THE HOLOCAUST
1933 – 1945
Introduction to The Holocaust
THE HOLOCAUST
WAS THE SYSTEMATIC,
BUREAUCRATIC MASS
MURDER OF MORE THAN
SIX MILLION JEWS BY THE
NAZI REGIME AND ITS
COLLABORATORS
Holocaust History
This introductory lesson will be
used to inspire more student
research into The Holocaust. This
lesson will span six major periods
of the Holocaust Era.
Pre-War Europe 1933
German Occupied Territory
U. S. Holocaust Memorial Museum
Hitler Meets Hindenburg in Potsdam
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
In 1933, Chancellor Hitler greets
President von Hindenburg in
Potsdam, Germany, with an outward
appearance of deference toward the
heavily decorated ruler whose
government and order he was in the
process of absolutely overthrowing.
This picture was distributed
nationally and internationally,
portraying an utterly deceitful
impression to the world of the Nazi
ideology and of Hitler's intent to
establish himself as the supreme law
of the land.
Hitler Youth
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
From age ten to seventeen, youth were required to join Hitler Youth, an
organization that provided physical and mental training to prepare these
youth for service in the SA, SS, and the military. After the war, many of
these youth were required to complete “de-Nazification” programs to rid
them of this hatred and teach them more democratic ways.
Nazis Approach Jewish Men
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
These Hasidic Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto are being humiliated by
Nazi officers as they are forced to take their hats off as a form of
surrender to these cruel officials, who stand mockingly imposing their
assumed superiority.
Humiliation of Jews
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
In towns all over
Europe, honorable
Jews were forced by
officials to scrub entire
sidewalks and streets
with small brushes
while they were
laughed at and
scorned by large
crowds of pro-Nazis.
Hungarian Roundup:
Women’s Hands Raised
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
During the summer of 1944, Hitler invaded Hungary and took
hundreds of thousands of Jewish-Hungarians as prisoners. As a
consequence of Hitler's invasion, multitudes of Hungarian Jews were
deported to Auschwitz.
Able-Bodied Men
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
Upon arrival at a concentration
camp, Jews who were “fit for work”
were put to work at many different
tasks such as factory work, road
construction, and land clearing.
The work was extremely vigorous,
yet the inmates were given very
little food and received totally
inadequate rest. The goal of such
work was to eventually kill the
men. Many dropped to their deaths
while they worked, or walked to
and from their work site.
The Final Solution
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
The Nazi Regime and its collaborators created a systematic bureaucratic
program for the mass murder of the Jews. The Nazi plan was calculated and
premeditated to exterminate European Jewry. When the war was over in
1945, over six million Jews had been murdered through this organized,
industrialized Nazi system.
Aftermath
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
The liberation of the Jews from the concentration camps was an experience that
coupled both intense joy and intense pain for those involved. The American generals,
Patton, Eisenhower, and Bradley were horrified at what had been done to human
beings by the Nazis. During April and May of 1945, one by one Buchenwald, Dachau,
Mauthausen, Bergen-Belsen, and many other concentration camps were liberated.
Liberation
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
Two airborne divisions, ten armored divisions, and twenty-three infantry divisions
of the American army are highly honored for their bravery and heroism as they
entered the concentration camps upon the defeat of the Germans, to face sights
that were beyond imagination.
The Nuremburg Trials
Oil on Canvas
Created by K-12th grade and College-Age Students
Twenty-two high-ranking Nazi leaders stood trial at the Palace of Justice in
Nuremburg, Germany for their murderous acts, extermination, enslavement,
deportations, and persecution on political, religious, and racial grounds and all
other violations of law.
Sources
http://www.ushmm.org/
http://www.yadvashem.org
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary
Images courtesy of the WFCS Holocaust Museum
http://theholocaustmuseum.info/
Copyright © 2014. WFCS Holocaust Museum