The Holocaust
A Timeline
http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/holocaust/timeline.html
Holocaust:
• hol·o·caust (Greek – holokaustos) n. great
destruction resulting in the extensive loss of life,
especially by fire.
• Holocaust = the genocide of European Jews and
others by the Nazis during World War II: “Israel
emerged from the Holocaust and is defined in
relation to that catastrophe” (Emanuel Litvinoff).
• Anti-Semitism - hostility toward and discrimination
against the Jews
Pre-War
1933
• Jan 30- Adolph Hitler is
appointed Chancellor of
Germany.
• Feb 27- Nazis burn down
the Reichstag, the
German Parliament
building; civil rights are
suspended.
• March 24- German
Parliament passes the
Enabling Act, giving
Hitler dictatorial powers.
5/10/34 - The burning of books.
“Where they burn books, they will ultimately also
burn people” – Heinrich Henne 1821
1933
• 4/11 - Nazis issue a decree defining a non-Aryan as
"anyone descended from non-Aryan, especially
Jewish, parents or grandparents. One parent or
grandparent classifies the descendant as nonAryan...especially if one parent or grandparent was
of the Jewish faith.“
• 7/14 - Nazi Party is declared the only legal party in
Germany; Also, Nazis pass law to strip Jewish
immigrants from Poland of their German citizenship.
• 9/29 - Nazis prohibit Jews from owning land.
• 3 concentration camps established
1934
• 5/17/34 - Jews not allowed
national health insurance.
• 6/30/1934 – Night of the
Long Knives; Nazis conduct
a purge of the SA
• 7/2/34 – Ernst Rohm, leader
of SA, executed
• 8/2/34 - German President
von Hindenburg dies. Hitler
becomes Führer & Reich
Chancellor.
1935
• 5/21/35 - Nazis ban Jews from serving in
the military.
• 8/6/35 - Nazis force Jewish
performers/artists to join Jewish Cultural
Unions.
• 9/15/35 - Nuremberg Race Laws against
Jews decreed.
The Nuremberg Race Laws of
1935 deprived German Jews of
their rights of citizenship, giving
them the status of "subjects" in
Hitler's Reich. The laws also
made it forbidden for Jews to
marry or have sexual relations
with Aryans or to employ young
Aryan women as household help.
1936
• March 7- Nazis occupy the
Rhineland.
• June 17 - Heinrich Himmler is
appointed chief of the German
Police.
• Aug 1- Olympic games begin in
Berlin. Hitler and top Nazis seek
to gain legitimacy through
favorable public opinion from
foreign visitors and thus
temporarily refrain from actions
against Jews.
Heinrich Himmler
ID Triangles
• Yellow = Jews – two stars overlaid to form Star of
David, with word “Jude” inscribed
• Red = political dissidents, incl. Communists
• Green = common criminals
• Purple = Jehovah’s Witnesses
• Blue = immigrants
• Brown = gypsies
• Black = lesbians & “anti-socials”
• Pink = gay men
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_concentration_camp_badges
1937
• 1/1937 - Jews are banned from many professional
occupations including teaching Germans, and from
being accountants or dentists. They are also denied
tax reductions and child allowances.
• 7/16/1937 - Buchenwald Concentration Camp
opens
• 11/8/1937 - Eternal Jew traveling exhibition opens
in Munich
1938
• 3/12, 3/13 - Nazi troops enter Austria, which has a
population of 200,000 Jews, mainly living in Vienna.
• 7/1938 - At Evian, France, the U.S. convenes a
League of Nations conference with delegates from 32
countries to consider helping Jews fleeing Hitler, but
results in inaction as no country will accept them.
• 7/23/38 - Nazis order Jews over age 15 to apply for
identity cards from the police, to be shown on demand
to any police officer.
EVIAN CONFERENCE - 1938
1938
• Aug 17- Nazis require Jewish women to add Sara
and men to add Israel to their names on all legal
documents including passports.
• Oct 15 - Nazi troops occupy the Sudetenland.
• Oct 28 - Nazis arrest 17,000 Jews of Polish
nationality living in Germany, then expel them back
to Poland which refuses them entry, leaving them in
'no-man's land' near the Polish border for several
months.
• Nov 7 – Herschel Grynszpan assassinates Ernst
vom Rath
Nov 9/10 - Kristallnacht - The Night
of Broken Glass.
• On November 9, mob
violence broke out as the
regular German police
stood by and crowds of
spectators watched. Nazi
storm troopers along with
members of the SS and
Hitler Youth beat and
murdered Jews, broke
into and wrecked Jewish
homes, and brutalized
Jewish women and
children.
KRISTALLNACHT
• It was decided in advance that the
German police would not interfere with the
outbursts against the Jews
• 91 killed
• 25,000-30,000 Jews arrested and sent to
concentration camps
• 267 synagogues ransacked or set on fire
• 7500 businesses destroyed
1938
• Nov 12- Nazis fine Jews one billion marks
for damages related to Kristallnacht.
• Nov 15- Jewish pupils are expelled from
all non-Jewish German schools.
• Dec 14- Hermann Göring takes charge of
resolving the "Jewish Question."
1939
• 2/21 - Nazis force Jews to hand over all gold and
silver items.
• 4/30 - Jews lose rights as tenants and are relocated
into Jewish houses.
• 5/13/-6/16 - The SS St. Louis, a ship crowded with
930 Jewish refugees with landing permits for Cuba, is
turned away by Cuba & the United States and returns
to Europe; Britain, Holland, Belgium, France share in
taking the refugees
WWII
1939
• 9/1 - Nazis invade Poland (Jewish pop. 3.35 million,
the largest in Europe). Beginning of SS activity in
Poland.
• 9/1 - Jews in Germany are forbidden to be outdoors
after 8 p.m. in winter and 9 p.m. in summer.
• 9/21 – Reinhard Heydrich issues instructions to SS
Einsatzgruppen (special action squads) in Poland
regarding treatment of Jews, stating they are to be
gathered into ghettos near railroads for the future
"final goal.“
1939
• Sept - Quote from Nazi newspaper, Der Stürmer,
published by Julius Streicher - "The Jewish people
ought to be exterminated root and branch. Then the
plague of pests would have disappeared in Poland
at one stroke."
• Nov 23- Yellow stars required to be worn by Polish
Jews over age 10.
1940
• 4/9 – German invasion of Denmark & Norway
• 4/29 - Nazis choose the town of Oswiecim
(Auschwitz) in Poland near Krakow as site of new
concentration camp.
• 5/10 - German invasion of Holland, Belgium &
France
• 7/1940 - Eichmann's Madagascar Plan presented,
proposing to deport all European Jews to the island
of Madagascar, off the coast of east Africa.
Auschwitz
1940
• 9/27 - Tripartite (Axis) Pact signed by Germany,
Italy and Japan.
• 11/1940 - The Krakow Ghetto is sealed off
containing 70,000 Jews.
• 11/15 - The Warsaw Ghetto, containing over
400,000 Jews, is sealed off.
1941
• 4/6/1941 – Yugoslavia & Greece invaded by Germany
• 6/22/1941 – German invasion of the USSR
• 7/31/1941 – Goering appoints Reinhard Heydrich to carry
out final Solution against the Jews
• Summer - Himmler summons Auschwitz Kommandant
Rudolf Höess to Berlin and tells him, "The Führer has
ordered the Final Solution of the Jewish question. We, the
SS, have to carry out this order...I have therefore chosen
Auschwitz for this purpose.“
• 12/11/1941 – Germany declares war on the US
1941
• 12/11/41 – the voyage of the Struma begins from
Bulgaria to Palestine
• The Struma is held at Istanbul for 70 days
• 2/23/42 – Struma towed out to Black Sea
• 2/24/42 – Russian submarine sinks the Struma with
only 1 survivor
1942
• 1/1942 - Mass killings of Jews using Zyklon-B begin
at Auschwitz-Birkenau in Bunker I (the red
farmhouse) in Birkenau with the bodies being buried
in mass graves in a nearby meadow.
• 1/20/42 – Wannsee Conference; mass plan to
eliminate 11 million European Jews detailed
• 3/1/42 - Belzec extermination begins
• 3/17/42 – Treblinka death camp opens
Facsimiles of the minutes of the Wannsee Conference.
This page lists the number of Jews in every European
country.
1942
• 6/10/42 – Heydrich murdered
• 7/22/42 – Warsaw ghetto Jews begin to move to
Treblinka
• June 30 and July 2 - The New York Times reports
via the London Daily Telegraph that over 1,000,000
Jews have already been killed by Nazis
• Dec 28, 1942 - Sterilization experiments on women
at Birkenau begin
Map of Camps
1943
• 3/1/43 - In New York, American Jews hold a mass
rally at Madison Square Garden to pressure the
U.S. government into helping the Jews of Europe.
• 4/4/43 - Newly built gas chamber/crematory V
opens at Auschwitz
• 4/19/43 – Warsaw ghetto uprising
• 4/19/43 – Warsaw ghetto destruction begins
• 6/1943 – Himmler orders all ghettos in Poland
liquidated
Joseph Mengele – “Angel of Death”
1944
• 3/19/44 – German invasion of
Hungary
• 5/15/44 - Jews from Hungary
arrive at Auschwitz. Eichmann
arrives to personally oversee and
speed up the extermination
process. By May 24, an estimated
100,000 have been gassed.
Between May 16 and May 31, the
SS report collecting 88 pounds of
gold and white metal from the
teeth of those gassed. By the end
of June, 381,661 persons - half of
the Jews in Hungary - arrive at
Auschwitz.
1944
• 8/4/44 - Anne Frank and family arrested by Gestapo
in Amsterdam, then sent to Auschwitz. Anne and
her sister Margot are later sent to Bergen-Belsen
where Anne dies of typhus on March 15, 1945.
• 10/30/44 - Last use of gas chambers at Auschwitz.
• 11/8/44 - Nazis force 25,000 Jews to walk over 100
miles in rain and snow from Budapest to the
Austrian border, followed by a second forced march
of 50,000 persons, ending at Mauthausen.
1945
• 1/1945 - As the Allies advance, the Nazis conduct
death marches of concentration camp inmates
away from outlying areas.
• 1/27/45 - Soviet troops liberate Auschwitz. By this
time, an estimated 2,000,000 persons, including
1,500,000 Jews, have been murdered there.
• 4/30/45 - Hitler commits suicide in his Berlin bunker.
• 5/8/45 - Unconditional German surrender
Post-War
Nuremberg Trials
• 12/9/46 - former SS doctors and scientists go on trial
before a U.S. Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. Sixteen
are found guilty, with 7 being hanged.
• 11/1945-10/1946 - Twenty two former SS Nazi
leaders go on trial before a U.S. Military Tribunal in
Nuremberg for crimes against peace & humanity and
war crimes. Fourteen are sentenced to death. The
others receive prison sentences. Herman Goering
commits suicide before he could be executed.
• All were hung, cremated at Dachau, and ashes
dumped into a river in Munich.
Adolph Eichmann
After the War
• 5/11/1960 - Adolf Eichmann is captured in Argentina
by Israeli secret service.
• 4/11-8/14/1961 - Eichmann on trial in Jerusalem for
crimes against the Jewish people, crimes against
humanity and war crimes. Found guilty and hanged
at Ramleh on May 31, 1962. A fellow Nazi reported
Eichmann once said "he would leap laughing into
the grave because the feeling that he had five
million people on his conscience would be for him a
source of extraordinary satisfaction."
The Holocaust by the
Numbers
Estimated Jewish Deaths by
Country and % of Jewish
Population Killed
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
POLAND- 3,000,000
USSR- 1,000,000
HUNGARY- 596,000
GERMANY- 200,000
FRANCE- 77,320
ROMANIA- 287,000
AUSTRIA- 65,000
90%
11%
70%
90%
26%
50%
90%
•
•
•
•
LITHUANIA- 143,000
BELGIUM- 28,900
ITALY- 7,680
FINLAND – 7
90%
60%
20%
1%
• NETHERLANDS- 100,000
• BOHEMIA/
MORAVIA- 71,150
• LATVIA- 80,000
• SLOVAKIA- 71,000
• YUGOSLAVIA- 63,300
• GREECE- 67,000
• DENMARK- 60
• ESTONIA- 2,000
• LUXEMBOURG- 1,950
• NORWAY- 762
75%
89%
90%
83%
60%
77%
1%
90%
20%
41%
Totals
• Estimated Killed- 9,508,340
• Estimated Percentage of World Jewish
Population- 63%
Terms
• Aryan – pure Germanic race
• Einsatzgruppen – mobile killing units disposing of
undesirables
• Ghetto – walled section of the city where Jews were
forced to live
• Pogrom – organized attack on Jews
• Zyclon-B – insecticide used for massed gassing of
Jews in the death camps