Today’s story is the miraculous account of how the Norwegian’s saved their gold reserves from the Nazis and spirited them out of the country right under the enemy’s noses. If the Germans had obtained these reserves, they would have gained more wealth to supply their war machine.
Although Norway was neutral during WWII, Nicolai Rygg, the director of Norges Bank where the nation’s gold reserves resided, made preparations in case Norway should fall or a crisis develop. Early in 1940, Rygg brought in volunteers to pack bars of gold in white painted boxes and seal them with iron bands. Bags of gold coins were packed in smaller kegs. Of the 421 million Krone stored in the bank, 300 million was shipped to the United States. The rest was left in the vault because Norwegian law did not allow all the gold to be removed from the country at one time.
After Rygg learned that German warships were headed up the Oslo Fjord on April 9th, Rygg contacted General Laake, the Commander-in-Chief of military forces, who ordered Rygg to immediately evacuate the gold to the bank in Lillehammer. Moments later, Rygg learned that the Germans already occupied major cities but hadn’t reached Oslo (the sinking of the Blücher kept the Germans from seizing the capital for an extra eight hours).
Norges Bank at Oslo 1906-1986. Courtesy of Norges Bank.
Twenty-six trucks were chartered from local merchants, and the drivers were directed to the side entrance of the bank but were not informed about what they would be carrying. Bank guards were placed close to the bank to keep inquisitive eyes away, but the military was not used in order to avoid drawing attention to the operation. The bank employees loaded the gold.
Each truck, along with two armed bank guards, drove away immediately after loading so there was no convoy to draw the attention of the Luftwaffe. The first truck left at 8:15 AM and the last truck shortly before 1:30 PM. German soldiers marched down the main street of Oslo at exactly the same time, and the Norwegian commander of the Oslo garrison surrendered the city at 2:00 PM at the Akershus Fort, only a couple hundred yards from Norges Bank.
A Gold Bar from the Norges Bank. Courtesy of Norges Bank.
The gold shipment totaled 818 large crates, 685 smaller crates, and 39 kegs of gold coins. Lillehammer was 115 miles from Oslo, and the trucks traveled over snow-laden roads. Vehicles and pedestrians fleeing the capital slowed down the trucks, and people became angry because the trucks didn’t stop to help them. The last truck arrived at the bank in Lillehammer at 8:00 PM.
The bank employees in Lillehammer tucked the gold away in their vault; however, they could only unload the cargo when the Luftwaffe wasn’t flying over them. The media picked up on the activity and broadcast that trucks of gold were arriving in Lillehammer. A Trondheim newspaper also reported on the shipment, but the Germans did not pick up on the reports. The Royal Family, the Norwegian government, and the Norwegian gold had escaped for the time being!
The gold remained at Lillehammer for ten days while the Norwegians barricaded the roads and kept the Germans from advancing. Rygg checked on the gold twice and on the second trip, he asked the bank manager, Andreas Lund, to memorize the numbers to the vault lock. Frequent bombing raids forced the bank to close and wait to reopen until the planes disappeared.
Norges Bank at Lillehammer. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons – Public Domain
On April 14th, 15 German transport planes dropped about 180 lightly armed paratroopers in the Dombås area, northwest of Lillehammer. They were spread over a wide area, and the Norwegian troops successfully killed or captured them over a five-day period. This kept the railway lines to the north and the west coast open.
In the mean time, it became obvious that the Germans could overtake Lillehammer at any time. Oscar Torp, the Norwegian Minister of Finance, tasked Fredrik Haslund, Secretary of the Labour Party, with transporting the gold from Lillehammer to the port of Åndalsnes where the British Royal Navy could take it safely away. On April 17th, the British—determined to assist the Norwegians in ousting the Germans—had landed a large number of troops and equipment at three Norwegian ports—Harstad, Namsos, and Åndalsnes.
United States Military Academy Dept. of History – Courtesy of Wikipedia – Public Domain
At midnight on April 19th, orders came to open the bank vault door. Unfortunately due to fear and anxiety, Lund had a difficult time getting the lock to the brand new vault open—it had only been opened once before and Lund was operating by memory. He finally succeeded with the code a little past 1:00 AM.
Haslund had recruited the Lillehammer chief of police who assembled 30 volunteers who met at a secret location at 10:00 PM. They were armed with spades and shovels so they would appear to be preparing to dig trenches. Instead they were quietly transported to the bank and loaded the trucks which took the gold to the railway station, a short distance away. The gold was loaded onto the wooden railcars. A small group of soldiers was ordered to accompany the train, but the men weren’t told what they were guarding. They soon figured out the contents because of the Norges Bank initials displayed on the outside of each container.
Lillehammer Train Station. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons – Public Domain
The train left Lillehammer at 4:00 AM with its lights dimmed in case any Luftwaffe aircraft flew over. When dawn approached, the bullion train stopped at Otta and pulled onto a siding to wait for a safer time to proceed. Later, a train arrived at Otta Station from the north with three carriages full of British soldiers who had their thumbs in the air. The Norwegians were encouraged. Little did they know what dangers lay ahead.
The gold train sat undetected on a railroad siding in Otta. It didn’t run during the day because the German bombers loved to target anything moving. After a twenty-four-hour wait, the gold train left at 10:00 PM and arrived at the port town of Åndalsnes at 4:30 AM on April 20th.
View of the innermost part of the Romsdalsfjord with Åndalsnes up to the left in the picture. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. Public Domain.
Åndalsnes is located at the head of a fjord – a long narrow inlet which connects to the Norwegian Sea. The British had landed troops and secured Åndalsnes two days before, and at 9:00 AM on the 20th, the Germans commenced bombing the port, the British ships, all transport routes, and the town of approximately 2000 people. In spite of their intelligence, the Germans were not aware of the presence of Norway’s gold, which remained at the station awaiting transportation out by British warship to the United Kingdom.
At 11:00 PM, Fredrik Haslund, the official tasked with conveying the gold out of Norway, sent the gold train to a siding at Romsdalhorn, a few kilometers away. Towering mountains guarded the tiny station, making it a perfect place to hide a train. Due to the constant daytime bombing, a crew of railwaymen worked in twelve-hour shifts to repair the area’s rail lines.
On the night of April 24th, Mr. Haslund ordered the gold train to be brought down to the dock in Andalsnes. Norwegian soldiers loaded 200 boxes of gold onto the HMS Galatea which had just unloaded British troops and equipment. The cruiser carried sixteen tons of the gold along with Norwegian officials to Scotland, and from there, the gold was transported to London and the Bank of England. Thirty-four tons of gold remained in Norway, awaiting transportation to the Allies. If the Nazis took possession, the precious metal would provide a tremendous boost to the enemy’s war chest.
A Modern View of Åndalsnes from the Romsdalsjjord Courtesy of Creative Commons via Wikimedia. Author Ludovic Peron.
The Norwegians expected German soldiers to come up the valley into Åndalsnes at any moment. Only hours remained to move the gold. An army captain obtained twenty-five trucks and drivers, and in two hours’ time, all the gold was removed from the train and loaded on the trucks. The convoy navigated over poorly paved roads that were covered with melting snow and mud. Unfortunately, the Luftwaffe returned to Åndalsnes and attacked the convoy. The soldiers and drivers ran for cover and no one was injured during the forty-five minutes of strafing. The convoy continued its journey, and when the next attack commenced, the drivers sped up. The Germans weren’t successful at hitting their targets. After reaching a ferry crossing, some trucks were hidden and some were camouflaged until dark.
A ferry arrived but could only carry two trucks across the water at a time. It took six hours to convey all the trucks to the other side. Because of deep ruts and potholes caused by the winter weather, the road ahead had to be repaired in places before the convoy could pass through. Trucks broke down and had to be replaced, and the crews became exhausted unloading and reloading the gold. Local farmers utilized their horses and equipment to drag one truck out of a ditch and back onto the road.
Eventually the convey arrived at the port of Molde where the Norwegian Government, King Haakon, and Crown Prince Olav were taking cover. They had arrived on April 23rd, and Molde had essentially become the new capital of Norway. The gold was unloaded into a large vault in the basement of the Confectionsfabriken building (clothing factory) in town.
Confectionsfabriken Building – Molde
The people of Molde were very helpful. They assisted with unloading the gold, providing security, and feeding the exhausted soldiers. But the Germans were intent on capturing or killing the King, Crown Prince, and Government. The Luftwaffe attacked Molde and it’s surroundings with bombs and incendiaries. The townsfolk set off the air-raid alarms as soon as they spotted aircraft, which allowed everyone time to escape to the woods.
On April 28th, the German Government announced that they were at war with Germany and that King Haakon was wanted ‘dead or alive.’ This was no surprise to the king or the Government. The relentless air strikes forced the British to send the cruiser HMS Glasgow to Molde and plans were made to evacuate.
The Germans bombed Molde for the first time at night. With debris littering the roads and fires raging, Norway’s gold was loaded on any available truck and transported to various locations at the harbor. Not all the trucks were immediately able to find a safe path through the destruction.
Before the HMS Glasgow could pull into port, a fire had to be extinguished on the dock. A portion of the gold was carried on board from this dock, and some was ferried by smaller ships from other points and loaded by crane onto the ship. The King, Crown Prince, members of the Norwegian Government, and the French, Danish, and British embassy members and staff joined British soldiers aboard the ship.
The Ruins of Molde – 1940. Courtesy of Flickr. No known copyright restrictions.
After the Germans unsuccessfully attacked the ship, the Glasgow left port and sailed down the fjord in reverse for at least an hour. It was too dangerous to turn around in the fjord at night. Not all of the gold had been loaded and not all of the gold had even made it to the dock before the Glasgow was forced to sail.
Along with the gold, the Glasgow carried King Haakon, Crown Prince Olav, members of the Norwegian Government, and diplomatic officials from Britain, France, and Denmark to the Tromso area in the far north of Norway. From here, the Norwegians hoped to form an offensive against the Germans and drive them out of the country.
Summer Night in Tromso (2012). Photo Credit: Mark Ledingham via Wikimedia Commons
After delivering its precious human cargo, the Glasgow turned south and safely landed the second installment of Norway’s gold in Scotland. Norwegian officials accompanied the shipment by train to London where it was stored in the vault of the Bank of England.
Back in Molde, Fredrik Haslund, the official in charge of rescuing the gold, searched for a way to remove the 18 tons which the Glasgow had been forced to leave behind due to the bombings. While Molde was burning, Haslund loaded eight tons of the gold on the steamer Driva, and the ship set off at 2:00 AM, only one hour after the Glasgow had pulled away.
The Luftwaffe dropped a stick of bombs in the water near the Driva, but she wasn’t damaged. During her trip north she was attacked by a German seaplane, and to avoid being sunk, the Driva’s first mate beached the craft on a flat shoreline. Bombs fell but landed in the sea. As the tide came in, another steamer pulled the Driva back out into the fjord.
Molde Under Attack in 1940 Painting by Rolf Groven
In the meantime, near Molde, Haslund decided the gold should be moved to fishing vessels because the Driva was too much of a target for the Germans. Word was sent to the Driva to rendezvous at the village of Gjemnes. The remaining ten tons of gold was transported by truck to Gjemnes and loaded onto fishing boats (puffers) there. Five hundred and forty-seven boxes of bullion were loaded in the dark, including the gold from the Driva. By this time, Norway’s fight against the Nazis was over in southern Norway but still continued in the far north of the country.
The puffers sailed through the fjords, laying over at coastguard stations and villages but not staying in any one place for long. Unfortunately, the captains of the puffers weren’t comfortable moving into unfamiliar waters farther north along the dangerous coast, and Haslund was forced to find other sources to move the gold to Tromso where the new capitol had been established.
Bodo at the time Haslund visited before it was bombed by the Germans on May 27, 1940. Courtesy of Hundholmen
The gold was again unloaded and reloaded on two different fishing boats. The boats split up but rendezvoused at a small port north of Bodo on May 7th. Hasland left the boat and traveled by car to Bodo where he located the local military commander and learned where the British had placed the minefields in a fjord they must pass through. After safe passage through the fjord, they obtained the services of the commanding officer of a Norwegian guard ship who boarded and piloted them safely to Tromso where they arrived on May 9th.
The gold was combined on one of the puffers, and that boat went out to sea with the other fishing boats each day. On May 21st, the gold was loaded on the HMSEnterprise, a Royal Navy cruiser. The Luftwaffe had previously attacked the Enterprise with 150 bombs, and she was in poor condition. She left on May 23rd on a zig-zag course for the UK. She was attacked again, but none of the bombs hit their target. The Enterprise traveled down the west coast of England without destroyer protection and docked at Plymouth in the south. The gold was transported by train to London and deposited in the Bank of England.
Expecting a German invasion of Britain at any moment, the Norwegians made plans to move its gold once again. The British had already removed all of its own gold reserves before the war started in September of 1939. The Norwegian precious metal was split into several shipments and sent across the Atlantic to the Federal Reserve Bank in New York and to the Bank of Canada in Ottawa. A small portion of the gold remained with the Norwegian Government-in-Exile established in England. This allowed them to function independently throughout the war.
Source: Gold Run by Robert Pearson. Casemate Publishers, 2015.
Eastern Europe was heavily impacted by WWII. Millions of civilians and soldiers lost their lives when Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union initially invaded and then reconquered these lands later in the war. Both countries massacred many civilians and soldiers and deported hundreds of thousands to either Germany or Siberia, where the deportees often died of starvation.
What was the emotional and spiritual state of the general population in these countries prior to WWII? Did the people expect such widespread devastation, and were they prepared for the suffering ahead? Did they think about their spiritual welfare?
It so happens that a great spiritual awakening took place across denominational lines in Eastern Europe in the 1930‘s and continued into the war period. God, in his love and mercy, sent witnesses and opened the windows of heaven prior to the great calamities which followed.
In 1934 a young evangelist from Scotland traveled to Riga, Latvia, a small northern country bordered by the Baltic Sea on the west and the Soviet Union to the east. Even though he didn’t personally know anyone in the country, James Stewart clearly felt God had called him to this land. He arrived almost destitute and penniless, his clothing inadequate for the harsh winter weather. He found refuge in the home of Pastor Robert Fetler and held a revival campaign in Fetler’s church. Twelve hundred people attended the meetings nightly, which often lasted until three o’clock in the morning.
Fetler’s brother, William, pastored the Salvation Temple Revival Church, also in Latvia, and the church was holding a revival convention the week Stewart arrived in the country. The congregation had prayed for revival for many years and hundreds of believers participated in a twenty-four-hour-a-day prayer circle for that purpose.
Stewart preached in the Salvation Temple’s services where over two thousand people gathered every day for weeks and months. The meetings continued sometimes all day and all night, and those attending attested to the “awful sense of the majesty and holiness of God.” The Russian, German, and Polish churches which met in the building were “touched by the power of God.”
ESTONIA
Physically exhausted from ministering daily in Latvia, Stewart went north to the little country of Estonia to rest. It wasn’t long before he made contact with a pastor whose people had also been praying for revival. They began gospel meetings and soon had to move the services to the largest Protestant building in the capital city of Talinn. They ran out of space in that church and asked church members to stay home to make room for the visitors. Then it became necessary to rent the largest public hall in the city, which seated thousands.
Stewart arrived at the new location one night and found a crowd waiting outside. When he asked the people why they hadn’t been allowed inside, they answered that the hall was crowded and there wasn’t any more room.
During the course of the meetings, Stewart lost his voice and went to another town to rest. After his voice returned, he conducted meetings entitled “Lectures on the Bible” and gave each attendee a New Testament. As he both taught and preached from the Scriptures, the listeners gave their hearts to Christ, including his interpreter, a university professor.
POLAND
Creative Commons
In 1935, James Stewart left for Warsaw and met with the Russian Missionary Society to receive instructions on how to assist pastors ministering in the small towns and villages among the Russians of eastern Poland. Stewart visited and encouraged these pastors, arranged for the systematic distribution of Scriptures in the villages, and conducted evangelistic meetings in rented public halls and theaters.
Stewart was especially burdened for the large number of Jews he encountered, so he held special meetings for them. Both orthodox and liberal Jews attended, packing the buildings so tightly that the gas lamps went out for lack of sufficient oxygen.
The films of actor James Stewart played in the same cities and towns where missionary James Stewart led people to Christ. Some folks traveled to town to watch the movies but went to the wrong hall by mistake. After listening to the gospel message, they gave their hearts to Christ. Stewart held ten-day campaigns in the larger towns of Rowne, Baronowicze, Vilna, Pruzana, and Lutsk, and the rented cinema buildings filled to overflowing.
CZECHOSLOVAKIA
Map of Czechoslovakia and northern Austria, 1928-1938. Created by PANONIAN [public domain] via Wikimedia Commons
James Stewart returned to Warsaw, and an associate asked him where he planned to go next. “Czechoslovakia,” he said without a pause. His friend asked if Stewart knew anyone there. No, he didn’t. But that same day, Mr. Zdened Koukol, a chocolate manufacturer from a town near Prague, Czechoslovakia, walked into the associate’s office. He met Stewart and asked him when he planned to come to his country and hold revival meetings.
Stewart traveled to Czechoslovakia and, under Koukol’s sponsorship, held meetings starting in October of 1936. After two weeks of speaking to a cold and unresponsive congregation in Kutna Hora, the young preacher packed his bags, planning to move on. Koukol urged him to stay longer. James prayed and the Lord convicted Him for his impatience.
Koukol encouraged the believers in the towns of Kutna Hora and Kolin to pray and believe that revival was possible, starting in their own hearts. Koukol rented a large public hall in Kolin, and young people flocked to the meeting. No one responded the first night. However, very late that same night, a Christian woman who held an important position in the Kolin church appeared at Koukol’s home.
The woman feared that sin in her life had prevented God’s blessing upon the revival meeting. Stewart counseled with her, and she left determined to make things right. A very different atmosphere was evident at the meetings in the following days. Many heard the gospel for the first time and accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior.
Source:
Stewart, Ruth. James Stewart Missionary, A Biography. Revival Literature, 1977.
If you’re not familiar with the story of the Kindertransports which took place during WWII, you can find more information by reading my earlier post here: “The Kindertransports: Nearly 10,000 Children Saved from Nazi Territory.” Today, I’m sharing a special ending for one of the children who rode on a Kindertransport that originated in Austria.
Jews seeking emigration visas line up in front of the Polish consulate in Vienna. Austria, March 22, 1938. Wide World Photo. Courtesy of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
The Germans marched into Austria in 1938 and immediately instituted the same Nazi racial policies they had gradually established in Germany during the previous five years. Kurt Fuchel was seven years old, and his idyllic life in Vienna changed rapidly. Kurt’s father was dismissed from his position as a mid-level bank manager, Kurt was dismissed from his school, and tensions mounted in the Fuchel home.
Kurt’s parents spent many hours visiting consulates, making phone calls, and studying maps as they endeavored to escape their homeland. Kurt, accustomed to being the center of attention, coped by pulling the tablecloth off the table, dishes and all.
Kurt’s Mother in Their Vienna Apartment, 1930. Courtesy of USHMM
The German occupiers passed a law that Austrians in good standing with the Nazis could “appropriate” Jewish apartments. The Fuchels lived in a very nice apartment in Vienna, and on the morning of Kristallnacht (November 9-10), when other Jewish businesses and homes were raided, a Frau Januba with some officers arrived at the Fuchel home and claimed their apartment. She showed the Fuchel’s an official paper and gave them one day to move out. When Kurt’s father told her she was stealing what he and his wife had worked for, she threatened to send him to a concentration camp.
The Fuchels packed what they could but had to leave the rest and move in with a neighbor the next day. The Fuchel’s situation became so grave that they sent Kurt to England on the Kindertransport. He traveled by train through Germany and Holland and then by ship across the English Channel to Harwich. Percy and Mariam Cohen chose to become Kurt’s foster parents and met him in Harwich on a bitterly cold morning. Dirty and smelling of seasickness, Kurt and the other children straggled off the gangplank into an unknown land. The Cohens took Kurt home, gave him a bath, burned his old clothes, and provided him with new ones.
Kindertransport Refugees Arriving at Harwich, England, 1938 From Institute of Contemporary History and Wiener Library Limited. Courtesy of USHMMKindertransport from Vienna, Austria, Arriving at Harwich, England. From Wide World Photo – Courtesy USHMM
According to Mariam Cohen, Kurt was very well behaved and became a happy member of their family. He gained a little brother – five-year-old John Cohen. Kurt learned English from a German man hired by the Cohens, and then he attended a small, private school with John. Kurt promptly forgot how to read, write, and speak German and never relearned it.
Kurt recalls hiding under the grand piano in the living room and listening as the adults gathered around the radio and heard England declare war on Germany. To an eight-year-old, the beginning of the war was exciting. When the air raid sirens went off, he and the Cohens hid in the downstairs coat closet, and in the mornings, they picked up shrapnel outside. The fear and horror came later.
Kurt’s biggest worry was that the Cohens would send him away. Other children he knew from the Kindertransports had not adjusted well to their new families and had been forced to move to other homes. Kurt worked hard in school and worked hard to please the Cohens, but he was jealous of John and paid close attention to whether the two boys were treated the same. After a time, Kurt concluded that the Cohens were very fair with both of them.
Kurt Fuchel
Meanwhile, Kurt’s parents escaped Austria through Italy and settled in the south of France. Kurt was able to correspond with them for the first two years he lived with the Cohens. Wonderful people in southern France hid Kurt’s parents, and, after the war, the Fuchels reestablished contact with the Cohens. Kurt was so settled in his new life that he was horrified by the thought of going back to live with the Fuchels.
Mr. Cohen convinced Kurt’s parents to wait to send for him until Kurt had earned his English school certificate and the Fuchels had reestablished themselves. Kurt’s father obtained employment, and he and his wife found a place to live in Toulouse, France. Kurt was sixteen years old when he and the Cohens left for France.
When Kurt saw his parents for the first time in nine years, he was overtaken by a strong sense of love, which he both felt and fought. He couldn’t speak German or French and his parents spoke little English. When the Cohens left to return home to England, Mr. Cohen cried. Most of the children from the Kindertransports had lost their birth parents to the Nazis, but Kurt had two sets of parents who loved him.
Kurt’s parents had sent a seven-year-old off to England and now they were confronted with a sixteen-year-old. This required an adjustment for all of them, but Kurt and his parents rebuilt their relationship. In 1956, the Cohens’ quota number came up to emigrate to the United States.
Even though Kurt was now a Frenchman and was comfortable with life in France, he and his parents moved to America, and Kurt fell in love with New York. And, of course, he could already speak the language. Kurt corresponded with the Cohens over the years but regretted not seeing Mr. Cohen before he died. Later, Kurt was able to enjoy many visits with Mrs. Cohen and John.
Source:
Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport by Mark Jonathan Harris and Deborah Oppenheimer, 2000.
Last month, I shared how Hitler came to power and took dictatorial control of Germany in 1933, and I described the state of the Jews in Germany during the interwar period (WWI – WWII). Here’s the link to the post if you missed it: “How Did Evil Men Take Power in Germany?” Today we will examine how Hitler and the Nazis gradually subjugated their opponents and the Jewish people prior to WWII.
In April of 1933, the German government sponsored a two-day boycott of Jewish businesses. Political opponents of the Nazis and all Jews who hadn’t fought in WWI were dismissed from civil service. New laws pushed Jews out of other government jobs, including Jewish doctors who worked in government-financed healthcare programs.
In 1933 . . . 37,000 Jews emigrated from Germany.
In 1934 . . . another 23,000 Jews fled the country.
But during these early years of Nazi control, many Germans, including the Jews, thought that Hitler wouldn’t last long.
Not even everyone in his own movement agreed with his policies.
The three-million-men-strong, brown-shirted, street-fighting SA Stormtroopers, who’d been instrumental in bringing the Nazis to power, now threatened the party’s power and existence. Hitler’s close friend Ernst Röhm headed the SA. He and the other SA leaders were unhappy with Hitler’s slow implementation of the radical policies the Nazis had advocated from the beginning. Also, Röhm wanted Hitler to combine the Reichswehr, the German military, with the SA and replace the officer corps. The German military leaders fought back by threatening to topple the Nazi regime if the too-powerful SA wasn’t eliminated.
Between June 30 and July 2, 1934, and under Hitler’s direction . . . Heinrich Himmler and the SS arrested the SA leaders and shot them to death, including Hitler’s buddy, Ernst Röhm.
This operation became known as the “Night of the Long Knives.”
As a result, the German Army leadership formed an alliance with Hitler and supported him when he declared himself Führer on August 19, 1934, less than three weeks after the death of President Hindenburg. Most of these military leaders remained loyal to Hitler for many years to come.
In September of 1935, Hitler reduced the Jews to the status of second-class citizens and stripped them of their civil rights. Despite this, many thought the worst was over. Indeed, the Jews felt a sense of calm for two years, and . . .
10,000 Jewish emigrants returned to Germany from neighboring countries in 1935.
By 1938, Germany had rebounded from the economic instability created by WWI and the Great Depression. Firmly in control of the country, Hitler and his regime set their sights on territorial expansion, and Jewish policies took a radical turn.
The German Army occupied Austria in March, 1938.
There were 185,000 Jews (3% of the country’s population) living in Austria, and 170,000 of them lived in Vienna (10% of the city’s population). Sixty-two percent of all lawyers in Vienna were Jewish, and a similar percentage held positions in finance and commerce. Almost 50% of all Viennese doctors were Jewish, and Jews dominated trade and were quite visible in cultural enterprises.
Before the occupation, the Nazi Party was very active in Austria, promoting the unification of Germany and Austria and stirring up anti-Semitism. After the annexation, anti-Jewish laws were put in place and enforced immediately. The Jews quickly came under attack and were even assaulted in the streets. Jews lost their businesses and their apartments from the start.
In August of 1938, SS Lieutenant Adolph Eichmann set up an emigration office in Vienna to help speed the exit of Jews from the country, and . . .
150,000 Jews left during the following eighteen months.
The Nazis forced them to give up their property and their wealth before leaving Austria, but the Jews were thankful to be alive.
Violence against the Jews increased in Germany and Jewish businessmen were pressured to sell and leave. Jews who had previously immigrated from Poland were sent back; however, the Polish government didn’t allow them to return and left them to fend for themselves in the frontier zone. An angry young Jewish man in Paris whose Polish parents resided in the frontier zone retaliated by shooting Ernst vom Rath, a German officer stationed at the German Embassy in Paris. The Nazis used this incident to accelerate Jewish persecution in Germany and Austria.
On the nights of November 8-10, 1938, SS and SA men, dressed as ordinary citizens, “set fire to 1000 synagogues, smashed up 7500 Jewish-owned businesses, invaded and ransacked the homes where Jewish people lived, and fatally assaulted over 90 Jewish men. Police herded 30,000 male Jews into concentration camps until they could be ransomed out by their terrified families” (Cesarani).
This event became known as Kristallnacht, or “Night of Broken Glass.”
In addition, the Nazis charged the German Jewish community one billion Reichsmark (approximately 400 million U.S. dollars at that time) for the damage done on Kristallnacht. This spared the German insurance companies from paying.
What were the conditions in Germany which led to another world war only twenty years after the War to End All Wars? How did a “civilized” nation allow its leaders to annihilate so many of its own citizens? And how did such evil leaders gain power in the first place?
Post WWI Turmoil
The Treaty of Versailles – as one of the conditions of surrender, Germany was forced to pay huge reparation payments to the countries she fought during WWI. She also lost territory and was forced to surrender her colonies abroad, further limiting the income needed to pay debts and recover from the War. To help pay its obligations, the German government printed more money, which led to extreme inflation.
Enter ➥ numerous political parties vying to fix Germany’s troubles, parties that opposed the new government (Weimar Republic) and hated democracy. The German Army hired former WWI soldiers to infiltrate and spy on these groups. One of these soldiers, Adolph Hitler, became an undercover agent and joined the German Workers’ Party in 1920. He liked the party’s program, so he dumped his role as spy and soon became the leader, renaming the party the National Socialist German Workers Party, or Nazis.
Hitler’s Rise to Power
Hitler led the Nazi Party in a failed attempt to take over the Bavarian state government in 1923 and spent a year in prison. After his release, he built support for his party by recruiting from other discontented groups.
1928 elections – the Nazis had 800,000 votes (2.6%) for representatives in the Reichstag (German Parliament).
1929 Wall St. Crash – American banks called in German loans, causing German businesses and banks to fold and unemployment to spin out-of-control.
1930 elections – the Nazis had 6.4 million votes for representatives in the Reichstag. The centrist German government was unable to cure the economic problems and parliament was paralyzed by the two large opposing blocks of Nazis and Communists.
July, 1932 elections – the Nazis received 13.7 million votes (37.3% of the vote) and became the second largest party in the Reichstag. Hitler used his growing power to demand the position of chancellor, but President Hindenburg resisted.
September, 1932 elections – the Nazis received 11.7 million votes (fewer than the previous election), and President Hindenburg offered Hitler the post of chancellor, which he accepted on January 30, 1933. The Nazi celebrations included torchlight parades and the assaulting of their political opponents.
February, 1933 – an arsonist set fire to the Reichstag building, and Hitler convinced President Hindenburg to issue a decree (allowed by the Weimar Constitution), suspending most civil liberties in Germany. These rights (secrecy of the post and telephone; habeas corpus; freedom of the press, of expression, of free association, of public assembly) were not reinstated as long as the Nazis held power. Because the Reichstag arsonist was a communist, Hitler declared that the communists were plotting to take over the government. Many communists were arrested, including those serving in the parliament.
March, 1933 elections – the Nazis received 44% of the vote. By forming an alliance with another party which had received 8% of the vote, the Nazis now had a majority in the Reichstag (52%). In order to pass the Enabling Act, the Nazis either arrested or intimidated representatives of the Social Democratic Party who opposed them. The act passed, giving Hitler the right to rule by decree, and he effectively became the dictator of Germany.
The Nazis immediately embarked on a plan to exclude the Jewish population from German culture, politics, economics, and society.
The State of the Jews in Germany
After WWI, approximately 600,00 Jews lived in Germany (under 1% of the population). One third lived in Berlin (4% of the Berlin population). Seventy percent of Jews lived in large cities while 50% of the non-Jewish population lived in small towns and villages. In 1933, only one in five Jews lived in small towns.
During this period, 75% of all Jews were employed in trade, commerce, the financial sector, and the professions (three times the proportion among the general population). Jews owned 80% of the turnover of all German department stores, 25% of smaller retail outlets, and 30% of clothing stores. They handled 25% of all wholesale agricultural trade, and in some districts, largely controlled cattle dealing and grain marketing.
Only 11% of all doctors and 16% of all lawyers in Germany were Jewish, but they were concentrated in Berlin, giving the appearance of a much higher percentage. Several of the great publishing houses were owned by Jews, and they were highly represented among writers and journalists, in theater and the film industry. However, a significant number were rather poor.
In 1932, during the Great Depression, over 31.5% of Jewish employees in Berlin were out of work, and one in four received charity. Jews from Poland and Russia had immigrated to Germany during the 1880’s to the 1920’s, and by 1933, they made up 20% of all German Jewry. The Eastern Jews were predominately small merchants, itinerant traders, shopkeepers, tailors, artisans, and industrial workers. Many were Orthodox and religiously observant whereas the majority of German Jews belonged to the Reform or Liberal movement. Also, many German Jews were assimilating and marrying outside the faith.
Sources:
Introduction from Into the Arms of Strangers, Stories of the Kindertransport, by Mark Jonathan Harris and Deborah Oppenheimer. (Introduction by David Cesarani)
