Research Paper Holocaust Overview

Ethan Mason

Eng 102-102 Mr. Neuburger 12 July 2012

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The Holocaust happened in the early 1930s to the mid 1940s. It was brought on by the rise of the chancellor Adolf Hitler who, with the help of the Nazi party, attempted a Genocide upon many cultures. It really was a tragic event in which millions of people had died. In order to truly understand one needs to know about these series of events that allowed this evil act to occur.

Rise of the Nazi Power

The Nazi power made its dramatic rise during the German depression. The power first began to make its rise when Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor by President Paul von Hindenburg January 30, 1933.

Adolf Hitler According to an article The Rise of Adolf Hitler, Adolf Hitler had a rough life to say the least, from his mother and father dying when he was young, to having his art rejected and then during World War One (WWI) when he joined the military, Germanys

Hitler greeting President Von Hindenburg, January 30, 1933

defeat caused a great unsettling in Hitler. In addition the article describes, when Hitler joined the Nazi

party in 1920 it did not take long for him to work his way up the ladder to a much more powerful position in the organization. By 1921 Hitler had become the leader of the Nazi party. This just lead to more troubles for Hitler though, after the Beer Hall Putsch, Hitler was put on trial for treason and was sentenced to 5 years in prison for his crimes. During his time in prison Hitler

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wrote his book Mein Kampf, which was actually dictated to another person named Rudolf Hess as Hitler paced around his room speaking. It was not until several years later around the years 1932-33 that Hitler began to gain more authority. Once he was appointed as chancellor and Reichstag burned this prompted the fall of the republic and the rise of the Nazi Party and Hitlers Dictatorship (HISTORY PLACE).

Anti-Semitism

Anti-Semitism, defined means the hate of a culture or religion that the Nazi Party used as a vast weapon in their fight for this so called better world. According to the article, Nazi
Germany and the Jews: Anti-Semitism, it tells of how there had always been a hatred between the Jewish faith and the Christians of Europe. The Nazi Party used this weapon in the standpoint or the race and did not attack the religion or the politics. The new racial outlook defined the German people as the finest and purest branch of the Aryan-Nordic race (along with the Nordic-Scandinavian peoples) and labeled Jews as a subhuman race that strove to challenge the correct world order and deprive the supreme race of its position of dominance and leadership. Unless the Aryan race won the struggle and established its dominion, Jews would bring about the extermination of the human race. (YADVASHEM)
Anti-Semitism

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Nuremburg Laws

These were that laws that set the new institutionalized theories of the Nazi party. At the annual party that the Nazi party threw every year, in Nuremburg, Germany, these laws were announced and began a whole new era of Nazi ideologies. Most of these laws prevented the Jews from having nearly any political rights what so ever. These new laws gave a different definition to how Jews were defined as Jews. These new laws stated, Anyone who had three or four Jewish grandparents was defined as a Jew, regardless of whether that individual
Massed crowds at the Nazi party rally in Nuremberg. Nuremberg, Germany, 1935. http://bit.ly/1ByPsp

identified himself or herself as a Jew or belonged to the Jewish religious community.(USHMM)

There was one time that the Nuremburg laws went into a lull so to say. This was in 1936 when the Olympic Games were being held in Berlin, Germany. Some of the signs were removed and the Anti-Jewish, attacks began to decrease as well. During these Olympic Games though the Nazi Party did not allow Jewish competitors to participate in the events.

Kristallnacht

Kristallnacht, otherwise known as the night of broken glass, this was a perfect name for the events that took place on this most fateful night. Because of one 17 year old boy who feared and cared for his family and who decided to take an action. This Jewish boy family, who came from Poland to the Germany border, which is odd to me but apparently things were better for the

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Jews inside the borders of Germany. With his family living in a small town and being treated like livestock, this boy walked to the German Embassy in Paris and shot the first man he saw. This unfortunately played right into the hands of the Nazi party who was just waiting for a reason to justify a reason why they were about to do what they did. According to AISH, In one night 1,350 synagogues were destroyed; over 90 Jews were killed; 30,000 were thrown into concentration camps; 7,000 Jewish businesses were destroyed as
Synagogue burning

well. (Holocaust History)

The Rounding Up- Ghettos

Ghettos, we may think of them today as the sort of trashier parts of towns outside of the big beautiful cities. Well this is part of where they got that name and definition from. The ghettos during the time of WWI were placed on the outside of towns that were considered to be Christian, towns. These ghettos were located around: Krakow, Warsaw, Vilnius, Lublin and Lwow.
These were the ghettos location as shown as the makers on the map.

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Wannsee Conference

The Wannsee Conference, which took place on January 20, 1942 went down as one of the most infamous meetings in history. This was surmised to be the second part of the Nazi Partys extermination plans for the Jews and other people that they felt that were inferior, subhuman races. Just to put a thought into the mind, the meeting started with Heydrich confirming the change in the Jewish was no longer that the be forced out of the Instead, the Jews fate within the Nazi work would now be
The Villa at 56-58 Am Grossen Wannsee that the conference was held at

policy; The overall Nazi plan Jews under Nazi control should Reich through emigration. would now be determined Empire. Those Jews capable of made to do forced labour and

those unfit for work would the implication is unmistakable from Eichmanns record be killed. (WW2HISTORY)

Death Camps/Extermination Camps

This is the part of history that sticks in the minds of most people. When someone thinks of the Holocaust the first thing to their mind was the Death Camps. Not only were these places set up for Jews but they were used to kill anyone that the Nazi Party deemed to be inferior to themselves and therefor worthy of dying.

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The first of these camps to be established was Chelmno. Over 152,000 people were gassed to death at this location. It was the Reinhard Operation that brought the worst of all the murders during the time. The Reinhard Operation was set up to eliminate the Jews that occupied Poland. At this time the Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka camps were established. The numbers of reported deaths were ridiculously high, as reported from, HolocaustEducation. Over 600,000 lost their lives at Belzec alone, 250,000 were reported at the Sobibors location. Treblinka was the most efficient location when it came to the three extermination camps established during Operation Reinhard, reporting that around 900,000 had been killed.
Bodies are burned in Auschwitz. In the summer of 1944 more than 440,000 Hungarian Jews arrived in Birkenau. The capacity of the ovens did not suffice as a result the bodies were burned under open sky

The last two of the extermination camps were the Auschwitz-Birkenau which claimed somewhere between 1-2 million lives during the time it was open. Then finally Majdanek had the lowest numbers which were somewhere between 60-80,000.

Liberation

June 6, 1944, now known as D-Day, the allies executed the largest amphibious strike in the history of the world. Making their way through Europe the U.S., British, Canadian, and Soviet troops ran into the extermination/concentration camps. Though it was not the
A image stating the Day of D-Day http://bit.ly/1ByPsp

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primary objective of the troops they freed the captives, provided them food and water, along with some badly need medical attention and collected evidence in order to persecute for war crimes. On May 8, 1945, one year after the launch of D-Day, Germanys unofficial surrender came into proportion and the world had reason to cheer and rejoice. This marked the ending of WWI and liberated Europe from the Nazi Party. In 2004, we honored the WWII veterans by establishing a memorial on the national mall for the 50th anniversary of D-Day.

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Works Cited Rise of the Nazi Power. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Web. 23 July 2012 Adolf Hitler. The Rise of Adolf Hitler. History Place. Web. 23 July 2012 Anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism-Yad Vashem. Yad Vashem. Web. 23 July 2012 Nuremburg Laws. Nuremburg Laws: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Web. 23 July 2012 Kristallnacht. Holocaust Studies-Aish. Aish. Web. 23 July 2012 Ghettos. Death camps. Death camps. Web. 23 July 2012 Wannsee Conference. Holocaust-ww1history. Ww1history. Web. 23 July 2012 Death camps/Extermination camps. The Danish Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. Holocaust Education. Web. 23 July 2012 Liberation. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Web. 23 July 2012