href="#ulink_2a04bcf2-2d98-5b87-af9d-585be0afda20">***
*** The Nazi regime used the term “Third Reich” to refer to Germany and its territories. This term also had strong historical associations with the Holy Roman Empire (First Reich) and the Bismarck era (Second Reich) and a religious association with millennialist Christian views. Reich means “kingdom.”
Our banner flutters before us.
Into the future we’ll pull man for man.
We march for Hitler through night and through hardship
With the flag of youth for freedom and sustenance.
—Hitler Youth Banner Song
As I witnessed the Hitler Youth parades, my blood turned to ice. I beheld the heaving sea of swastika flags. I saw the edge of the abyss. German veterans sought to shed the humiliation of the World War and greeted the resurrection of the German military with great satisfaction. Hitler’s success in Austria and the Munich accord with Daladier of France and Chamberlain of Britain had elevated Germany’s international status. The Volksgemeinschaft**** seethed with fanatic pride.
**** This Nazi term is a combination of the word “Volk,” literally meaning “nation,” and Gemeinschaft, or “community.” According to Nazi usage, Volk became associated with notions of “Aryan” racial unity, purity, and superiority. A pure-blooded master race was to be the common goal. Each member of the Volksgemeinschaft had an equal and solemn responsibility to defend the oneness and greatness of the German nation.
The population demands that all who
do business with the Jews
be excluded from any benefits provided by the Reich...
—“Viernheim Gazette”
Jews were now making desperate plans to escape. My sweet sister Hanna had worked loyally and efficiently for almost ten years as a secretary at Tempels’ paper mill. But Nazi pressure on the management resulted in Hanna’s dismissal. An “Aryan” took her job. Shortly before the November 1938 pogrom, some emigration facilities were operating. Hanna made a quick and courageous decision. A Jewish organization was sending young married couples to Argentina, where land and livestock could be obtained on credit. Adolf Strass, the son of a Jewish wine-maker from Rhine Hessen, asked her to marry him so they could qualify for the farmland in Argentina. Hanna accepted the uncertain offer in order to escape the new Dark Ages and in the hopes of being able to rescue her family. She married the stranger in Reichenbach in February 1938. I briefly met Adolf the day of their wedding, a very sad occasion. There were no vows of love and devotion exchanged, no festive ceremony. Adolf came just long enough to sign the papers and then left again to prepare for their emigration. My sister was to follow him to Mainz a few weeks later.
Ida, my older sister, lost her job as a maid. The family she worked for suddenly realized that she was Jewish, a racially inferior woman. This pure “Aryan” family could no longer tolerate her presence. They literally chased her out. Determined to emigrate to Palestine, she joined a Zionist organization and trained to take up life on a kibbutz. The waiting list was very long. While she waited for word, she met Sydney Nussbaum, a young man who had been sent to Buchenwald concentration camp after the pogrom in Hamburg in spite of the sacrifice his family had made for Germany. Sydney’s father and his four brothers had all been killed in combat in the World War. While in camp Sydney had received his immigration papers from the U.S., which allowed him to walk out, empty-handed but free.
Sydney related frightening stories about his time in Buchenwald. He had seen an old Jewish man in the camp meet a violent end at the hands of a sadist. Sydney himself had undergone drastic weight loss in just a few weeks, which left him terribly weakened. But he had made it out of camp alive—so many others had returned to their families in black boxes.
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