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After Hitler's release from prison, he rebuilds the Nazi Party. He established himself as sole leader and everyone owed him loyalty. The party structure includes the SA (storm troopers), a paramilitary arm; the SS, an elite group within the SA; and the Hitler Youth.
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The Nazis issue a decree ordering compulsory retirement of non-Aryans from civil service. Hitler calls for a boycott against Jewish businesses. These actions, as well as Nazi attacks on Jews, causing many Jews to begin emigrating from Germany.
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The Nazi governor of Poland requires Jews to wear the Star of David on their clothing for identification.-1939
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The Germans establish a ghetto in Lódz, Poland, and force the city's 200,000 Jews into it. Some 20,000 more Jews from other countries would be deported to Lódz in coming years. Lódz is one of more than three hundred ghettos in Nazi-controlled territory. The ghettos serve as holding places for Jews on the way to the death camps.
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Construction begins on Auschwitz, originally intended to house political prisoners.
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The first prisoners arrive at Auschwitz They are members of the Polish resistance and intelligentsia.June
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IG Farben, a large German chemical cartel, finalizes plans to establish a synthetic rubber plant at Auschwitz, investing in the construction of the camp. Prisoners serve as slave labor for the plant.
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Germany invades the Soviet Union. Mobile killing units (Einsatzgruppen) follow the invaders to kill Jews and Soviet officers. By the fall of 1943, they will have killed 1.5 million Jews. Many Soviet prisoners are sent to Auschwitz.
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The first Auschwitz victims, mostly Russian prisoners of war, are killed using Zyklon B gas.
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Construction of the second Auschwitz camp, Birkenau, begins. Soviet POWs build the camp.
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Allied bombing of Hamburg, Germany, Jews in the city are deported to the Lódz ghetto.
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At the Wannsee Conference, Nazi officials discuss the Final Solution, a plan to kill all European Jews as well as Soviet prisoners of war and Gypsies. The Final Solution would involve several ministries within the German government bureaucracy and require an extensive rail system to move victims from across Europe to a network of ghettos, subcamps, and labor camps before they are sent to extermination camps. Approximately 3.5 million Jews die in the camps. In all, some six million Jews, about ha
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Mass murder using Zyklon B begins at Birkenau.
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The Slovakian government agrees to deport its Jews to Auschwitz and then pays Germany to take the deportees' dependents, too.
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Kazimierz Piechowski, a Polish political prisoner at Auschwitz, organizes an escape from the camp.
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SS and French police meet about police collaborating with Nazis in rounding up Jews. French authorities agree to arrest and deport foreign Jews, which they begin to do on July 16.
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Himmler orders the beginning of Operation Reinhard, in which all ghettos would be liquidated and all Polish Jews within the General Government (a geographical description) would be murdered by the end of the year. He also orders the enlargement of the Birkenau camp at Auschwitz.
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Himmler orders most Gypsies in Germany to be deported to Auschwitz.
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Dr. Josef Mengele arrives at Auschwitz, where he conducts brutal medical experiments on prisoners.
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Rudolf Höss is removed from Auschwitz as commandant due to corruption at the camp.
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For the first time, Jewish prisoners from Auschwitz are transferred to the Buna-Monowitz subcamp to work for IG Farben.
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The first Jews from Rome are deported to Auschwitz.
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Rudolf Höss returns to Auschwitz to plan for the annihilation of Hungarian Jews. Nearly 440,000—half of the Jews in Hungary—are sent to Auschwitz. Many are gassed within days of their arrival.
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Hungarian leader Miklos Horthy halts deportation of Jews from Hungary to Auschwitz.
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The Gypsy Camp at Auschwitz is liquidated. Nazis send some four thousand Gypsies to the gas chambers.
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The Lódz ghetto is liquidated. Sixty thousand Jews and an undetermined number of Gypsies are sent to Auschwitz.
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The last transport of Jews leaves the Lódz ghetto for Auschwitz.
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The Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz stage a revolt, destroying Crematorium IV. Some prisoners escape briefly but are recaptured. The SS kill many Sonderkommandos—even some who had not participated—in retaliation.
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The last people are gassed at Auschwitz. The last recorded transport of Jewish prisoners arrives at Auschwitz.
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The SS begins the destruction of the Auschwitz crematoria.
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Soviet troops liberate Auschwitz. Only a few thousand prisoners remain.
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British troops arrest Rudolf Höss, who had escaped notice after the war and was now posing as a farm worker. He is tried and convicted at Nuremberg. While in prison awaiting execution, he writes his memoirs.
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Rudolf Höss is hanged at Auschwitz.
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Rudolf Höss meets with Heinrich Himmler, who tells Höss to flee capture by disappearing into the army.
