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Slovak Jew Bela Weichherz and his wife, Esti, lived in the city of Bratislava where he worked as a traveling salesman for the Philips Company. As the persecution of Jews in their native Slovakia worsened, Bela wrote a diary to show the heartbreaking expressions of a father’s fear for his family. He last wrote in his diary shortly before they were all exiled to a Nazi killing center.
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The National Socialist German Workers' Party, more commonly as known as the Nazi Party, seized control of the German state when German President Paul von Hindenburg appoints Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler as Chancellor at the head of a coalition government.
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After Adolf Hitler’s appointment as Chancellor in January 1933, government at every level began to adopt laws and policies that restricted the rights of Jews in Germany. This new law limited the number of Jewish students. Public schools taught students to love Hiler and hate Jewish.
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German President Paul von Hindenburg dies. With the support of the German armed forces, Hitler becomes President of Germany. Later that month Hitler abolishes the office of President and Hitler now becomes the absolute dictator of Germany.
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These laws established many of the racial theories and provided the legal framework for the systematic persecution of Jews in Germany. The Nuremberg Race Laws did not identify a “Jew” as someone with particular religious beliefs but instead as someone with three or four Jewish grandparents.
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Buchenwald was one of the largest concentration camps established within German borders. Women were not part of the Buchenwald camp system until late 1943 or early 1944.However, in 1938, in the aftermath of Kristallnacht, German SS and police sent almost 10,000 Jews to Buchenwald were the camp authorities subjected them to very cruel treatment and many died.
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Jews felt the effects of more than 400 decrees and regulations that restricted all aspects of their public and private lives. Thus, hundreds of individuals in all levels of government throughout the country were involved in the persecution of Jews as they conceived, discussed, drafted, adopted, enforced, and supported anti-Jewish legislation.
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Honoring their guarantee of Poland’s borders, Great Britain and France declare war on Germany. Two days earlier, on September 1, 1939, Germany had invaded Poland.
