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Holocaust
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Nazis open Dachau concentration camp, followed by Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen and Ravensbrück for women.
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Start of the boycotting of Jewish owned shops/ buisnesses
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The Law for the Reestablishment of the Professional Civil Service was passed.
This meant Jews could not serve as teachers, professors, judges, or other government positions. -
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Jews are slowly stripped of thier rights.
Including; Nazis prohibit Jews from owning land, Jews not allowed national health insurance, Jews are prohibited from getting legal qualifications Nazis ban Jews from serving in the military, -
Nazi Party is declared the only legal party in Germany; Also, Nazis pass Law to strip Jewish immigrants from Poland of their German citizenship.
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Jews are banned from the German Labor Front
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German President von Hindenburg dies. Hitler becomes Führer.
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The Numremeberg Race Laws against Jews were put into effect
This law made it so German Jews were strippped of their rights of citizenship, giving them the status of "subjects". -
Olympic games begin in Berlin.
Hitler and top Nazis seek to gain favorable public opinion from foreign visitors and thus temporarily refrain from actions against Jews. -
Nazis order Jews over age 15 to apply for identity cards from the police, to be shown on demand to any police officer.
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Nazis destroy the synagogue in Nuremberg
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Nazis arrest 17,000 Jews of Polish nationality living in Germany, then send them back to Poland which refuses them entry, leaving them in 'No-Man's Land' near the Polish border for several months.
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Kristallnacht/ Night of Broken Glass
Night of Broken Glass was a night of violence againt the Jewish shops, buisnesses & synagogues. -
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Because of the "Night of Broken Glass" a lot of rights are taken from the Jews
Nazis fine Jews one billion marks for damages related to Kristallnacht, Jewish pupils are expelled from all non-Jewish German schools, Nazis force Jews to hand over all gold and silver items, German Jews are forbidden to own wireless radio sets, German Jews denied the right to hold government jobs, Jews lose rights as tenants and are relocated into Jewish houses, & ews in Germany are forbidden to be outdoors after 8 p.m. in winter and 9 p.m. in summer. -
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The St. Louis, a ship crowded with 930 Jewish refugees, is turned away by Cuba, the United States and other countries and returns to Europe.
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Yellow stars required to be worn by Polish Jews over age 10
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The Lodz Ghetto in occupied Poland is sealed off from the outside world with 230,000 Jews locked inside.
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The Krakow Ghetto is sealed off containing 70,000 Jews.
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The Warsaw Ghetto, containing over 400,000 Jews, is sealed off.
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3,600 Jews arrested in Paris.
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Ghettos established at Kovno, Minsk, Vitebsk and Zhitomer.
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Majdanek concentration camp becomes operational.
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Jews in Romania forced into Transnistria. By December, 70,000 perish
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German Jews ordered to wear yellow stars.
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The first test use of Zyklon-B gas at Auschwitz.
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The Vilna Ghetto is established containing 40,000 Jews.
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Chelmno extermination camp becomes operational.
Jews taken there are placed in mobile gas vans and driven to a burial place while carbon monoxide from the engine exhaust is fed into the sealed rear compartment, killing them. The first gassing victims include 5,000 Gypsies who had been deported from the Reich to Lodz. -
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Mass killings of Jews using Zyklon-B begin at Auschwitz-Birkenau
The bodies were buried in a mass grave in a nearby meadow -
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Belzec extermination camp becomes operational.
The camp is fitted with permanent gas chambers using carbon monoxide piped in from engines placed outside the chamber, but will later substitute Zyklon-B. -
Jews in France, Holland, Belgium, Croatia, Slovakia, Romania ordered to wear yellow stars
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At Auschwitz, a second gas chamber, Bunker II (the white farmhouse), is made operational at Birkenau due to the number of Jews arriving.
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Himmler grants permission for sterilization experiments at Auschwitz.
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Treblinka extermination camp opened
The camp is fitted with two buildings containing 10 gas chambers, each holding 200 persons. Carbon monoxide gas is piped in from engines placed outside the chamber, but Zyklon-B will later be substituted. Bodies are burned in open pits. -
Open pit burning of bodies begins at Auschwitz in place of burial
The decision is made to dig up and burn those already buried, 107,000 corpses, to prevent fouling of ground water. -
Reduction of food rations for Jews in Germany.
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SS begins cashing in possessions and valuables of Jews from Auschwitz and Majdanek.
German banknotes are sent to the Reichs Bank. Foreign currency, gold, jewels and other valuables are sent to SS Headquarters of the Economic Administration. Watches, clocks and pens are distributed to troops at the front. Clothing is distributed to German families. -
Sterilization experiments on women at Birkenau begin.
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Nazis order all Gypsies arrested and sent to extermination camps.
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In New York, American Jews hold a mass rally at Madison Square Garden to pressure the U.S. government into helping the Jews of Europe.
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Exterminations at Chelmno cease.
The camp will be reactivated in the spring of 1944 to liquidate ghettos. In all, Chelmno will total 300,000 deaths. -
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Exterminations cease at Treblinka, after an estimated 870,000 deaths.
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Two hundred Jews escape from Treblinka extermination camp during a revolt.
Nazis then hunt them down one by one. -
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The Danish Underground helps transport 7,220 Danish Jews to safety in Sweden by sea.
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Massive escape from Sobibor as Jews and Soviet POWs break out
300 make it safely into nearby woods. Of those 300, fifty will survive. Exterminations then cease at Sobibor, after over 250,000 deaths. All traces of the death camp are then removed and trees are planted. -
Nazis carry out Operation Harvest Festival in Poland
This kills 42,000 Jews. -
President Roosevelt issues a statement condemning German and Japanese ongoing "crimes against humanity."
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D-Day
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Rosenberg orders Hay Action, the kidnapping of 40,000 Polish children aged ten to fourteen for slave labor in the Reich.
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Last use of the gas chambers at Auschwitz.
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Himmler orders destruction of the crematories at Auschwitz.
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Russians liberate Budapest, freeing over 80,000 Jews.
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Approximately 40,000 prisoners freed at Bergen-Belsen by the British
They reported that "both inside and outside the huts was a carpet of dead bodies, human waste, rags and filth." -
Hitler commits suicide in his Berlin bunker.
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Americans free 33,000 inmates from concentration camps.