Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews (105 page)

472

Notes to pages 118–124

verlorene Geschichte. Jüdisches Wirtschaftsleben in Marburg und seine Vernichtung im

Nationalsozialismus (Marburg, 1992), 116 ff.

115. Barkai, Boykott, 151.

116. Bajohr, ‘Arisierung’, 279.

117. RGBl, 1940, I, pp. 891–2.

118. Leo Lippmann, ‘ . . . Dass ich wie ein guter Deutscher empfinde und handele’. Zur

Geschichte der Deutsch-Israelitischen Gemeinde in Hamburg in der Zeit von Herbst 1935

bis zum Ende 1942 (Hamburg, 1994), 71–2.

119. Minutes of the first meeting of the Reich Central Agency, 11 Feb. 1939 (ADAP), series D, vol. 5, no. 665.

120. OS, 500-1-550.

121. For assets of 1 million RM the grading was 10 per cent, larger assets were to be assessed at even higher rates in individual cases.

122. See Maier, Arbeitseinsatz, 22 ff. (especially on history and motivation) and Wolf

Gruner, Arbeitseinsatz, 40 ff.

123. See above.

124. Maier, Arbeitseinsatz, 23–4.

125. Gruner, Arbeitseinsatz, 50–1.

126. BAB, R 18/5519, ‘Entwurf für die Ansprache Fricks auf der Konferenz’; cf. Gruner,

Arbeitseinsatz, 62.

127. Maier, Arbeitseinsatz, 26 ff.; Gruner, Arbeitseinsatz, 66 ff.

128. Ibid. 92.

129. Further details in Gruner, Arbeitseinsatz, 84 ff. See, for example, the survey carried out in Berlin municipal business operations about whose results the Mayor was informed

early in March 1939: STA Berlin, Rep 01-02 GB 1281 (YV, JM 10660), the Councillor in

Charge of Municipal Business Operations, 7 Mar. 1939 to the Mayor; cf. Gruner,

Arbeitseinsatz, 90.

130. Ibid. 106.

131. OS, 504–2–2 (20), minute by the Chief of Security Police, 1 Mar. 1939, quoted in Konrad Kwiet, ‘Forced Labour of German Jews in Nazi Germany’, LBIY 36 (1991), 389–410. Cf.

also Gruner, Arbeitseinsatz, 83–4.

6.

The Politics of Organized Expulsion

1. ADAP, series D, vol. 4, no. 273.

2. ADAP, series D, vol. 4, no. 158, 167 ff.

3. Speech of 30 January, quoted in Max Domarus, Hitler. Reden und Proklamationen

(Wiesbaden, 1973), ii. 1047 ff., for the passage in question 1055–8.

4. Domarus, Hitler. Reden, ii. 1057. Stefan Kley, ‘Intention. Verkündung, Implementier-

ung. Hitlers Reichstagsrede vom 30 Januar 1939’, Zeitschrift für die Geschichtswis-

senschaft 48 (2000), sees this statement from Hitler as the announcement of the firm

intention of the dictator, who was at this time already resolved to murder the

European Jews. Kley deduced this from his view that in January 1939 Hitler had firmly

decided upon a world war, and had thus sought himself to bring about the precondi-

tion that he had introduced for the murder of the Jews, the ‘world war’. (See Kley,

Notes to pages 124–127

473

Hitler, Ribbentrop und die Entfesselung des Zweiten Weltkriegs (Paderborn, 1996),

201 ff.) The author himself concedes that ‘no direct path leads . . . from Hitler’s intentions to the events’ since, as we know, the systematic murder of the Jews of Europe did

not start until 1941/2; the forced emigration still being practised in 1939 is even in

diametrical opposition to the supposed genocidal intention. For these reasons alone

the reconstruction of a firm ‘intention’ on Hitler’s part to murder the European Jews in

early 1939 is problematic if not nonsensical.

5. For greater detail see the following section.

6. On the Fischböck plan: Aufzeichnung des Leiters der Politischen Abteilung des AA, 14

Nov. 1938, ADAP, series C, vol. 5, no. 650. The passing of the negotiation contract on to Schacht is the background for the remark made by Goering in the conference on 6

December: ‘I therefore request the gentleman—the man in question will know what I

mean—that he will carry out no further negotiations here.’

7. On the Schacht–Rublee negotiations see Ralph Weingarten, Die Hilfeleistung der

westlichen Welt bei der Endlösung der deutschen Judenfrage. Das ‘Intergovernmental

Committee on Political Refugees’ IGC 1938–1939 (Bern, Frankfurt a. M., Las Vegas, 1981),

127 ff.; Fischer, Schacht, 216 ff.

8. BAB, 25-01, 6641, letter from Rublee to Schacht, 23 Dec. 1938 with the outline for the project.

9. Details about the plan and the negotiations in note from Schacht, 16 Jan. 1939, BAB, 25–

01, 5541, ADAP, series C, vol. 5, no. 661.

10. Weingarten, Hilfeleistung, 135 ff.

11. OS, 500-1-506, undated note (‘Secret! Jewry) from the Jewish Department.

12. BAB, R 58/276.

13. On 10 January Schacht had informed Stuckart in broad terms about the agreement he

hoped to reach with Rublee. Subsequently, on 18 January a discussion was held with

senior SS and police officials in Heydrich’s office, followed by another discussion with

Stuckart and, on the following day, a meeting with Schacht. In these discussions there

was general agreement that Schacht’s ideas should be made the basis of further

emigration policy (minutes of 19 Jan. 1939); both documents in OS, 500-1-638.

14. Report on the first working discussion of the Committee of the Reich Central Office for Jewish Emigration on 11 Feb. 1939, ADAP, series D, vol. 5, no. 665, pp. 786 ff. At the

meeting the establishment of Central Offices in Berlin, Breslau, Frankfurt., and

Hamburg was announced.

15. RGBl, 1939, I, p. 1097. Details of the history in Wolf Gruner, ‘Poverty and Persecution: The Reichsvereinigung, the Jewish Population and Anti-Jewish Policy in the Nazi State

1933–1945’, YVS 27 (1999) 28 ff.; and Esriel Hildesheimer, Jüdischer Selbstverwaltung

unter dem NS-Regime. Der Existenzkampf der Reichsvertretung und Reichsvereinigung

der Juden in Deutschland (Tübingen, 1994), 79 ff.

16. Further details see below, pp. 134–5.

17. See Herbert A. Strauß, ‘Jewish Emigration from Germany: Nazi Policies and Jewish

Response’, LBIY 25 (1980), 313–61 (I) and 26 (1981), 343–409.

18. Ibid. 383 ff.

19. Ibid. 326.

20. Barkai, Boykott, 169 ff.

474

Notes to pages 127–134

21. Bruno Blau, ‘Die Juden in Deutschland von 1939 bis 1945’, Judaica 7 (1951), 270–84, 278.

22. Ibid. 273.

23. Barkai, Boykott, 171–2. On the continuation of Jewish cultural life after the November pogrom see Volker Dahm, ‘Kulturelles und geistiges Leben’, in Benz, ed., Die Juden in

Deutschland, 223 ff.

24. Barkai, Boykott, 171–2; Hildesheimer, Selbstverwaltung, 80 ff.

7.

The Persecution of Jews in the Territory of the Reich, 1939–1940

1. Michael Wildt, Generation des Unbedingten. Das Führungskorps des Reichssicherheit-

shauptamtes (Hamburg, 2002), 358 ff.

2. Esriel Hildesheimer, Jüdische Selbstverwaltung unter dem NS-Regime. Der Existenz-

kampf der Reichsvertretung und der Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland

(Tübingen, 1994), 116 ff.

3. Ibid. 132 ff.

4. Ibid. 153 ff.

5. Ruth Röcher, Die Jüdische Schule im nationalsozialistischen Deutschland 1933–1942

(Frankfurt a. M., 1992), 86 ff.; Joseph Walk, Jüdische Schule und Erziehung im Dritten

Reich (Frankfurt a. M., 1991), 217 ff.

6. Hildesheimer, Selbstverwaltung, 163–4.

7. Ibid. 165 ff.

8. See Uwe Adam, Die Judenpolitik im Dritten Reich (Düsseldorf, 1972), 258 ff. and

Avraham Barkai, Vom Boykott zu ‘Entjudung’. Der wirtschaftliche Existenzkampf der

Juden im Dritten Reich 1933–1943 (Frankfurt a. M., 1988), 183 ff.

9. Special Measure, Joseph Walk, Das Sonderrecht für die Juden im NS-Staat. Eine

Sammlung der gesetzlichen Massnahmen und Richtlinien—Inhalt und Bedeutung

(Heidelberg, 1981), iv. 2; Adam, Judenpolitik, 259. The news reached Victor Klemperer,

for example, on 13 September 1939 (three days after it had been decreed) via a

messenger from the local office of the Protestant Church to which Klemperer belonged

(Viktor Klemperer, I Shall Bear Witness: The Diaries of Viktor Klemperer 1941–1945

(London, 1999), i. 378).

10. Dokumente zur Geschichte der Frankfurter Juden 1933–1945 (Frankfurt a. M., 1963),

no. 433.

11. Special Measure, Walk, Sonderrecht, iv. 115 (Decree of the Reich Postal Ministry, 19 July 1940).

12. Statutes of the ‘Reichsluftschutzbund’, 28 June 1940, RGBl, I, p. 992; Adam, Judenpo-

litik, 258–9.

13. Special Measure, Walk, Sonderrecht, iv. 127.

14. Adam, Judenpolitik, 260 ff.

15. Special Measure, Walk, Sonderrecht, iv. 10 (Decree of the Chief of the Security Police concerning Special Food Shops for Jews, 12 Sept. 1939).

16. Konrad Kwiet, ‘Nach dem Pogrom. Stufen der Ausgrenzung’, in Wolfgang Benz, ed.,

Die Juden in Deutschland. 1933–1945. Leben unter nationalsozialistischer Herrschaft

(Munich, 1988), 605 ff.

Notes to pages 134–135

475

17. Kwiet, Pogrom, 606 ff. and in more detail Regina Bruss, Die Bremer Juden unter dem

Nationalsozialismus (Bremen, 1983), 151 ff.

18. Special Measure, Walk, Sonderrecht, iv. 67 (Decree of the Reich Minister of Economics, 23 Jan. 1940). This measure meant that Jews did not receive clothing coupons, tokens

for knitting or sewing, or shoes. They were provided with second-hand clothing by the

municipality (see Hildesheimer, Selbstverwaltung, 168).

19. This emerges particularly clearly from Victor Klemperer’s diaries.

20. For examples see Joseph Werner, Hakenkreuz und Judenstern. Das Schicksal der

Karlsruher Juden im Dritten Reich (Karlsruhe, 1988), 281 (Karlsruhe); Horst Matzerath,

‘Der Weg der Kölner Juden in den Holocaust. Versuch einer Rekonstruktion’, in

Gabriele Rogmann and Horst Matzerath, eds, Die jüdischen Opfer des Nationalsozia-

lismus aus Köln. Gedenkbuch (Cologne, 1995), 534 (Cologne). The Oberpräsident

(provincial governor) responsible for the Rhine Province issued a general ban on

moves into cities on 15 Feb. 1940 (Herbert Lepper, Von der Emanzipation zum

Holocaust. Die israelitischen Synagogengemeinde zu Aachen 1801–1942; geschichtliche

Darstellung Bilder, Dokumente, Tabellen, Listen (Aachen, 1994), ii, doc. 1109).

21. Vienna was in the forefront of such developments. Partly because of direct pressure

from the NSDAP the majority of Jews had been driven out of their homes by the end of

1938. In September and October 1939 plans were drawn up for the settlement of

Vienna’s Jews in closed camps, but they were dropped as the Nisko Programme

began (see Gerhard Botz, Wohnungspolitik und Judendeportation in Wien 1938 bis

1945. Zur Funktion des Antisemitismus als Ersatz nationalsozialistischer Sozialpolitik

(Vienna, 1975), 57 ff. and 94). In September 1938 in Berlin Speer had masterminded the

confiscation of Jewish homes in his capacity as General Building Inspector for the Reich

Capital, and in January 1939 he began to systematize the utilization of homes that Jews

had been forced to leave as a result of a relaxation in the regulations governing notices to quit (see Susanne Willems, Der entsiedelte Jude. Albert Speers Wohnungspolitik für

den Berliner Hauptstadtbau (Berlin, 2000), 105 ff.). In summer 1939 Speer began to

create ‘Jew-free districts’ in the city and after January 1941 the Jews were driven out of their homes in organized ‘clearance operations’ (ibid. 134 ff. and 186 ff.). In Karlsruhe the majority of Jews still living in the city were accommodated in the ‘Jewish houses’ by the end of April 1939 (Werner, Hakenkreuz, 280). On 1 April 1940 the decision was

taken in Aachen to bring together the remaining Jews in ‘Jewish houses’ (Lepper,

Emanzipation, ii. 134). Between October and November 1939 a total of 47 ‘Jewish

houses’ were established in Leipzig, which initially received Jewish tenants from

municipal housing (Klemperer, Zeugnis, i. 503). In Minden/Ravensberg ‘Jewish houses’

were set up in the larger districts from 1939 but filling them took until autumn 1940

(Joachim Meynert, Was vor der ‘Endlösung’ geschah. Antisemitische Ausgrenzung in

Minden-Ravensberg 1933–1945 (Münster, 1988), 227–8). On ‘Jewish houses’ see Wolf

Gruner, Der geschlossene Arbeitseinsatz deutscher Juden. Zur Zwangsarbeit als Element

der Verfolgung, 1938–1943 (Berlin, 1997), 249 ff.

22. Wolf Gruner has identified 38 such camps: Arbeitseinsatz, 250.

23. For more detail on this see ibid. 107 ff.

24. Heinrich Himmler, Geheimreden 1933 bis 1945 und andere Ansprachen, ed. Bradley

F. Smith and Agnes F. Peterson (Frankfurt a. M., 1974), 115 ff.

476

Notes to pages 135–138

25. OS, 500-1-597.

26. OS, 503-1-324.

27. On euthanasia see Michael Burleigh, Death and Deliverance: Euthanasia in Germany

1900–1945 (Cambridge, 1994); Ernst Klee, ‘Euthanasie’ im NS-Staat. Die ‘Vernichtung

lebensunwerten Lebens’ (Frankfurt a. M., 1983); Henry Friedlander, The Origins of Nazi

Genocide: From Euthanasia to the Final Solution (Chapel Hill, NC, 1995); Hans-Walther

Schmuhl, Rassenhygiene, Nationalsozialismus, Euthanasie. Von der Verhütung zur

Vernichtung ‘lebensunwerten Lebens’, 1890–1945 (Göttingen, 1987).

28. On the ‘misery of psychiatry’ before the outbreak of the Second World War, see in

particular Dirk Blasius, ‘Einfache Seelenstörung’. Geschichte der deutschen Psychiatrie

1800–1945 (Frankfurt a. M., 1994), esp. 145 ff.; Burleigh, Death, 43 ff.; Ludwig Siemen,

Menschen blieben auf der Strecke. Psychiatrie zwischen Reform und Nationalsozialismus

(Gütersloh, 1987); Hans Walter Schmuhl, ‘Kontinuität oder Diskontinuität? Zum

epochalen Charakter der Psychiatrie im Nationalsozialismus’, in Franz-Werner Ker-

sting, Karl Teppe, and Bernd Walter, eds, Nach Hadamar. Zum Verhältnis von