Kristallnacht

1
Kristallnacht

• Night of Shattered Glass

2
Failure of Emigration

• 50 or 250,000 Jews leave Germany between
  1933-1939.
• Evian Conference in 1938
• No commitments to take in refugees
• Hitler takes this as Green Light to deal with
  the Jewish Question

3
Herschel Grynszpan

• 17,000 Jews from Germany sent to Poland who
  refused to accept them. They lived in no mans
  land in official limbo
• Grynszpans family plight drove him to seek
  revenge, killing a Nazi official at the German
  Consulate in Paris.

4
Der Stuermer characterizations of Grynszpan
following the death of Von Rath
5
November 9-10, 1938

• Order of violence orchestrated at highest levels
  of Government
• Read Heydrichs secret order
• Prayer Books lay destroyed on floor
• Over 1600 synagogues damaged or destroyed.

6

• Local residents watch as flames consume the
  synagogue in Opava, set on fire during
  Kristallnacht.

7
Results of Kristallnacht

• 30,000 Jews arrested and sent to one of three
  concentration camps
• Buchenwald
• Sachsenhausen
• Dachau
• Over 90 Jews Killed in the violence of the event.
• Unknown number die in camps

8
Results Continued

• Transfer of the Jewish Question taken from the
  Gestapo and given to the SS
• Jews collectively fined 1 billion Marks for the
  murder of vom Rath (equal to roughly 5.5 Billion
  of todays currency)

9
Who Spoke Out During Kristallnacht?

• President Roosevelt recalled the German
  Ambassador in protest
• He also extended the visas of over 12000 German
  Jews visiting in the US
• Widespread condemnation in the press
• Little concrete action with respect to
  immigration issues