What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder, and Everyday Life In Nazi Germany PDF
Preview What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder, and Everyday Life In Nazi Germany
HISTORY ERIC A. JOHNSON author of NAZI TERROR and The horrors of the Nazi Regime and the Holocaust still JOHNSON 4/c process KARL-HEINZ REUBAND present some of the most disturbing questions in modern & matte poly finish history: Why did Hitler’s party appeal to millions of REUBAND Germans, and how entrenched was anti-Semitism among the population? How could anyone claim, after the war, that the genocide of Europe’s Jews was a secret? Did ordinary non-Jewish Germans live in fear of the Nazi state? In this unprecedented firsthand analysis of daily life as experi- enced in the Third Reich, What We Knewoffers answers to these most important questions. Combining the expertise of Eric A. Johnson, an American historian, and Karl-Heinz Reuband, a German sociologist, What We Knewis the most startling oral history yet of everyday life in the Third Reich. “A very important book.” —FINANCIAL TIMES “A wellspring of information, this text provides unprecedented insights into the mind-set and daily lives of ‘average’Germans, and the lives led by Jews in Nazi Germany.” —HISTORY IN REVIEW W H AT W E “A major contribution to the understanding of life in Nazi WHAT Germany.” —BOOKLIST WE ERIC A. JOHNSON is a professor of history at Central KNEW K N E W Michigan University. He is the author, most recently, of Nazi Terror. He lives in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. TERROR, KARL-HEINZ REUBAND is professor of sociology at the University of Düsseldorf. He lives in Düsseldorf, MASS Germany. MURDER, AND EVERYDAY T E R R O R , M A S S M U R D E R , A N D LIFE IN NAZI Jacket photograph: CORBIS US $18.00 / $23.95 CAN GERMANY EVERYDAY LIFE IN NAZI GERMANY A Member of the Perseus Books Group AN O R A L H I S T O R Y www.basicbooks.com WHAT WE KNEW Also by Eric A. Johnson Nazi Terror: The Gestapo, Jews, and Ordinary Germans Urbanization and Crime: Germany, 1871–1914 The Civilization of Crime: Violence in Town and Country since the Middle Ages (coeditor) Social Control in Europe, 1800–2000 (coeditor) Also by Karl-Heinz Reuband Drogenkonsum und Drogenpolitik: Deutschland und die Niederlande im Vergleich Soziale Realität im Interview: Empirische Analysen methodischer Probleme (coeditor) Die deutsche Gesellschaft in vergleichender Perspective (coeditor) W H AT W E K N E W Terror, Mass Murder, and Everyday Life in Nazi Germany ✛ ✛ ✛ A O H N RAL ISTORY Eric A. Johnson and Karl-Heinz Reuband A Member of the Perseus Books Group Copyright © 2005 by Eric A. Johnson and Karl-Heinz Reuband Hardcover first published in 2005 by Basic Books Paperback published in 2006 by Basic Books, A Member of the Perseus Books Group All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Books published by Basic Books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the United States by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more infor- mation, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 11 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142, or [email protected]. Cataloging-in-Publication data for this book is available from the Library of Congress. HC: ISBN 0-465-08571-7 05 06 07 08 / 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 PBK: ISBN-13 978-0-465-08572-9; ISBN 0-465-08572-5 In memory of Walter and Thea Reuband and John Clark Johnson C ✛ ✛ ✛ ONTENTS Acknowledgments xi Introduction xiii Part One: Jewish Survivors’ Testimonies 1 Jews Who Left Germany Before Kristallnacht 3 William Benson, Leipzig, “Never to forget, never to forgive.” Margarete Leib, Karlsruhe, “They strangled my father with a packaging cord.” Henry Singer, Berlin, “Anti-Semitism was there before Hitler.” Karl Meyer, Cologne, “In Cologne they never had this anti- Semitism.” 2 Jews Who Left Germany After Kristallnacht 26 Armin Hertz, Berlin, “My toes were frozen ...all of them fell off.” Josef Stone, Frankfurt, “All the people started yelling at us.” Elise and Hermann Gottfried, Berlin, “They were all detectives in civilian clothing.” vii viii CONTENTS Rebecca Weisner, Berlin, “Every few weeks they rounded up people and shot them.” Joseph Weinberg, Stuttgart, “We did not feel the anti-Semitism.” 3 Jews Who Were Deported from Germany During the War 59 Max Liffmann, Mannheim, 1940 to Gurs, “Fear was not something I knew.” Herta Rosenthal, Leipzig, 1942 to Riga, “All the Jews were leaving, and they [the Germans] were happy, a lot of them. They were standing there laughing.” Ernst Levin, Breslau, 1943 to Auschwitz, “They say ‘we didn’t know about it.’ Bullshit!” Ruth Mendel, Frankfurt, 1943 to Auschwitz, “I wouldn’t be alive if not for my mother.” Helmut Grunewald, Cologne, 1943 to Auschwitz, “I know that I’ll be sent to Auschwitz and be gassed anyway.” Herbert Klein, Nuremberg, 1943 to Theresienstadt, “We were the last ones deported in 1943.” Werner Holz, Krefeld, 1943 to Theresienstadt, “I was blond, blond.” Hannelore Mahler, Krefeld, 1944 to Theresienstadt, “We didn’t want to believe it because we could have been next.” 4 Jews Who Went into Hiding 120 Ilse Landau, Berlin, “I had been caught and sent to Auschwitz ... I jumped out of the train!” Lore Schwartz, Berlin, “In any case, I came out of the war a virgin.” Rosa Hirsch, Magdeburg, “There were some people who tried to help. But they were such a minority.” Part Two: “Ordinary Germans’” Testimonies 5 Everyday Life and Knowing Little About Mass Murder 141 Hubert Lutz, Cologne, “In my ten years in the Hitler Youth, I never heard anybody suggest that you spy on your parents or that you spy on anybody else.” Marta Hessler, Stettin, “They came and arrested my brother.” CONTENTS ix Rolf Heberer, Freithal, “For 60 million Germans, that was what the people really wanted.” Gertrud Sombart, Dresden, “Most people were, of course, for Hitler.” Erwin Hammel, Cologne, “They felt like members of the master race.” Anna Rudolf, Berlin, “You, good girl!” Peter Reinke, Cologne, “Why should I have been afraid? We just sat there in detention.” Helga Schmidt, Dresden, “There was never any particular sympathy for the Jews.” Werner Hassel, Leobschütz, “A large number of people really didn’t know anything.” 6 Everyday Life and Hearing About Mass Murder 185 Hiltrud Kühnel, Frankfurt, “That was his hobby, measuring skulls.” Ruth Hildebrand, Berlin, “The soldiers on leave... did a lot of talking.” Ekkehard Falter, Dresden, “Rat-a-tat-tat, dead.” Stefan Reuter, Berlin, “One heard in communist circles that numbers of Jews were being gassed.” Ernst Walters, Schwalbach, “Gassed. They were killed and soap was made from the bones.” Effie Engel, Dresden, “[The BBC] also confirmed it, and with rather exact information.” Winfried Schiller, Beuten, “Auschwitz was not so very far away from us.” 7 Witnessing and Participating in Mass Murder 226 Adam Grolsch, Krefeld, “In two days, 25,000 men, women, and children.” Hans Ruprecht, Cologne, “We have to carry out some ‘cleansing measures’ here.” Albert Emmerich, Eberswalde, “There are three hundred Jews lying in each grave.” Walter Sanders, Krefeld, “I not only told my parents about that, I also told others when I was on leave.”
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