The Holocaust How Did It End?

Approaching Defeat With the Soviets rapidly approaching from the East and the Allies from the West, the Nazis began moving Jews to concentration camps in Germany The Nazis then began destroying their extermination camps in hopes that the mass killings they conducted would not be discovered by the Allies Before the dismantling of their concentration camps, however, the Nazis rapidly began exterminating Jews at extremely high rates. It is believed that half of the deaths carried out in concentration camps happened in the last year

Death Marches In the Summer of 1944, the Nazis began evacuating their extermination camps in what would be known as “death marches” The Nazis thought that marching Jewish prisoners to Germany would be useful for three reasons If they were caught by the Allies, the atrocities of the camps would be exposed to the world The Germans were still in denial about losing the war and needed the Jews to create armaments Some Nazi leaders such as Himmler, felt that the prisoners could be used to bargain with the Allies if they lost the War Around 60,000 prisoners died on these marches

Liberation On January 1945, the Soviets liberated the Nazis biggest camp, Auschwitz Only a few thousand Jews remained as the rest had been killed on “Death Marches” The British and Americans liberated camps in Northern Germany while the Soviets freed the rest Thousands of liberated Jews would die within weeks due to malnutrition

What Did the Liberators Think? “Of all the horrors of the place, the smell, perhaps, was the most startling of all. It was a smell make up of all kinds of odors –human excreta, foul bodily odors, smoldering trash fires, German tobacco — which is a stink in itself — all mixed together in a heavy dank atmosphere, in a thick muddy woods, where little breeze could go.” -Captain J.D. Pletcher

What Did the Liberators Think? “[The prisoners] were so thin they didn’t have anything didn’t have any buttocks to lie on; there wasn’t any flesh on their arms to rest their skulls on…one man that I saw there who had died on his knees with his arms and head in a praying position and he was still there, apparently had been for days -William B Lovelady “These Jewish people and these Polish people were like animals. They were so degraded, there was no goodness, no kindness, nothing of that nature, there was no sharing. If they got a piece of something to eat, they grabbed it and ran away in a corner and fought off anyone who came near them.” - Samuel Glashow

What Happened to the Survivors? The Holocaust left tens of thousands of homeless Jews in Europe many of which feared to return home In some places such as Poland Antisemitism was still strong and violence against them continued Many of the survivors emigrated to Western Europe and North America, yet many of these countries had a limit on how many they could take With the creation of Israel in 1953, a massive number of survivors had a place to call home (170,000+)

Aftermath of the Holocaust A number of Nazi commanders involved with the Holocaust had international trials and were convicted guilty. Many Nazis managed to escape and have been arrested throughout the years. Recently, a 93 year old man was convicted in Germany in May of 2014 While the Holocaust was not the reason for the creation of the nation of Israel, it gave the creation of the country international attention and support