British PoWs and the Holocaust

British PoWs and the Holocaust PDF Author: Russell Wallis
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1786721945
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 275

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Book Description
In the network of Nazi camps across wartime Europe, prisoner of war institutions were often located next to the slave camps for Jews and Slavs; so that British PoWs across occupied Europe, over 200,000 men, were witnesses to the holocaust. The majority of those incarcerated were aware of the camps, but their testimony has never been fully published. Here, using eye-witness accounts held by the Imperial War Museum, Russell Wallis rewrites the history of British prisoners and the Holocaust during the Second World War. He uncovers the histories of men such as Cyril Rofe, an Anglo-Jewish PoW who escaped from a work camp in Upper Silesia and fled eastwards towards the Russian lines, recounting his shattering experiences of the so-called 'bloodlands' of eastern Poland. Wallis also shows how and why the knowledge of those in the armed forces was never fully publicised, and how some PoW accounts were later exaggerated or fictionalised. British PoWs and the Holocaust will be an essential new oral history of the holocaust and an extraordinary insight into what was known and when about the greatest crime of the 20th century.

British PoWs and the Holocaust

British PoWs and the Holocaust PDF Author: Russell Wallis
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1786721945
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 275

Get Book

Book Description
In the network of Nazi camps across wartime Europe, prisoner of war institutions were often located next to the slave camps for Jews and Slavs; so that British PoWs across occupied Europe, over 200,000 men, were witnesses to the holocaust. The majority of those incarcerated were aware of the camps, but their testimony has never been fully published. Here, using eye-witness accounts held by the Imperial War Museum, Russell Wallis rewrites the history of British prisoners and the Holocaust during the Second World War. He uncovers the histories of men such as Cyril Rofe, an Anglo-Jewish PoW who escaped from a work camp in Upper Silesia and fled eastwards towards the Russian lines, recounting his shattering experiences of the so-called 'bloodlands' of eastern Poland. Wallis also shows how and why the knowledge of those in the armed forces was never fully publicised, and how some PoW accounts were later exaggerated or fictionalised. British PoWs and the Holocaust will be an essential new oral history of the holocaust and an extraordinary insight into what was known and when about the greatest crime of the 20th century.

Jewish Soldiers in Nazi Captivity

Jewish Soldiers in Nazi Captivity PDF Author: Yorai Linenberg
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198892780
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 285

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Book Description
This book explores the extraordinary story of Jewish POWs in German captivity during the Second World War - extraordinary because of the contrast between Germany's genocidal policy towards Jews on one hand, and its relatively non-discriminatory treatment of Jewish POWs from western countries on the other. The radicalisation of Germany's anti-Semitic policies entered its last phase in June 1941 with the invasion of the Soviet Union; during the following four years, nearly six million Jews were murdered. In parallel, Germany's POW policies had gone through a radicalisation process of their own, resulting in the murder of millions of Soviet POWs, of Allied commando soldiers, and of POW escapees, with Adolf Hitler eventually transferring in July 1944 the responsibility for POWs from the Wehrmacht to Heinrich Himmler, in his role as head of the Replacement Army. And yet, despite all this, Jewish POWs from western countries were usually not discriminated against and were treated, in most cases, according to the 1929 Geneva Convention. Jewish Soldiers in Nazi Captivity combines memoirs, letters, and oral histories with Red Cross camp visit reports and other archival material to challenge the accepted view of the Holocaust as an indiscriminate murder of all Jews in Europe and will help to reshape our understanding of the Holocaust and of Nazi Germany.

Allies in Auschwitz

Allies in Auschwitz PDF Author: Duncan Little
Publisher: CLAIRVIEW BOOKS
ISBN: 1905570406
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 97

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Book Description
The huge Auschwitz camp in Poland, the Third Reich’s most gruesome death camp, contained not only the infamous concentration camp - whose horrors are well-documented - but also a prisoner-of-war facility that housed British inmates. Situated close enough to the Jewish quarters to smell the stench of burning bodies from the crematoria, the POWs were forced to work alongside concentration camp inmates in a Nazi factory. Witnesses to daily violence, the men survived beatings, hard labour and the extreme cold of Polish winters, whilst subsisting on meagre rations. Their final ordeal was to march hundreds of miles, in the depths of winter, to secure freedom in the spring of 1945. Based on interviews with some of the few surviving members of E715 Auschwitz, this book charts the British captives’ true story: from arriving on cattle trucks through to their eventual departure on foot. Haunted by what they had witnessed as young men, Brian Bishop, Doug Bond and Arthur Gifford-England were only able to speak about their experiences decades later, when approached during research for this book. Few people were interested in these remarkable men in post-war Britain, and they were left to cope with the trauma of their experiences with little support. Allies in Auschwitz records an important and forgotten episode of modern history. As corroboration of the men’s testimony, the final chapter includes post-war accounts from other British POWs held in E715 Auschwitz, based on documents compiled by war crimes’ investigators for the Nuremburg Trials.

10 British P.O.W.s Saved My Life

10 British P.O.W.s Saved My Life PDF Author: Hannah Rigler
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781889534985
Category : Ex-prisoners of war
Languages : en
Pages : 211

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Book Description
This is the story of Sara (Hannah) Matuson Rigler's survival when caught in the catastrophe of the Holocaust by 10 British Prisoners of War, whose compassion matched her courage, and how she kept her promise to her brutally murdered family to remember and honor them by doing good in the world.

Auschwitz

Auschwitz PDF Author: Colin Rushton
Publisher: Summersdale
ISBN: 0857658484
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 223

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Book Description
In 1942 young soldier Arthur Dodd was taken prisoner by the German Army and transported to Auschwitz. He was forced to do hard labour, starved and savagely beaten. This shocking story sheds new light on the operations at the camp, exposes a hierarchy of prisoner treatment by the SS and presents the largely unknown story of military POWs held there.

Confronting Captivity

Confronting Captivity PDF Author: Arieh J. Kochavi
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN: 0807876402
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 392

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Book Description
How was it possible that almost all of the nearly 300,000 British and American troops who fell into German hands during World War II survived captivity in German POW camps and returned home almost as soon as the war ended? In Confronting Captivity, Arieh J. Kochavi offers a behind-the-scenes look at the living conditions in Nazi camps and traces the actions the British and American governments took--and didn't take--to ensure the safety of their captured soldiers. Concern in London and Washington about the safety of these POWs was mitigated by the recognition that the Nazi leadership tended to adhere to the Geneva Convention when it came to British and U.S. prisoners. Following the invasion of Normandy, however, Allied apprehension over the safety of POWs turned into anxiety for their very lives. Yet Britain and the United States took the calculated risk of counting on a swift conclusion to the war as the Soviets approached Germany from the east. Ultimately, Kochavi argues, it was more likely that the lives of British and American POWs were spared because of their race rather than any actions their governments took on their behalf.

Britain and the Holocaust

Britain and the Holocaust PDF Author: Caroline Sharples
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137350776
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 346

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Book Description
How has Britain understood the Holocaust? This interdisciplinary volume explores popular narratives of the Second World War and cultural representations of the Holocaust from the Nuremberg trials of 1945-6, to the establishment of a national memorial day by the start of the twenty-first century.

British Character and the Treatment of German Prisoners of War, 1939–48

British Character and the Treatment of German Prisoners of War, 1939–48 PDF Author: Alan Malpass
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030489159
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
This book examines attitudes towards German held captive in Britain, drawing on original archival material including newspaper and newsreel content, diaries, sociological surveys and opinion polls, as well as official documentation and the archives of pressure groups and protest movements. Moving beyond conventional assessments of POW treatment which have focused on the development of policy, diplomatic relations, and the experience of the POWs themselves, this study refocuses the debate onto the attitude of the British public towards the standard of treatment of German POWs. In so doing, it reveals that the issue of POW treatment intersected with discussions of state power, human rights, gender relations, civility, and national character.

Spectator in Hell

Spectator in Hell PDF Author:
Publisher: Pelican Publishing
ISBN: 1455612286
Category : Prisoners of war
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description


Arthur Dodd's Auschwitz Days

Arthur Dodd's Auschwitz Days PDF Author: Natasha Tristan
Publisher: UB Tech
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 55

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Book Description
Have ever the interesting funny stories of the battlefield caught everyone’s attention? No, isn’t it? It may be doubtful. Or very few that can be counted on the finger. Anyone will shudder to repeat things that failed one or more times, right? It will surely think twice when it comes to battlefield. When British soldier Arthur Dodd and his comrades were incarcerated in camps in Nazi-occupied Poland, they demonstrated nothing of the sort. This article gives readers an interesting way to look through the snippets of the days of Britain POWs in their camps, where attempts to escape were thwarted, but within days they were trapped again and punished even faster. It paves the way for all to understand the value of the relationship that emerges in the face of adversity. It’s possible to get to know a different facet of the Holocaust and World War II that has never been seen before. An in-depth journey through the sub-camp Auschwitz III gives a closer look at the plight of the Holocaust victims. Take a trip through the lives of the Monowitz (Auschwitz III) which paved the way for the Holocaust and World War 2.