Karl Hermann Frank was born in Karlsbad (Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic), on the 24th January 1898. As a Sudeten German, a growing hatred of Czechoslovakians magnified, and eventually overtook Frank, as the events leading up to, and during the war, added to the festering resentment bubbling inside him. Indeed, his animosity towards the Czech people… Read more »

The Night of the Long Knives, in June 1934, saw the wiping out of the SA’s leadership and others who had angered Hitler in the recent past in Nazi Germany. After this date, the SS lead by Heinrich Himmler was to become far more powerful in Nazi Germany. For all the power the Enabling Act gave Hitler, he still felt threatened… Read more »

The Dutch famine of 1944, known as the Hongerwinter (“Hunger winter”) in Dutch, was a famine that took place in the German-occupied part of the Netherlands, especially in the densely populated western provinces above the great rivers, during the winter of 1944–1945, near the end of World War II. A German blockade cut off food and fuel shipments from… Read more »

Female guards were generally low class to middle class and had no work experience; their professional background varied: one source mentions former matrons, hairdressers, street car ticket takers, opera singers, or retired teachers. Volunteers were recruited by ads in German newspapers asking for women to show their love for the Reich and join the SS-Gefolge… Read more »

Max Heiliger was a fictional name created during the Nazi era under authority of Reichsbank president Walter Funk in a secret arrangement with leader of the Schutzstaffel Heinrich Himmler. It was a false identity used to establish bank accounts to launder valuables stolen from those killed in the Nazi system of concentration camps and extermination camps,  Stolen banknotes and jewelry along… Read more »

There were 37 confirmed pairs or trios of brothers assigned to USS Arizona on December 7, 1941. Of these 77 men, 62 were killed, and 23 sets of brothers died. Only one full set of brothers, Kenneth and Russell Warriner,   survived the attack; Kenneth was away at flight school in San Diego on that… Read more »

Nazi human experimentation was a series of medical experiments on large numbers of prisoners, including children, by Nazi Germany in its concentration camps  in the early to mid 1940s, during World War II and the Holocaust. Chief target populations included Romani, Sinti, ethnic Poles, Soviet POWs, disabled Germans, and Jews from across Europe. Nazi physicians and their assistants forced prisoners into participating; they did not willingly volunteer and no consent was… Read more »

The Deutsches Jungvolk “German Youth” was a youth organisation in Nazi Germany for boys aged 10 to 14,  and was a section of the Hitler Youth movement. Through a program me of outdoor activities, parades and sports, it aimed to indoctrinate its young members in the tenets of Nazi ideology. Membership became fully compulsory for eligible boys in 1939. By the end… Read more »

The German Wehrmacht or “defence force” was the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1946. It consisted of the Heer or Army, the Kriegmarine or Navy and the Luftwaffe or Air Force. The designation Wehrmacht for Nazi Germany’s military replaced the previously used term, Reichswehr (1919–1935), and constituted the Third Reich’s efforts to rearm the nation to a greater extent than the Treaty of Versailles permitted.   Following Germany’s… Read more »

Father Kun was born 8 November 1911 in Nyirbator, Hungary. He attended seminary in Rome. He then served as a priest in a Franciscan monastery. In 1943, he left the monastery and moved to Budapest. In March 1944, Kun enrolled in the Arrow Cross Party . During the lead-up to the German invasion of Hungary,… Read more »