father died. Abraham later was sent to Skarzysko, Buchenwald, Schlieben, Bisingen, and Dachau. US troops liberated Abraham as the Germans evacuated prisoners.

Ruth Meyerowitz describes sabotage effort in Malchow munitions factory

In Frankfurt, Ruth's family faced intensifying anti-Jewish measures; her father's business was taken over and Ruth's Jewish school was closed. In April 1943, Ruth and her family were deported to Auschwitz. Ruth was selected for forced labor and assigned to work on road repairs. She also worked in the "Kanada" unit, sorting possessions brought into the camp. In November 1944, Ruth was transferred to the Ravensbrueck camp system, in Germany. She was liberated in May 1945, during a death march from the…

Hungary before the German Occupation - Photograph

Ghettos - ID Card/Oral History

Minsk environs, 1941-1942

Schindler's factory under construction

Construction of Oskar Schindler's armaments factory in Bruennlitz. Czechoslovakia, October 1944.

Death at a concentration camp quarry

A Soviet inmate lies dead in the Mauthausen concentration camp quarry. Austria, between July 1941 and May 1945.

Chart of the camp workforce

Chart indicating the workforce of the Auschwitz-Monowitz camp by category and nationality of inmates. Poland, January 16, 1945.

V-2 rockets

Sections of V-2 rockets, the so-called Vengeance Weapons, are removed by rail from the Dora-Mittelbau camp after liberation. Near Nordhausen, Germany, June 1945.

Gerda Weissmann

Gerda was born to a Jewish middle-class family in Bielsko, Poland, a town noted for its textile industry. She began her education in Polish public school, but later entered a Catholic girls school. A rabbi was permitted to come into the school and instruct the Jewish students in religious studies. 1933-39: On Friday, September 1, 1939, German fighter planes appeared overhead, causing many people to flee the city. Gerda's family remained and lived through the intense shelling that followed on Sunday…

Chuna Grynbaum

Chuna was born in a small one-story house that served as both his family's residence and their tailor shop. He was the youngest of nine children born to religious Jewish parents. The family's tailor shop mostly served Starachowice's Catholic Poles. The work was often done in exchange for goods such as firewood or a sack of potatoes. 1933-39: Chuna's father died unexpectedly in June 1939. After returning from synagogue one day, his father lay down to rest. He asked Chuna to close the shade to darken the…

Eva Miodelska

Eva was the oldest of four children born to a Jewish family in the central Polish town of Lipsko, about 30 miles southeast of Radom. The family lived at #12 Casimirska Street and Eva attended a private Jewish primary school. Eva's father owned a factory that produced shoes made from leather and cork. 1933-39: In the early 1930s Eva began secondary school in Zwolen, a town about 20 miles to the north. In 1936 her father left for Argentina to settle the estate of his deceased sister. For the two years he…

Salonika - Photograph

Before World War II, Salonika had the largest Jewish community in Greece. In April 1941, Germany occupied parts of Greece, including Salonika. Between 1941 and 1943, Salonika's Jewish community was destroyed. More t...

Beifeld album page satirizing travel posters

(Middle) In a take-off of travel posters advertising peaceful vacation spots, Beifeld draws a picture of a Hungarian military tent pitched next to a tree on which a bird is cheerfully chirping. Next to the tent the artist writes "Peaceful Surroundings" but above, a Soviet bomber releases a bomb aimed at the tent. [Photograph #58022]

Beifeld album page

In a take-off of travel posters advertising peaceful vacation spots, Beifeld draws a picture of a Hungarian military tent pitched next to a tree on which a bird is cheerfully chirping. Next to the tent the artist writes "Peaceful Surroundings" but above, a Soviet bomber releases a bomb aimed at the tent. [Photograph #58022]