Eva Mozes Kor and her twin sister, Miriam  , grew up in a small village in Romania in the 1940s. Theirs was the only Jewish family in the region. “My father said as long as you say your prayers, did the good deeds that God wanted you to do, and lived so far away from… Read more »

Tsvi Chaim Nussbaum (October 31, 1935 –age 76- July 2, 2012) was a Holocaust survivor, known as possibly being the boy in a famous photograph of the Warsaw Ghetto   That cap, the big buttoned jacket, the raised socks. But especially the defenseless hands and the anxious eyes. You almost see them tremble. A terrified child who does not understand… Read more »

It was the loneliness of the 12-year-old that first drew me, Emma Craigie, to Helga Goebbels. She was the oldest of the six children taken by their parents, Joseph and Magda Goebbels,  into Hitler’s Berlin bunker on April 22 1945. Their tale had barely been written about and had never been the subject of a… Read more »

Brigitte Hamann says her book  is based on a diary given to her by relatives of Dr. Eduard Bloch , who lived in Hitler’s home town of Linz in Austria. Hitler regarded him as an “edeljude” – a noble Jew – and never forgot the kindness he showed his mother Klara  when he treated her for… Read more »

The Afrika Korps was formed February 19, 1941, after the German Armed Forces High Command had decided to send an expeditionary force to Libya to support the Italian army, which had been routed by an Allied counteroffensive, Operation Compass. The German expeditionary force, commanded by Erwin Rommel, at first consisted only of the 5th Panzer… Read more »

Estimates for the total number of casualties in the war vary, because many deaths went unrecorded. Most suggest that some 60 million people died in the war, including about 20 million military personnel and 40 million civilians. Many of the civilians died because of deliberate genocide, massacres, mass-bombings, diseases and starvation.      The Soviet Union lost around… Read more »

Margarete “Marga” Boden was born, 09-09-1893  in Goncerzewo near Bromberg. the daughter of landowner Hans Boden and his wife Elfriede, whose maiden name was Popp. Margarete had four brothers and a sister. In 1909, she attended the Höhere Töchterschule (Higher Girls School) in Bromberg, a city in northern Poland. Margarete trained and worked as a nurse during the First World War followed by a stint at… Read more »

Albert Frey,  born 16 February 1913 was a Standartennführer in the 1st SS Division Leibstandarte  SS Adolf Hitler . He was born in Heidelberg, the son of a master baker. In December 1933 he joined the SS-Verfügungstruppe. In 1937 as an SS Oberscharführer (Staff Sergeant), he attended the SS Junker school at Brunswick  where he came out… Read more »

Jannetje Johanna (Jo) Schaft (16 September 1920 – 17 April 1945) was a Dutch communist resistance fighter during World War II.     She became known as the girl with the red hair (in Dutch Het meisje met het rode haar, also the title of a book and film about her). Her secret name in the resistance movement was Hannie. Hannie Schaft was born… Read more »

The Sturmabteilung, SA ,  meaning Storm Detachment or Assault Division, in Nazi Germany, functioned as the original paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. It played a significant key role in Adolf Hitler rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s.  Their primary purposes were providing protection for Nazi rallies and assemblies, disrupting the meetings of opposing parties, fighting against the paramilitary units of… Read more »