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Hitler becomes Chancellor
HItler becomes Chancellor -
Boycott of Jewish Businesses
A woman reads a boycott sign posted on the window of a Jewish-owned department store. The Nazis initiated a boycott of Jewish shops and businesses on April 1, 1933, across Germany. -
Dachau
In October, 1933, Dachau’s commandant, Theodor Eicke, introduced a system of regulations which inflicted brutal punishments on prisoners for the slightest offenses. When Eicke became Inspector of the newly established German concentration camp system, he ensured that the Dachau camp served as a model for all later concentration camps. It also became a training center for SS guards who were deployed throughout the concentration camp system. -
The Purge of the Sturmabteilung (SA)
The Röhm Purge was the murder of the leadership of the SA (Storm Troopers), the Nazi paramilitary formation led by Ernst Röhm. The murders took place between June 30 and July 2, 1934. The ruling elites and ultimately Hitler saw the SA as a threat to their hold on power. The purge demonstrated the Nazi regime’s willingness to go outside of the law to murder as an act of state for the perceived survival of the nation. -
Nuremburg Laws
An instructional chart distinguishes individuals with pure “German blood” (left column), “Mixed blood” (second and third columns), and Jews (right two columns), as defined in the Nuremberg Laws. -
Killing Centers
Close-up street portrait of Dawid Samoszul, probably taken in Piotrkow Trybunalski, Poland, between 1936 and 1938. Dawid was killed in the Treblinka killing center at the age of 9. -
Kristallnacht (“Night of Broken Glass”)
Residents of Rostock, Germany, view a burning synagogue the morning after Kristallnacht (“Night of Broken Glass”). On the night of November 9–10, 1938, the Nazi regime unleashed orchestrated anti-Jewish violence across greater Germany. -
World War II Begins
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Auschwitz
The entrance to the gas chamber in Auschwitz I, where Zyklon B was tested on Soviet prisoners of war. The building in the background is a hospital for SS members. Auschwitz, Poland. -
Killing Squads
Soldiers from unidentified units of Einsatzgruppe C look through the possessions of Jews massacred at Babi Yar, a ravine near Kiev. Soviet Union, September 29–October 1, 1941. -
The Ghettos
In less than three months, the Hungarian gendarmerie, coordinating with German deportation experts from the Reich Main Office for Security, concentrated nearly 440,000 Jews from all over Hungary except for the capital city, Budapest. They forced the Jews into short-term “destruction ghettos” and then deported them into German custody at the Hungarian border. The Germans deported most of the Hungarian Jews to the Auschwitz-Birkenau killing center. -
Majdanek Liberation
A Soviet soldier walks through a mound of victims' shoes piled outside a warehouse in Majdanek soon after the liberation. Majdanek, Poland, August 1944. -
Germany Surrenders
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The Nuremberg Trials
Leading Nazi officials listen to proceedings at the International Military Tribunal, the best known of the postwar trials, in Nuremberg, Germany, before judges representing the Allied powers. -
The Prosecution
US Chief Prosecutor Robert H. Jackson delivers the opening speech of the American prosecution at the International Military Tribunal. Nuremberg, Germany. November 21, 1945.