A document concerning Nazi methods for deceiving Theresienstadt prisoners
One of the primary elements used by the Germans in the mass murder of the Jews of Europe, within the frame of the “Final Solution”, was the extensive spreading of the false information propaganda, deception and camouflage. The Nazi fake mechanism reached a unique peak in the establishment of Theresienstadt Ghetto (1941-1945), in the Protectorate […]
The “Family Camp“ (B II b) of the Theresienstadt Deportees in Birkenau
On September 6, 1943, a transport with 5,007 Jewish prisoners from the Czech lands left ghetto Theresienstadt, “able-bodied” men with their families; they were chosen by the authorities to be sent purportedly to a labor camp but in fact to the concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. In the framework of preparations for the visit of […]
Cultural Life in the Theresienstadt Ghetto
People carry their culture with them wherever they go. Therefore, when the last Jewish communities in Central Europe were deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto (Terezin in Czech), they created a cultural blossoming in the midst of destruction, at their last stop before annihilation. The paradoxical consequence of this cultural flourishing, both in the collective memory […]
Dr. Desider Friedmann, lawyer and Zionist leader
Dr. Friedmann was born 1880 in Boskovice, Moravia, studied law in Vienna and settled there. Still a student he became a Zionist and a follower of Dr. Benjamin Zeev Herzl, beginning with the first Zionist congress. He became a Zionist leader and active in the Vienna Jewish community. He served as head of the Vienna […]
Jugendfürsorge (Youth Care Department)
We prepared this list about 20 years ago while many Holocaust survivors still used to attend our annual May assembly; there I affixed my lists on a board and everybody corrected and completed my draft. I also compared notes with Terezinská iniciativa in Prague and the lists were accepted by all. I do not believe […]
The German Reasons for Establishing a Bank in Ghetto Theresienstadt
The Germans were interested to show Theresienstadt as a normal “civilian” city. The establishment of the Bank of the Jewish self-administration (Bank der juedischen Selbstverwaltung) on January 1, 1943, was meant to present the town with a regular appearance, whose inhabitants, even though they were imprisoned for the duration of the war, still enjoy full […]
The Jewish Leadership
The Council of Elders and the Jewish Elder were appointed by the Germans to manage the ghetto. The latter was subordinate to the German commander and personally responsible for execution of orders given and for the timetable prescribed. Every day he had to appear before the commander to give a detailed report on the population […]
Medicine in Theresienstadt
In 1979, the former nurse Emilie Valentová remembered her boss, the ophthalmologist Richard Stein: “He was a scientist, a specialist, he was operating on, in Theresienstadt, in the conditions there, he was even operating on strabismus, which was then by far not as frequent as today. After the war I realized, he was actually operating […]