The Holocaust

2. For hundreds of years Christian Europe had regarded the Jews as the
Christ -killers. At one time or another Jews had been driven out of almost
every European country. The way they were treated in England in the
thirteenth century is a typical example.
In 1275 they were made to wear a yellow badge.
 In 1287 269 Jews were hanged in the Tower of London.
This deep prejudice against Jews was still strong in the twentieth century,
especially in Germany, Poland and Eastern Europe, where the Jewish
population was very large.
After the First World War hundreds of Jews were blamed for the defeat in
the War. Prejudice against the Jews grew during the economic depression
which followed. Many Germans were poor and unemployed and wanted
someone to blame. They turned on the Jews, many of whom were rich
and successful in business.
Jews were a SCAPEGOAT

3. Hitler and the Nazis tap into the long-
held feeling of many Europeans; the
resentment of Jews
This is known as anti-Semitism
Hitler and Nazis say the Aryans — blonde
hair, blue eyed Germanic peoples — are
the “master race” of Germany and world
1935 Nuremberg Laws take away rights
of German Jews
Kristallnacht, “the night of shattered
glass” occurs in 1938.
Fearing more violence and oppression,
thousands of Jews tried to leave
Germany.
Other countries accepted a large number
but were unwilling to take all those who
wished to leave.

4. The Holocaust truly began
in 1939 at the start of the
war when the Nazis
invaded Poland.
Poland had a large Jewish
population at the time
which increased the
urgency of the “Jewish
Question”.
The Nazi’s quickly
devised ways to deal with
the Jews.
German Troops marching into Warsaw, the
capital of Poland.

5. This is the true story of a Jewish
man named Wladek Szpilman.
He and his family were living in
Warsaw at the time of the Nazi
takeover in 1939.
Wladek was a pianist who worked
for a Polish radio station.
Wladek and his family rejoiced when
they heard the news that France and
Great Britain had declared war on
Germany.
However, this is short lived when
the Nazis completely take Poland in
just over a month’s time.

6. Hitler then ordered all Jews in
Germany and his conquered lands
to live in certain parts of cities
called ghettos or be sent to
concentration camps where they
would be put to work for the
Germany war industry.
Poland, who had the over 3 million
Jews, (the largest population in
Europe), had especially large
ghettos.
Warsaw was the largest.
By 1940, all German Jews were
deported to Poland.

7. A newly-constructed wall partitions the central part of Warsaw, Poland, seen on
December 20, 1940. It is part of red brick and gray stone walls built 12 to 15 feet high
by the Nazis as a ghetto - a pen for Warsaw's approximately 500,000 Jews.

9. A scene from the Warsaw Ghetto where Jews are seen wearing white armlets bearing
the Star of David and trams are seen marked with the words "For Jews Only", on
February 17, 1941.

10. Hitler hoped that Jews
in ghettos would die of
disease, starvation
Despite bad conditions,
many Jews survived in
these areas

11. The faces of Jewish children living in a ghetto in Poland, under Nazi occupation. This
may be the last picture taken of them smiling.

12. Sadly, many Jews will not
survive…

13. A man carries away the bodies of dead Jews in the Ghetto of Warsaw in 1943, where
people died of hunger in the streets.

15. German soldiers question Jews after the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943.

16. Very quickly life for Jews
deteriorated as the Nazi
authorities prevent them
working or owning businesses,
and force them to wear Star of
David armbands.
Wladek and his family were
forced from their home in 1940,
into the overcrowded Warsaw
Ghetto where conditions only
get worse.
People starve, the guards are
brutal and corpses are left in
the streets.

17. On one occasion,
the Szpilmans
witness the SS kill
an entire family
during a raid on an
apartment building
across the street.

19. To ensure the death of all Jews,
Hitler enacts the “Final Solution”
in 1942.
He chooses genocide — the
systematic killing of an entire
people.
Germans also turned on many
other people — gypsies, Poles,
Russians, and those who were
mentally or physically disabled,
homosexuals, etc.
The Germans put the most
attention on Jews, however.

20. There were 3 phases of the Nazi plan to wipe out
the Jewish population of Europe.

21. Jews were rounded up and told they were to
be relocated.
They were then shot, one by one, by the Nazi
SS “death squads”.
Their bodies were then buried in mass graves.
There was even competition between group
leaders to see who could kill the most Jews.

24. The worst round of executions
took place at Babi Yar, a
ravine in the Ukraine.
The Nazi SS rounded up and
executed 33,771 Jews in a
single operation in
September, 1941.
Other people executed were
Soviet POW’s and gypsies.
An estimated 150,000 total
people lost their lives at Babi
Yar.

25. Jewish women, some holding infants, wait in a line for their turn to
be executed by the Nazi SS at Babi Yar.

26. A German policeman shoots individual Jewish women who remain
alive in the ravine after the mass execution. Many times the people
were told to lie face down. This way, the executioners did not have
to see the individual faces of the people they were murdering.

27. Portrait of two-year-
old Mania Halef, a
Jewish child who was
among the 33,771
persons shot by the
SS during the mass
executions at Babi
Yar, September,
1941.

28. Nazis sift through a huge pile of clothes
left by victims of the massacre.
Two year old Mani Halef’s clothes are somewhere amongst these.

29. During the
course of his
captivity of the
ghettos, Wladek
is able to avoid
and survive
random
executions.

32. Again, Jews were
rounded up and told they
were to be relocated in
vans.
 The vans were equipped
so that the van’s exhaust
was piped back into the
van.
700,000 Jews were killed
using gas vans.

34. The Nazis encountered several problems
with the executions and gas vans.
First, they were both taking too much time.
Second, resources such as gas and
ammunition were becoming scarce.
Third, soldiers involved were beginning to
have psychological problems with what
they were doing.

35. Nazi leaders decided to drastically
speed up the Final Solution.
There were two different types of
camps:
CONCENTRATION CAMPS
EXTERMINATION CAMPS
Jews from all over Nazi occupied
Europe were to be brought here.
Camps separated the strong from the
weak.
Strong prisoners were sent to
concentration camps and the weak
(mostly women, children and elderly)
were exterminated immediately.

36. Prisoner selection at
Auschwitz - Birkenau

37. During 1942, Hitler gives the
order to start separating the Jews
in the Warsaw Ghetto.
Wladek’s family is taken and
relocated but Wladek is saved by
a friend in the Jewish Ghetto
Police (Jews working for the
Nazis).
He is allowed to remain in the
ghetto (now the Warsaw
Concentration Camp) as a worker.
This would also be the last time
Wladek would see of his family.

39. Millions were gathered and
placed in concentration (prison)
camps.
There were over 100 of these in
Nazi-occupied Europe.
First camp was opened in 1933,
right after Nazis came to power.
These prisons used the inmates
as slave workers.
Many in the camps died of
starvation, disease and the harsh
conditions.
Most often time, prisoners lasted
less than half a year.

41. A prisoner in Dachau is forced
to stand without moving for
endless hours as a punishment.
He is wearing a triangle patch
identification on his chest.
A chart of prisoner triangle
identification markings used in
Nazi concentration camps
which allowed the guards to
easily see which type of
prisoner any individual was.

42. Soviet POWs at forced labor in 1943 exhuming bodies in the
ravine at Babi Yar, where the Nazis had murdered over 33,000
Jews in September of 1941.
In 1943, when the number of murdered Jews exceeded 1 million.
Nazis ordered the bodies of those buried to be dug up and burned
to destroy all traces.

43. Ravensbruck – concentration
camp for women
Buchenwald – one of the
largest, deadliest
concentration camps. Held
over 250,000 prisoners
Dachau – very first Nazi
concentration camp, held over
200,000 prisoners
Women of Ravensbruck

44. This is a picture of Anne Frank. In August of 1944, Anne, her family and others who
were hiding from the Nazis, were all captured and shipped off to a series of prisons
and concentration camps. Anne died from typhus at age 15 in Bergen-Belsen
concentration camp.

45. Heinrich Himmler visits Dachau
concentration camp
Bodies of starved prisoners
at Buchenwald

46. Wladek spent most of 1942 as
a slave laborer in the Warsaw
Concentration Camp.
In 1943, he was able to escape
the concentration camp and
hides with a non-Jewish friend.
He is able to hide out for more
than a year before he has to
find new places to keep from
being discovered.

48. Starting in 1942, the Nazis
built “death camps.”
Many started out as ordinary
concentration camps and
were later modified with
gassing installations for use
on humans
At these camps, thousands
of Jews were gassed to
death in huge gas chambers.

49. Zyklon B poison gas of choice by the Nazis. It was originally used
to kill vermin such as rats. The small pellets, were dropped from
the ceiling. When in contact with the air, they dissolve into gas.

50. Chelmo – first ever
extermination camp
Treblinka – said to have
executed around 870,000
Auschwitz-Birkenau –
most notorious and
deadliest death camp

51. Most Jews “relocated”
from the Warsaw
Ghetto were sent to
the extermination
camp, Treblinka.
This included Wladek’s
entire family where
they would be
executed.

52. At Auschwitz-Birkenau,
over 2 million people
died.
Around 1.4 million gassed
Half million died from
starvation or disease
Auschwitz was said to
have killed around
12,000 people a day!

55. Smoke rises as the
bodies are burnt.

56. 16 of the 44 children
taken from a French
children’s home.
They were sent to a
concentration camp
and later to Auschwitz.
ONLY 1 SURVIVED
A group of
children at a
concentration
camp in Poland.

58. The Nazis ordered the SS to take all possessions from Jews
TEETH WITH GOLD
PILES OF GLASSES

59. After liberation, an Allied
soldier displays a stash of
gold wedding rings taken
from victims.
Bales of hair shaven from
women at Auschwitz, used to
make felt-yarn.

60. A warehouse full of shoes and clothes taken from the victims

61. 0
200,000
400,000
600,000
800,000
1,000,000
1,200,000
1,400,000
Auschwitz Treblinka Chelmo
killed in camp

62. By 1944, Wladek has to
continually change hiding
spots as the city is
destroyed from constant
fighting.
He desperately travels
from house to house in
search of food and
supplies.
As winter sets in, he is
alone, cold and starving.

63. As the Allies advanced towards
Berlin, one by one they
discovered the horrors left by
the Nazis.
First the Soviets at Chelmo, then
the Americans at Dachau and
many more...
“Our troops found sights,
sounds, and stenches horrible
beyond belief, cruelties so
enormous as to be
incomprehensible to the normal
mind.“ - Colonel William Quinn

65. General
Eisenhower and
officers look over
the discovered
remains of Nazi
extermination.

66. While hiding in a house,
Wladek is discovered by a
German soldier, Wilm
Hosenfeld.
Wilm learns that Wladek is
a pianist and ask him to
play something.
Moved by Wladek’s music,
Wilm allows Wladek to
remain hiding in the attic.
Wilm would even regularly
bring food to Wladek.

67. In 1945, the Germans are
forced to leave Warsaw
because of the advancing
Soviet army.
Wilm met up with Wladek
one last time to promise he
would listen for him on the
radio after the war.
As a last act of friendship,
Wilm gave Wladek his
greatcoat to keep warm
just before he leaves.

68. Soviet and Polish
troops liberate
Warsaw in 1945 and
the war comes to an
end soon thereafter.
Wladek is rescued
and is the only one of
his family through to
have survived the
war and the entire
Holocaust.

69. As the war came to and
end and it was all said and
done, about 11 million
people had been killed as a
result of Nazi
extermination.
Around 6 million of the
victims were Jewish.
Of the 9 million Jews in
Europe, fewer than four
million had survived the
whole ordeal.

70. 0
1,000,000
2,000,000
3,000,000
4,000,000
5,000,000
6,000,000
Jews Soviet
POW's
Polish Gypsies
Death Totals

71. A Total of 6,000,000 Jews
Percentage of Jews killed in each country

72. 0
500,000
1,000,000
1,500,000
2,000,000
2,500,000
3,000,000
3,500,000
POLAND USSR HUNGARYGERMANY
BEFORE
AFTER
Jewish population before, Jewish population after Holocaust

73. 0
1,000,000
2,000,000
3,000,000
4,000,000
5,000,000
6,000,000
7,000,000
8,000,000
9,000,000
10,000,000
BEFORE KILLED SURVIVORS
JEWISH
POPULATION IN
EUROPE

74. Wladek would continue
playing music his entire life.
He went on to work for the
Polish Radio and composed
over 500 original works for
radio, plays and movies.
He even performed more
than 2000 concerts
worldwide.
He died at the age of 88 in
the year 2000.

75. Originally a teacher, Wilm was
drafted into the military in 1939.
Throughout the war, Wilm helped
rescue or hide many Jewish Poles,
including Wladek Szpilman.
Wilm was captured by the Soviets
in 1945.
He was sentenced to 25 years of
labor for war crimes (likely
because of the crimes of his Nazi
affiliation).
He died in 1952 after being
tortured in a Soviet prison camp.