Directions:The Following Question in Based on the Accompanying 14 Documents

Directions:The following question in based on the accompanying 14 documents.

This question is designed to test your ability to work with historical documents. As you analyze the documents, take into account both the sources of the documents and the authors’ point of view.

Question: Analyze the roles and the varying degrees of responsibility of the participants and bystanders during the Nazi Holocaust.

Background Information: Between 1939 and 1945 over 12 million men, women, and children were exterminated during the Nazi Holocaust. Most of the killings were accomplished by shootings, carried out by Einsatzkommando (Special Action Teams). The Einsatzkommando primarily killed in Poland, the Baltic States and the USSR were composed of Wehrmacht (German Army) and SS units, as well as a number of German Reserve Police Battalions. Millions of others were exterminated in the six killing centers established in German occupied Poland between 1942 and 1944. These Sonderlager (special camps) were Auschwitz II (Birkenau), Belzec, Chelmno, Madjdanek, Sobibor, and Treblinka.

Document 1

Illustration of the Birkenau

(Auschwitz II Death Camp)

As recalled by Klemens Sträuble

SS-Strummann (Lance Corporal)

“Gate of Death” Illustration

#15 Tower Guard

From the Auschwitz Trial,

Frankfurt am Main, 1960

Document 2

“To kill three million people is in my view the greatest crime of all. I only took part in the murder of some three million people at Auschwitz-Birkenau out of consideration for my family because there was nothing I could do to change anything. I myself was never a Nazi and had to join the party. I am Roman Catholic and to this day believe in God. I was never an anti-Semite and still claim today that everybody has a right to live. “

Maximilliam Grabner

SS-Untersturmführer (Senior Corporal)

Auschwitz II (Birkenau)

Transcript from the Auschwitz Trail-Frankfurt am Main, 1960

Document 3

“SS-Scharfführer Möll took part in eight or nine ‘special actions’ in Birkenau. I myself personally saw him at five. Möll would open the gassing vents on top of the gas chambers and when he poured in the Zyklon-B he’d always say, ‘Now here’s something for you to chew on.’ All I did was keep the prisoners moving into the undressing rooms to keep everything moving quickly and quietly.”

Ludwig Kraus

SS-Mann (Private)

Auschwitz II (Birkenau)

Transcript from The Auschwitz Trial- Frankfurt am Main, 1960

Document 4

“As I have already mentioned, I received my orders for the ‘special action’ from SS-Untersturmführer Grabner. I never attempted to avoid carrying out such an order. It never entered my head. I had been in the SS a long time and my entire attitude towards orders was colored by my training. I found the orders for the ‘special actions’ to be an injustice and I applied repeatedly to get a transfer into a Waffen-SS combat unit on the front. One time Grabner ordered me to pur Zyklon-B into the opening of the gas chamber. Apparently a number of members of the SS-medical staff who normally carried out the gassings refused further participation. The gassing was a transport of 300-400 Jews, mostly men. This was the only time I actually partipated in a ‘special action’ in Birkenau using Zyklon-B. The rest were all shootings in the yard.”

Hans Stark

SS-Untersturmührer (Captain)

Auschwitz II (Birkenau)

Transcript from Auschwitz Trail-Frankfurt am Main, 1960

Document 5

“I want to make it clear for the record that I never actually killed anyone at Auschwitz. I was part of the SS-medical staff and our participation at the ‘special actions’ was clearly one of medical necessity. After each action we would verify the subjects were dead. On 5 Septemeber 1942, I attended my ninth or tenth ‘special action.’ They were Dutch Jews from Holland. The SS who participate in the ‘special actions’ are all volunteers. Each man gets a fifth of a liter of schnapps, 5 cigarettes, 100g of salami and bread. Finding volunteers was never a problem.”

Dr. Johannes Paul Kremer

SS-Hauptsturmführer (Captain)

Auschwitz II (Birkenau)

Personal Diary Entry

5 Septemebr, 1942

Document 6

“During the spring and summer of 1944 we were processing 10,000 to 12,000 people a day in the ‘special actions’. I should know. I was stationed in the switching tower (see document 1, #15 ‘Gate of Death’) overlooking the ‘new ramp,’ built to accommodate the three or four transports arriving daily from Hungary. From where I was posted, I could see the entire camp, though sometimes it was not a clear view because of all the smoke billowing up out of the four crematoria. Though I was technically part of the SS, I was in reality only a railroad switchman, directing trains to the appropriate tracks for the ‘selection.’ I could just as easily have been switching trains in Berlin. Instead I was at Auschwitz.”

Markus Fritsch

SS-Scharfführer (Sergeant)

Auschwitz II (Birkenau)

Transcript from the Auschwitz Trial-Frankfurt am Main, 1960

Document 7

“Captian Trapp spoke to us immediately before the ‘special action’ in Jozefow. He told us the Jews had instigated the American economic boycott that had hurt Germany. He also said the Jews of Jozefow had been aiding Polish underground fighters, killing German soldiers. There were 1,500 Jews in Jozefow and they all were to be shot. Having explained what awaited us and the difficulty of our assignment, Trapp then made the offer that if anyone among us did not feel up to the task we could step out and would not have to participate in the shootings.”

Georg Auerbach

Reserve Police Battalion 101

Jozefow, Poland

13 July, 1942

Document 8

“At the cemetary entrance we chased away all the eager spectators. First Sergeant Ostmann arrived in a truck with a supply of vodka for the shooters. Ostmann turned to one of the men who had avoided the shooting so far and said, ‘Drink up now, Pfeiffer. You’re really standing in shit this time because all the women and children must be shot. You’ve been able to stay out of it so far, but today you go in with the rest of us.’ The execution squad consisted of two teams of 25-shooters, working in waves so we could rest and drink between executions.

Uli Hoffmann

Corporal

Reserve Police Battalion 101

Jozefow, Poland

13 July, 1942

Document 9

“I made it through the first round of shootings, but only with difficulty. You’ve got to understand that when you shoot human beings from that close, you get splattered with blood, bone, and brains. When they brought us the second batch I was too sickened by the whole affair to go on. I was given a mother and daughter for my second round. I went to the platoon leader and told him I was sick and asked to be relieved. He told me to go guard the trucks, which I did the rest of the day.”

Georg Kageler

Sergeant

Reserve Police Battalion 101

Jozefow, Poland

13 July, 1942

Document 10

“No strict control was being kept. Some men who hurried at their task shot far more Jews then some who delayed as much as they could. Others simply slipped off to stand unnoticed in the forest by the trucks to avoid the shooting altogether. It was impossible for my comrades not to notice that I had not shot a single Jew. Early on I decided not to participate. So they showered me with insults afterward like, ‘You shithead!’ or ‘You Jew-loving coward!’ but I suffered no consequences for my refusal to participate. I must mention that I was not the only one who refused to participate in the ‘action’ and I know of no one who suffered any legal or criminal charges.”

Gustav Mahlmann

Private

Reserve Police Battalion 101

Jozefow, Poland

July, 1942

Document 11

“After the Jozefow massacre morale was horrible in our unit. We’d shot to death over 1,500 men, women and children. We were instructed to place the end of our rifles on cervical vertebrae of the victims neck, but when you’re shooting people that close, you get covered with blood, bone and brains. At the end of the day, we were at mess. We all fell to the ground, many throwing up the contents of their stomachs to add to the mess. We weren’t killers; we were just ‘ordinary men.’ None of us were SS or even in the Nazi Party. We were just reserve policemen, too old to get into the Army.”

Anton Bäcker

Corporal

Reserve Police Battalion 101

Jozefow, Poland

13 July, 1942

Document 12

“Since 22 July a Sonderzug (Special Train) for 5000 PJ (Polish Jews) has been traveling daily from the Warsaw HbF (main train station) to the Sonderlager (special camp) at Treblinka. The train returns empty, is cleaned and the rerouted to Treblinka the next day.”

Dr. Theodor Ganzenmüller

Head of the Deutsche Reichsbahn (German Railways)

In a letter from 28 July, 1942 to SS Obergruppenführer (General) Karl Wolf

Document 13

“On 25 September I was the engineer for Sonderzug-9232 (Special Train-9232) for PJ (Polish Jews). We left Szydlowiec at 21:30 (9:30 pm) with a ‘full board’ of 800 tons and reached Treblinka the next day, 26 September, at 11:24. At 15:59 (3:59 pm) we left Treblinka with an ‘emty load’ of 600 tons and returned to Kozienice, arriving after midnight on 27 September.”

Franz Köpf

Deutsche Reischbahn (German Railways) Engineer

From the ”duty log“ of September, 1942

Document 14

Illustration of the Treblinka Death Camp

As recalled by Peter Brehm

Deutsche Reichsbahn (German Railways) Engineer

27 November 1942