Jump to: 1938
1939 1940 1941
1942 1943 1944
1945
1933
January 30, 1933 - Adolf
Hitler is appointed Chancellor of Germany a nation with a Jewish population
of 566,000.
February 22, 1933 - 40,000 SA and SS men are
sworn in as auxiliary police.
February 27, 1933
- Nazis burn Reichstag
building to create crisis atmosphere.
February 28, 1933 - Emergency powers
granted to Hitler as a result of the Reichstag fire.
March 22, 1933 -
Nazis open Dachau concentration camp
near Munich, to be followed by Buchenwald
near Weimar in central Germany, Sachsenhausen
near Berlin in northern Germany, and Ravensbrück
for women.
March 24, 1933 - German Parliament
passes Enabling Act giving Hitler dictatorial powers.
See also: The
History Place - Rise of Hitler
April 1, 1933
- Nazis stage boycott of Jewish shops and businesses.
April 11, 1933 -
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 non-Aryan...especially
if one parent or grandparent was of the Jewish faith."
April 26, 1933 -
The Gestapo is born, created by Hermann Göring
in the German state of Prussia.
May 10, 1933
- Burning of books in Berlin and throughout
Germany.
July 14, 1933 - Nazi Party is declared
the only legal party in Germany; Also, Nazis pass Law to strip Jewish immigrants
from Poland of their German citizenship.
In July - Nazis pass law
allowing for forced sterilization of those found by a Hereditary Health
Court to have genetic defects.
In September - Nazis establish Reich
Chamber of Culture, then exclude Jews from the Arts.
September 29, 1933 - Nazis prohibit
Jews from owning land.
October 4, 1933 - Jews are prohibited
from being newspaper editors.
November 24, 1933 - Nazis pass
a Law against Habitual and Dangerous Criminals, which allows beggars, the
homeless, alcoholics and the unemployed to be sent to concentration camps.
1934
January 24, 1934 - Jews are banned
from the German Labor Front.
May 17, 1934 - Jews not allowed
national health insurance.
June 30, 1934
- The Night of Long Knives occurs as Hitler,
Göring and Himmler conduct a purge of the SA (storm trooper) leadership.
July 20, 1934 - The SS (Schutzstaffel)
is made an independent organization from the SA.
July 22, 1934 - Jews are
prohibited from getting legal qualifications.
August 2, 1934 -
German President von Hindenburg dies. Hitler
becomes Führer.
August 19, 1934 - Hitler receives a
90 percent 'Yes' vote from German voters approving his new powers.
1935
May 21, 1935 - Nazis ban
Jews from serving in the military.
June 26, 1935 - Nazis pass
law allowing forced abortions on women to prevent them from passing on
hereditary diseases.
August 6, 1935 - Nazis force
Jewish performers/artists to join Jewish Cultural Unions.
September 15, 1935 - Nuremberg
Race Laws against Jews decreed.
1936
February 10, 1936 -
The German Gestapo is placed above the law.
In March -
SS Deathshead division is established to guard concentration camps.
March 7, 1936
- Nazis occupy the Rhineland.
June 17, 1936 -
Heinrich Himmler is appointed chief of the
German Police.
August 1, 1936 - 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.
In August - Nazis set up an Office
for Combating Homosexuality and Abortions (by healthy women).
1937
In January -
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.
November 8, 1937
- 'Eternal
Jew' travelling exhibition opens in Munich.
1938 Return
to Top of Page
March 12/13, 1938 - Nazi troops
enter Austria, which has a population of 200,000 Jews, mainly living in
Vienna. Hitler announces Anschluss (union) with
Austria.
In March - After the Anschluss,
the SS is placed in charge of Jewish affairs in Austria with Adolf Eichmann
establishing an Office for Jewish Emigration in Vienna. Himmler then establishes
Mauthausen concentration camp near Linz.
April 22, 1938 - Nazis prohibit
Aryan 'front-ownership' of Jewish businesses.
April 26, 1938 - Nazis order Jews
to register wealth and property.
June 14, 1938 - Nazis order Jewish-owned businesses to register.
In July -
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.
July 6, 1938
- Nazis prohibited Jews from trading and providing a variety of specified
commercial services.
July 23, 1938 -
Nazis order Jews over age 15 to apply for identity cards from the police,
to be shown on demand to any police officer.
July 25, 1938 - Jewish doctors prohibited
by law from practicing medicine.
August 11, 1938 - Nazis destroy the
synagogue in Nuremberg.
August 17, 1938
- Nazis require Jewish women to add Sarah and men to add Israel to
their names on all legal documents including passports.
September 27, 1938 - Jews are prohibited
from all legal practices.
October 5, 1938 - Law requires Jewish
passports to be stamped with a large red "J."
October 15, 1938 - Nazi troops occupy
the Sudetenland.
October 28, 1938 - 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.
November 7, 1938 - Ernst vom Rath, third
secretary in the German Embassy in Paris, is shot and mortally wounded
by Herschel Grynszpan, the 17-year-old son of one of the deported Polish
Jews. Rath dies on November 9, precipitating Kristallnacht.
November 9/10 - Kristallnacht
- The Night of Broken Glass.
November 12, 1938 - Nazis fine Jews one
billion marks for damages related to Kristallnacht.
November 15, 1938 - Jewish pupils are
expelled from all non-Jewish German schools.
December 3, 1938
- Law for compulsory Aryanization of all Jewish businesses.
December 14, 1938 - Hermann Göring
takes charge of resolving the "Jewish Question."
1939 Return
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January 24, 1939 - SS leader
Reinhard Heydrich is ordered by Göring
to speed up the emigration of Jews.
January 30, 1939 - Hitler
threatens Jews during Reichstag speech.
February 21, 1939 -
Nazis force Jews to hand over all gold and silver items.
March 15/16 - Nazi troops seize
Czechoslovakia (Jewish pop. 350,000).
April 19, 1939 - Slovakia passes
its own version of the Nuremberg Laws.
April 30, 1939 - Jews lose rights
as tenants and are relocated into Jewish houses.
In May - The
St. Louis, a ship crowded with 930 Jewish refugees,
is turned away by Cuba, the United States and other countries and returns
to Europe.
July 4, 1939 - German Jews denied
the right to hold government jobs.
July 21, 1939 - Adolf Eichmann is
appointed director of the Prague Office of Jewish Emigration.
September 1, 1939 - Nazis invade Poland
(Jewish pop. 3.35 million, the largest in Europe). Beginning of SS activity
in Poland.
See also: The History Place - World
War II in Europe Timeline
September 1, 1939 - Jews in Germany are
forbidden to be outdoors after 8 p.m. in winter and 9 p.m. in summer.
September 3, 1939 - Great Britain and France
declare war on Germany.
September 4, 1939 - Warsaw is cut off
by the German Army.
September 17, 1939 - Soviet troops invade
eastern Poland.
September 21, 1939 - 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." He also orders a census and the
establishment of Jewish administrative councils within the ghettos to implement
Nazi policies and decrees.
September 23, 1939 - German Jews are
forbidden to own wireless (radio) sets.
September 27, 1939 -
Warsaw surrenders; Heydrich becomes leader of
RSHA.
September 29, 1939 - Nazis and Soviets
divide up Poland. Over two million Jews reside in Nazi controlled areas,
leaving 1.3 million in the Soviet area.
In September - 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."
In October - Nazis
begin euthanasia on sick and disabled in Germany.
October 6, 1939 - Proclamation by Hitler
on the isolation of Jews.
October 12, 1939 - Evacuation of Jews
from Vienna.
October 12, 1939 -
Hans Frank appointed Nazi Gauleiter (governor)
of Poland.
October 26, 1939 - Forced labor decree
issued for Polish Jews aged 14 to 60.
November 23, 1939 - Yellow stars required
to be worn by Polish Jews over age 10.
In December -
Adolf Eichmann takes over section IV B4
of the Gestapo dealing solely with Jewish affairs and evacuations.
1940 Return
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January 25, 1940 -
Nazis choose the town of Oswiecim (Auschwitz) in Poland near Krakow as
the site of a new concentration camp.
In January - Quote from Nazi
newspaper, Der Stürmer, published by Julius Streicher - "The
time is near when a machine will go into motion which is going to prepare
a grave for the world's criminal - Judah - from which there will be no
resurrection."
February 12, 1940 - First deportation
of German Jews into occupied Poland.
April 9, 1940 - Nazis invade Denmark
(Jewish pop. 8,000) and Norway (Jewish pop. 2,000).
April 30, 1940 - The Lodz Ghetto
in occupied Poland is sealed off from the outside world with 230,000 Jews
locked inside.
May 1, 1940 - Rudolf Höss is
chosen to be kommandant of Auschwitz.
May 10, 1940 - Nazis invade France
(Jewish pop. 350,000), Belgium (Jewish pop. 65,000), Holland (Jewish pop.
140,000), and Luxembourg (Jewish pop. 3,500).
June 14, 1940 - Paris is occupied
by the Nazis.
June 22, 1940 - France signs an
armistice with Hitler.
In July - Eichmann's Madagascar
Plan is presented, proposing to deport all European Jews to the island of
Madagascar, off the coast of east Africa.
July 17, 1940 - The first anti-Jewish
measures are taken in Vichy France.
August 8, 1940 - Romania introduces
anti-Jewish measures restricting education and employment, then later begins
"Romanianization" of Jewish businesses.
September 27, 1940 - Tripartite (Axis)
Pact signed by Germany, Italy and Japan.
October 3, 1940 - Vichy France passes
its own version of the Nuremberg Laws.
October 7, 1940 - Nazis invade Romania
(Jewish pop. 34,000).
October 22, 1940 - Deportation of 29,000
German Jews from Baden, the Saar, and Alsace-Lorraine into Vichy France.
In November - Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia
become Nazi Allies.
In November - The
Krakow Ghetto is sealed off containing 70,000 Jews.
November 15, 1940 - The Warsaw
Ghetto, containing over 400,000 Jews, is sealed off.
1941 Return
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In 1941 -
Hans Frank, Gauleiter of Poland, states, "I
ask nothing of the Jews except that they should disappear."
In January - Quote from Nazi newspaper,
Der Stürmer, published by Julius Streicher - "Now judgment has
begun and it will reach its conclusion only when knowledge of the Jews
has been erased from the earth."
In January -
A pogrom in Romania results in over 2,000 Jews killed.
February 22, 1941 - 430 Jewish hostages
are deported from Amsterdam after a Dutch Nazi is killed by Jews.
In March -
Hitler's Commissar Order authorizes execution
of anyone suspected of being a Communist official in territories about
to be seized from Soviet Russia.
March 1, 1941 - Himmler makes his
first visit to Auschwitz, during which he orders Kommandant Höss to
begin massive expansion, including a new compound to be built at nearby
Birkenau that can hold 100,000 prisoners.
March 2, 1941 - Nazis occupy Bulgaria
(Jewish pop. 50,000).
March 7, 1941 - German Jews ordered
into forced labor.
March 26, 1941 -
The German Army High Command gives approval to RSHA and Heydrich on
the tasks of SS murder squads (Einsatzgruppen)
in occupied Poland.
March 29, 1941 - A 'Commissariat'
for Jewish Affairs is set up in Vichy France.
April 6, 1941 - Nazis invade Yugoslavia
(Jewish pop. 75,000) and Greece (Jewish pop. 77,000).
May 14, 1941 - 3,600 Jews arrested
in Paris.
May 16, 1941 - French Marshal Petain
issues a radio broadcast approving collaboration with Hitler.
June 22, 1941 - Nazis invade Russia (Jewish pop. 3 million).
June 29/30 - Romanian troops conduct
a pogrom against Jews in the town of Jassy, killing 10,000.
Summer -
Himmler summons Auschwitz Kommandant Höss
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."
In July
- As the German Army advances, SS
Einsatzgruppen follow along and conduct mass murder of Jews in seized
lands.
In July
- Ghettos established at Kovno,
Minsk, Vitebsk and Zhitomer. Also in July, the government of Vichy France
seizes Jewish owned property.
July 17, 1941 - Nazi racial 'philosopher'
Alfred Rosenberg is appointed Reich Minister
for the Eastern Occupied Territories to administer territories seized from
the Soviet Union.
July 21, 1941
- In occupied Poland near Lublin, Majdanek
concentration camp becomes operational.
July 25/26 - 3,800 Jews killed during
a pogrom by Lithuanians in Kovno.
July 31, 1941 -
Göring instructs
Heydrich to prepare for Final Solution.
In August -
Jews in Romania forced into Transnistria. By December, 70,000 perish.
In August -
Ghettos established at Bialystok and Lvov.
August 26, 1941 -
The Hungarian Army rounds up 18,000 Jews at Kamenets-Podolsk.
September 3, 1941 - The first test use
of Zyklon-B gas at Auschwitz.
September 1, 1941 - German
Jews ordered to wear yellow stars.
September 6, 1941 - The Vilna Ghetto
is established containing 40,000 Jews.
September 17, 1941 -
Beginning of general deportation of German Jews.
September 19, 1941 - Nazis take
Kiev.
September 27/28 - 23,000 Jews killed
at Kamenets-Podolsk, in the Ukraine.
September 29/30 -
SS Einsatzgruppen murder 33,771 Jews at Babi Yar
near Kiev.
In October - 35,000 Jews from Odessa
shot.
October 2, 1941 - Beginning of the German
Army drive on Moscow.
October 23, 1941 - Nazis forbid emigration
of Jews from the Reich.
In November - SS Einsatzgruppe B reports
a tally of 45,476 Jews killed.
November 24, 1941 -
Theresienstadt Ghetto is established near
Prague, Czechoslovakia. The Nazis will use it as a model ghetto for propaganda
purposes.
November 30, 1941 - Near Riga, a mass
shooting of Latvian and German Jews.
December 7, 1941 - Japanese attack United
States at Pearl Harbor. The next day the U.S. and Great Britain declare war on
Japan.
December 8, 1941 -
In occupied Poland, near Lodz, Chelmno extermination
camp becomes operational. Jews taken there are placed in mobile gas vans
and driven to a burial place while carbon monoxide from the engine exhaust
is fed into the sealed rear compartment, killing them. The first gassing
victims include 5,000 Gypsies who had been deported from the Reich to Lodz.
December 11, 1941 - Hitler declares war
on the United States. President Roosevelt then asks Congress for a declaration of war on Germany saying, "Never
before has there been a greater challenge to life, liberty and civilization."
The U.S.A. then enters the war in Europe and will concentrate nearly 90
percent of its military resources to defeat Hitler.
December 12, 1941 - The ship "Struma"
leaves Romania for Palestine carrying 769 Jews but is later denied permission
by British authorities to allow the passengers to disembark. In February 1942,
it sails back into the Black Sea where it is intercepted by a Russian submarine
and sunk as an "enemy target."
December 16, 1941 - During a cabinet
meeting, Hans Frank, Gauleiter of Poland, states - "Gentlemen, I must
ask you to rid yourselves of all feeling of pity. We must annihilate the
Jews wherever we find them and wherever it is possible in order to maintain
there the structure of the Reich as a whole..."
1942 Return
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In January - 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.
January 20, 1942 -
Wannsee Conference to coordinate the "Final
Solution."
January 31, 1942 - SS Einsatzgruppe
A reports a tally of 229,052 Jews killed.
In March -
In occupied Poland, Belzec extermination
camp becomes operational. The camp is fitted with permanent gas
chambers using carbon monoxide piped in from engines placed outside the
chamber, but will later substitute Zyklon-B.
March 17, 1942 - The deportation
of Jews from Lublin to Belzec.
March 24, 1942 - The start of deportation
of Slovak Jews to Auschwitz.
March 27, 1942 - The start of deportation
of French Jews to Auschwitz.
March 28, 1942 - Fritz Sauckel named
Chief of Manpower to expedite recruitment of slave labor.
March 30, 1942 - First trainloads
of Jews from Paris arrive at Auschwitz.
In April - First transports of Jews
arrive at Majdanek.
April 20, 1942 - German Jews
are banned from using public transportation.
In May - In occupied Poland, Sobibor
extermination camp becomes operational. The camp is fitted with three gas
chambers using carbon monoxide piped in from engines, but will later substitute
Zyklon-B.
May 18, 1942 - The New York Times reports on an inside page that Nazis have machine-gunned over 100,000 Jews
in the Baltic states, 100,000 in Poland and twice as many in western Russia.
May 27, 1942 - SS leader Heydrich
is mortally wounded by Czech Underground agents.
In June - Gas vans used in Riga.
June 1, 1942 - Jews in France, Holland,
Belgium, Croatia, Slovakia, Romania ordered to wear yellow stars.
June 4, 1942 - Heydrich dies of
his wounds.
June 5, 1942 - SS report 97,000
persons have been "processed" in mobile gas vans.
June 10, 1942 -
Nazis liquidate Lidice in retaliation for Heydrich's
death.
June 11, 1942 - Eichmann meets with
representatives from France, Belgium and Holland to coordinate deportation
plans for Jews.
June 30, 1942 -
At Auschwitz, a second gas chamber, Bunker II (the white farmhouse), is
made operational at Birkenau due to the number of Jews arriving.
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.
Summer - Swiss representatives of
the World Jewish Congress receive information from a German industrialist
regarding the Nazi plan to exterminate the Jews. They then pass the information
on to London and Washington.
July 2, 1942 - Jews from Berlin
sent to Theresienstadt.
July 7, 1942 - Himmler grants permission
for sterilization experiments at Auschwitz.
July 14, 1942 -
Beginning of deportation of Dutch Jews to Auschwitz.
July 16/17 - 12,887 Jews of Paris
are rounded up and sent to Drancy Internment Camp located outside the city.
A total of approximately 74,000 Jews, including 11,000 children, will eventually
be transported from Drancy to Auschwitz, Majdanek and Sobibor.
July 17/18 - Himmler visits Auschwitz-Birkenau
for two days, inspecting all ongoing construction and expansion, then observes
the extermination process from start to finish as two trainloads of Jews
arrive from Holland. Kommandant Höss is then promoted. Construction
includes four large gas chamber/crematories.
July 19, 1942 - Himmler orders Operation
Reinhard, mass deportations of Jews in Poland to extermination camps.
July 22, 1942 - Beginning of deportations
from the Warsaw Ghetto to the new extermination camp, Treblinka. Also,
beginning of the deportation of Belgian Jews to Auschwitz.
July 23, 1942 - Treblinka extermination
camp opened in occupied Poland, east of Warsaw. The camp is fitted with
two buildings containing 10 gas chambers, each holding 200 persons. Carbon
monoxide gas is piped in from engines placed outside the chamber, but Zyklon-B
will later be substituted. Bodies are burned in open pits.
In August - The start of deportations
of Croatian Jews to Auschwitz.
August 23, 1942 - Beginning of German
Army attack on Stalingrad in Russia.
August 26-28 - 7,000 Jews arrested
in unoccupied France.
September 9, 1942 - Open pit burning
of bodies begins at Auschwitz in place of burial. The decision is made
to dig up and burn those already buried, 107,000 corpses, to prevent fouling
of ground water.
September 18, 1942 - Reduction of food
rations for Jews in Germany.
September 26, 1942 -
SS begins cashing in possessions and valuables
of Jews from Auschwitz and Majdanek. German banknotes are sent to the Reichs
Bank. Foreign currency, gold, jewels and other valuables are sent to SS
Headquarters of the Economic Administration. Watches, clocks and pens are
distributed to troops at the front. Clothing is distributed to German families.
By February 1943, over 800 boxcars of confiscated goods will have left Auschwitz.
October 5, 1942 - Himmler orders all
Jews in concentration camps in Germany to be sent to Auschwitz and Majdanek.
October 5, 1942 -
A German eyewitness observes SS mass murder.
October 14, 1942 - Mass
killing of Jews from Mizocz Ghetto in the Ukraine.
October 22, 1942 -
SS put down a revolt at Sachsenhausen
by a group of Jews about to be sent to Auschwitz.
October 25, 1942 -
Deportations of Jews from Norway to Auschwitz begin.
October 28, 1942 - The first transport
from Theresienstadt arrives at Auschwitz.
In November - The mass killing of 170,000
Jews in the area of Bialystok.
December 10, 1942 -
The first transport of Jews from Germany arrives at Auschwitz.
In December - Exterminations at Belzec
cease after an estimated 600,000 Jews have been murdered. The camp is then
dismantled, plowed over and planted.
December 17, 1942 - British Foreign Secretary
Eden tells the British House of Commons the Nazis are "now carrying
into effect Hitler's oft repeated intention to exterminate the Jewish people
of Europe." The U.S. declares those crimes will be avenged.
December 28, 1942 - Sterilization experiments
on women at Birkenau begin.
Map
of Concentration/Death Camps
1943 Return
to Top of Page
In 1943 -
The number of Jews killed by SS Einsatzgruppen passes one million. Nazis
then use special units of slave laborers to
dig up and burn the bodies to remove all traces.
January 18, 1943 - First resistance
by Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.
January 29, 1943 - Nazis order all Gypsies
arrested and sent to extermination camps.
January 30, 1943 - Ernst Kaltenbrunner
succeeds Heydrich as head of RSHA.
In February - The Romanian government
proposes to the Allies the transfer of 70,000 Jews to Palestine, but receives
no response from Britain or the U.S.
In February - Greek Jews are ordered
into ghettos.
February 2, 1943 - Germans surrender
to Russian troops at Stalingrad in the first big defeat of Hitler's armies.
February 27, 1943 - Jews working in Berlin
armaments industry are sent to Auschwitz.
In March -
The start of deportations of Jews from Greece to Auschwitz, lasting until
August, totaling 49,900 persons.
March 1, 1943 - 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.
March 14, 1943 -
The Krakow Ghetto is liquidated.
March 17, 1943 - Bulgaria states
opposition to deportation of its Jews.
March 22, 1943 - Newly built gas
chamber/crematory IV opens at Auschwitz.
March 31, 1943 - Newly built gas
chamber/crematory II opens at Auschwitz.
April 4, 1943 - Newly built gas
chamber/crematory V opens at Auschwitz.
April 9, 1943
- Exterminations at Chelmno cease. The camp will be reactivated in
the spring of 1944 to liquidate ghettos. In all, Chelmno will total 300,000
deaths.
April 19-30 - The Bermuda Conference
occurs as representatives from the United States and Britain discuss the problem
of refugees from Nazi-occupied countries, but results in inaction concerning
the plight of the Jews.
April 19, 1943
- Waffen-SS attacks Jewish Resistance in Warsaw
Ghetto.
In May - SS Dr. Josef Mengele
arrives at Auschwitz.
May 13, 1943 - German and Italian
troops in North Africa surrender to Allies.
May 19, 1943 - Nazis declare Berlin
to be Judenfrei (cleansed of Jews).
June 11, 1943 - Himmler orders
liquidation of all Jewish ghettos in occupied Poland.
June 25, 1943 - Newly built gas
chamber/crematory III opens at Auschwitz. With its completion, the four
new crematories at Auschwitz have a daily capacity of 4,756 bodies.
July 9/10 - Allied troops land in Sicily.
August 2, 1943 - Two hundred Jews escape
from Treblinka extermination camp during a revolt. Nazis then hunt them
down one by one.
August 16, 1943 - The Bialystok Ghetto
is liquidated.
In August - Exterminations cease at
Treblinka, after an estimated 870,000 deaths.
In September - The Vilna and Minsk Ghettos
are liquidated.
September 11, 1943 - Germans occupy Rome,
after occupying northern and central Italy, containing in all about 35,000
Jews.
September 11, 1943 - Beginning of Jewish
family transports from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz.
In October - The
Danish Underground helps transport 7,220 Danish Jews to safety in Sweden
by sea.
October 4 - Himmler
talks openly about the Final Solution at Posen.
October 14, 1943 - Massive escape from
Sobibor as Jews and Soviet POWs break out, with 300 making it safely into
nearby woods. Of those 300, fifty will survive.
Exterminations then cease at Sobibor, after over 250,000 deaths. All traces
of the death camp are then removed and trees are planted.
October 16, 1943 - Jews in Rome rounded
up, with over 1,000 sent to Auschwitz.
In November - The Riga Ghetto is liquidated.
In November - The U.S. Congress holds
hearings regarding the U.S. State Department's inaction regarding European
Jews, despite mounting reports of mass extermination.
November 3, 1943 - Nazis carry out Operation
Harvest Festival in occupied Poland, killing 42,000 Jews.
November 4, 1943
- Quote from Nazi newspaper, Der Stürmer, published by Julius
Streicher - "It is actually true that the Jews have, so to speak,
disappeared from Europe and that the Jewish 'Reservoir of the East' from
which the Jewish pestilence has for centuries beset the peoples of Europe
has ceased to exist. But the Führer of the German people at the beginning
of the war prophesied what has now come to pass."
November 11, 1943 -
Auschwitz Kommandant Höss is promoted to chief inspector of concentration
camps. The new kommandant, Liebehenschel, then divides up the vast Auschwitz
complex of over 30 sub-camps into three main sections.
December 2, 1943 - The first transport
of Jews from Vienna arrives at Auschwitz.
December 16, 1943 - The chief surgeon
at Auschwitz reports that 106 castration operations have been performed.
1944 Return
to Top of Page
January 3, 1944 - Russian troops reach
former Polish border.
January 24, 1944 - In response to political
pressure to help Jews under Nazi control, President Roosevelt creates the War Refugee
Board.
January 25, 1944 - Diary entry by Hans
Frank, Gauleiter of Poland, concerning the fate of 2.5 million Jews originally
under his jurisdiction - "At the present time we still have in the
General Government perhaps 100,000 Jews."
In February - Eichmann visits Auschwitz.
March 19, 1944 - Nazis occupy Hungary
(Jewish pop. 725,000). Eichmann arrives with Gestapo "Special Section
Commandos."
March 24, 1944 -
President Roosevelt issues a statement
condemning German and Japanese ongoing "crimes against humanity."
April 5, 1944 - A Jewish inmate,
Siegfried Lederer, escapes from Auschwitz-Birkenau and makes it safely
to Czechoslovakia. He then warns the Elders of the Council at Theresienstadt
about Auschwitz.
April 6, 1944 -
Nazis raid a French home for Jewish children.
April 7, 1944 - Two Jewish inmates
escape from Auschwitz-Birkenau and make it safely to Czechoslovakia. One
of them, Rudolf Vrba, submits a report to the Papal Nuncio in Slovakia
which is forwarded to the Vatican, received there in mid June.
April 14, 1944 - First transports
of Jews from Athens to Auschwitz, totaling 5,200 persons.
In May - Himmler's agents secretly
propose to the Western Allies to trade Jews for trucks, other commodities
or money.
May 8, 1944 - Rudolf Höss returns
to Auschwitz, ordered by Himmler to oversee the extermination of Hungarian
Jews.
May 15, 1944 - Beginning of the deportation
of Jews from Hungary to Auschwitz.
May 16, 1944 - 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.
In June - A Red Cross delegation
visits Theresienstadt after the Nazis have carefully prepared the camp
and the Jewish inmates, resulting in a favorable report.
June 6, 1944 - D-Day: Allied landings
in Normandy on the coast of northern France.
June 12, 1944 -
Rosenberg orders Hay Action, the kidnapping of
40,000 Polish children aged ten to fourteen for slave labor in the Reich.
Summer - Auschwitz-Birkenau records
its highest-ever daily number of persons gassed and burned at just over
9,000. Six huge pits are used to burn bodies, as the number exceeds the
capacity of the crematories.
In July - Swedish diplomat
Raoul Wallenberg arrives in Budapest, Hungary,
and proceeds to save nearly 33,000 Jews by issuing diplomatic papers and
establishing 'safe houses.'
July 24, 1944
- Russian troops liberate the first concentration camp, at Majdanek
where over 360,000 had been murdered.
August 4, 1944 - Anne Frank and family
are arrested by the 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.
August 6, 1944 - Lodz, the last Jewish ghetto
in Poland, is liquidated with 60,000 Jews sent to Auschwitz.
October 7, 1944 - A revolt by Sonderkommando
(Jewish slave laborers) at Auschwitz-Birkenau results in complete destruction
of Crematory IV.
October 15, 1944 - Nazis seize control
of the Hungarian puppet government, then resume deporting Jews, which had
temporarily ceased due to international political pressure to stop Jewish
persecutions.
October 17, 1944 - Eichmann arrives
in Hungary.
October 28, 1944 - The last transport
of Jews to be gassed, 2,000 from Theresienstadt, arrives at Auschwitz.
October 30, 1944 - Last use of the gas chambers
at Auschwitz.
November 8, 1944 -
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.
November 25, 1944 -
Himmler orders destruction of the crematories
at Auschwitz.
Late 1944 - Oskar
Schindler saves 1200 Jews by moving them from Plaszow
labor camp to his hometown of Brunnlitz.
1945 Return
to Top of Page
In 1945 - As Allied troops advance,
the Nazis conduct death marches of concentration
camp inmates away from outlying areas.
January 6, 1945 -
Russians liberate Budapest, freeing over 80,000 Jews.
January 14, 1945 - Invasion of eastern
Germany by Russian troops.
January 17, 1945 - Liberation of Warsaw
by the Russians.
January 18, 1945 - Nazis evacuate 66,000
from Auschwitz.
January 27, 1945
- Russian troops liberate Auschwitz. By
this time, an estimated 2,000,000 persons, including 1,500,000 Jews, have
been murdered there.
April 4, 1945 -
Ohrdruf camp is liberated, later visited by General
Eisenhower.
April 10, 1945
- Allies liberate Buchenwald.
April 15, 1945 - Approximately 40,000
prisoners freed at Bergen-Belsen by the
British, who report "both inside and outside the huts was a carpet
of dead bodies, human excreta, rags and filth."
April 23, 1945 - Berlin is reached
by Russian troops.
April 29, 1945
- U.S. 7th Army liberates Dachau.
April 30, 1945 - Hitler
commits suicide in his Berlin bunker.
April 30, 1945 - Americans free
33,000 inmates from concentration camps.
May 2, 1945 - Theresienstadt taken
over by the Red Cross.
May 5, 1945 -
Mauthausen liberated.
May 7, 1945 - Unconditional German
surrender signed by General Alfred Jodl at Reims.
May 9, 1945 - Hermann Göring
captured by members of U.S. 7th Army.
May 23, 1945 - SS-Reichsführer
Himmler commits suicide while in British custody.
November 20, 1945 - Opening
of the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal.
Holocaust Statistics
1946 Return
to Top of Page
March 11, 1946 -
Former Auschwitz Kommandant Höss, posing
as a farm worker, is arrested by the British. He testifies
at Nuremberg, then is later tried in Warsaw, found guilty and hanged at
Auschwitz, April 16, 1947, near Crematory I. "History will mark me
as the greatest mass murderer of all time," Höss
writes while in prison, along with his memoirs about Auschwitz.
October 16, 1946 - Göring commits
suicide two hours before the scheduled execution of the first group of
major Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg. During his imprisonment, a (now
repentant) Hans Frank states, "A thousand years will pass and the
guilt of Germany will not be erased." Frank and the others are hanged
and the bodies are brought to Dachau and burned (the final use of the crematories
there) with the ashes then scattered into a river.
December 9, 1946 - 23 former SS doctors and scientists go on trial before a U.S. Military Tribunal at Nuremberg.
Sixteen are found guilty, with 7 hanged.
1947
September 15, 1947 - Twenty one former
SS-Einsatz leaders go on trial before a U.S. Military Tribunal in Nuremberg.
Fourteen are sentenced to death, with only 4 (the group commanders) actually
being executed - the other death sentences having been commuted.
1960
May 11, 1960 - Adolf Eichmann is
captured in Argentina by the Israeli secret service.
1961
April 11 - August 14 - 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."
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