In this MA thesis, three transport lists from the Netherlands are analyzed in order to determine a pattern in which the Nazis deported the Dutch Jews: the first transport on July 15, 1942; the first transport to Sobibór on March 2, 1943, and the last transport of that year, on November 16, 1943. We knew approximately in what general order the Nazis deported the Jews: starting with the poor ones and ending with the richer ones who could afford to buy themselves protection to prevent their deportation earlier on with the proletariat. We have reconstructed a lot already, but the little day-to-day facts that are also important when one wants to make a reconstruction, are becoming much more visible by looking at the individual transport lists, one by one.

Throughout the years, some works have been written on a few of the 102 transports that left Holland between July 1942 and September 1944, like the booklets the Red Cross published after the war about the people in the transports and their fate. Jules Schelvis, a Holocaust survivor himself, wrote an immense reference work about Sobibór in the 1990s.

The transport lists were used for the book In memoriam l’zecher (1995), which contains all the names of the 104,000 Dutch Jews who didn’t return from the concentration camps. But after that, the lists weren’t subject to any kind of research anymore, until Guus Luijters started with the research for his book In memoriam (2012) in 2009, for which I was responsible for the image collecting and editing. In this book, Luijters memorialized all the Jewish, Roma and Sinti children that were murdered during the Shoah.

Besides almost 3,000 photos of children in the book, he gives some details about the 102 transports: how many people were on the train, how many of them were children, how many survivors did a certain transport have? Luijters also found sources from survivors: biographies and testimonies. Some of them I used in this thesis as well.

Besides this, the 102 transport lists have never been studied together as a whole. Due to the limited volume requested for an MA thesis, I was forced to make a selection, and I chose to analyze three transports. On top of that, I also wanted to examine what had happened to the transports after they left Westerbork: What was it like on the train? What happened after the arrival of a certain transport at its destination? Were there any survivors at the end of the war? How did they manage to survive?

After analysis, it turned out that the number of deportees for each transport was different than previously assumed. Some people were mentioned twice on the list. Others were taken off the list last minute, but their names were never removed. Also, the number of survivors turned out to be higher than assumed until now. From the first transport, ten people returned instead of eight, and from the last transport, 18 people returned instead of 16. This means, that indiscriminately repeating numbers off of lists – thinking authorities and organizations are always correct – is not accurate: the differences may be marginal, they are however important, especially because in many cases, mainly in Eastern Europe, we have to guess about the number of victims. Therefore, it is important that we establish the correct data wherever it is possible.

It also turned out that Jews were still living in Amsterdam after the big round-up of September 29, 1943. It was always assumed that with this final round-up, Jewish life outside camps and prisons in Holland ended. This turned out to be incorrect: since a relatively high number of Jewish Council employees were brought into Westerbork on October 28, 1943 and the beginning of November, it’s safe to conclude that certain departments of the Jewish Council apparently continued to be operative after September 29, 1943. This interesting conclusion is certainly well worth the effort to further research.

Supervisors:
Prof. Dan Michman
Prof. Arieh Kochavi

On January 5, 1945, four Jewish women prisoners were executed by hanging in Auschwitz. They were charged with stealing gunpowder from the “Union” munitions factory, where they were force-labored, and smuggling it to the prisoners of the Sonderkommando at the nearby camp of Birkenau, who mutinied three months earlier, on October 7, 1944, in an attempt to escape from the camp.

The uprising of the Sonderkommando may be likened to the tip of an iceberg, where much is obscured under water. This research attempts to delve into the details below the surface, both during the time leading up to the uprising and the period following it. On the one hand it traces the preceding events: the establishment and execution of the gunpowder smuggling activity and reevaluates them, and on the other hand it delineates the German investigation that followed the uprising, which led to the imprisonment of the four Jewish women and to their execution – all while evaluating multiple testimonies and documents, some of which have not yet been subjected to research.

This research yields several main results. First, contrary to common knowledge, according to which, the four women who alone were involved in the smuggling were apprehended and executed, it turns out that no less than thirty Jewish women prisoners participated in the gunpowder smuggling, which was an extensive operation, carried out in secrecy during a period of about seven months.

Regarding the uprising itself, this research refutes the common knowledge that the smuggled gunpowder was used to blow up one of the four crematoria. Rather, it turns out that the crematorium was indeed set on fire and burnt down, however, the hand-grenades that were made out of the smuggled gunpowder were never used, and therefore their potential did not materialize. Thus, the great effort, risk, and courage associated with the smuggling – were all in vain.

Regarding the investigation that followed the uprising, this research reexamines two distinct narratives concerning the circumstances that led to the arrest of the four women. It determines that both are valid, do not contradict each other, rather, they complement one another: the betrayal of one of the smugglers by a Jewish prisoner attempting to avoid punishment, prompted the activation of a secret agent against this smuggler, thereby leading to her incrimination.

Perhaps the most important finding is the uncovering of the reason for which the four women were accused of smuggling gunpowder and the determination of the goal behind their execution by hanging in publicly held ceremonies. Contrary to common wisdom, this was not due to the fact that a crematorium was blown up – allegedly with gunpowder that was smuggled by these women. It turns out that camp authorities chose to regard the proven smuggling from the factory as an act of sabotage that damaged the production process. These women therefore paid with their lives for the widespread acts of sabotage that were commonplace at the “Union” factory, and which had a detrimental effect on both the rate of production and its quality – acts of sabotage that camp authorities have failed to uncover and prevent. Therefore, the four women were hanged in order to terrorize the laborers at the ”Union”, so as to prevent any further acts of sabotage in the factory, and at the same time, to demonstrate to the higher echelons of the SS and the army that they are determined to put an end to sabotage once and for all.

Supervisor:
Prof. Sara Bender

In 1941, Lucien Febvre, a French historian, penned his famous essay “Sensibility and History: How to Reconstitute the Emotional Life of the Past.” Set against the background of fascism and the horrors of the Nazi regime, it became clear to Febvre, who believed emotions to be irrational, that politics, and other aspects of intellectual life, were not immune to the influence of emotions. In response, he called for an examination of emotions in historiography to better understand why some societies were more adept than others at managing their feelings, and to “explain fascism and reveal the principles on which a more rational order could be constructed.” Though much has changed since 1941 surrounding the understanding of emotions, Febvre’s call paved the way for the development of emotions history into the discipline it is today.

This thesis applies emotions history methodology to the study of the Holocaust. Through an examination of three emotionally motivated social behaviors – giving and exchange, finding meaning and comfort, and helping behavior – this paper reveals patterns and tendencies of emotional expression among female and male prisoners inside the Stutthof concentration camp system. In doing so, it highlights how certain modes of emotional expression affected behavior and social life and subsequently promoted survival. The analysis demonstrates how emotions history is a useful methodology that illuminates previously underappreciated aspects of Holocaust historiography; challenges the notion that concentration camp prisoners completely succumbed to the emotional standards imposed on them by their perpetrators and lived in an emotionally void state; seeks to contribute to the greater understanding of concentration camp life using the Stutthof camp system as a case study; and sheds light on the more intimate and subterranean elements of victims’ experiences. The analysis is anchored in victims’ postwar written testimonies, and is supported by theories from the social sciences, mainly social psychology.

Supervisor:
Prof. Amos Goldberg

The death camps established by the Nazi regime were a unique phenomenon that challenged the human spirit in every possible manner. In the decades that passed since World War II ended, scholars have been focused on understanding every aspect of life and death in these distinctive facilities. Still, one of the most interesting questions that remain unanswered regards human behavior during catastrophe. As existing research mostly focuses on understanding the methods prisoners of the Nazi regime practiced in order to survive, the question of what motivated these prisoners to strive and want to survive is mostly overlooked.

Auschwitz was chosen to be the case study of this research as it has been widely examined across various scholarly fields, constituting a stable foundation for further scholarship in the field of social history.

The population of prisoners at Auschwitz was diverse and included an inner hierarchy. Some prisoners managed to obtain positions that allowed them extraordinary privileges such as extra food or better hygiene, while the vast majority of prisoners, who were usually employed in one of the slave labor work details, struggled to receive the minimum provided by the camp’s authority.

This study focuses on those who were at the bottom of the scale. Prisoners who were employed in one of the slave labor work details and were not entitled to any sort of privileges. By understanding the delicate dynamics and interactions of the various groups of population throughout the camp, an observation of what motivated prisoners to struggle in order to survive may be presented.

The main premise of this research is that prisoners survived the death camp simply because they managed to form personal and reliable social connections. In that sense, the reason behind the motivation to survive is directly tied with the technical methods of survival. However, while not everyone who had meaningful human connections managed to survive, those who did, necessarily obtained human connections.

By understanding the motivation to survive in a place such as Auschwitz, we can learn a great deal about human nature and the individual’s ability to withstand catastrophe. Moreover, we will be able to uncover and understand a significant part of the Holocaust.

Supervisor:
Prof. Hagit Lavsky

In April 1943, the SS established the “Bergen-Belsen Exchange Camp”. From July 1943 onwards, groups of Jews from all over Europe were brought to this camp. The German intention regarding these Jews was to exchange them for Reich citizens who had been arrested and interned by the Allies.

From spring 1944, Bergen-Belsen transformed from an Exchange Camp to a concentration camp. In the final stages of WWII, between December 1944 and mid-April 1945, at least 85,000 men, women, and children were deported to Bergen-Belsen from other concentration camps. There was neither room nor facilities for these numbers of prisoners in the camp. As a result, tens of thousands of prisoners died in Bergen-Belsen in the first months of 1945.

In order to make space for regular prisoners in Bergen-Belsen, at one point in spring 1945 it was decided to evacuate the Exchange Camp. Three evacuation transports, with 6,700 exchange prisoners, left Bergen-Belsen, all with Theresienstadt as their destination.

The first transport left the ramp of Bergen station on April 8 and was liberated on April 13 in Farsleben by American troops. The second transport left on April 9 and reached Theresienstadt on April 20, 1945.

The third transport left around midnight between April 10 and 11. The train wandered for almost two weeks between the different fronts and was finally liberated on April 23 by Soviet troops near the village of Tröbitz. Because for a long period nothing was known about the fate of this third evacuation transport, also after its liberation, it became known as the “Lost Train.”

The aim of this thesis is to give a comprehensive and chronological account of the journey of the “Lost Train”, from the moment the prisoners started leaving Bergen-Belsen to the ramp outside of the camp on April 9, its departure around midnight between April 10 and 11, and its journey until the liberation on April 23, 1945. The conditions faced by the prisoners on the “Lost Train” and their attempts to survive on their two-week journey are described. 133 prisoners would not survive the journey. The bodies of the dead were buried in several locations or left alongside the railroad tracks if burial was impossible. A “death list” of the deceased was administered during the journey.

The thesis places the journey of the “Lost Train” in the historical context of Bergen-Belsen’s transformation from an Exchange Camp into a concentration camp and adds to our knowledge on the final stages of Nazi Germany.

Supervisor:
Prof. Dan Michman

Contemporary research and public discourse have recently drawn attention to the different perspectives of men and women on their social, political, and cultural environment. However, when it comes to the topic of the identity and behavior of perpetrators in concentration and extermination camps, this perspective has not yet been fully implemented in research on genocide in general and the Holocaust in particular. This paper takes this perspective and fills the gaps in knowledge that still exist with regard to the significance of gender, age, and nationality as factors influencing behavior. By analyzing the social profile of eight young Dutch women who volunteered as camp guards in Vught and later in Auschwitz-Birkenau, their reasons for participating in systematic genocide will be explained. This micro-history uses models and theories from the field of social history to analyze the impact and the women’s experience of their employment through, until now, mostly neglected archival material, trial records and ego-documents. This analysis will show that ideology was not the most important factor in their decision-making process. Instead, external factors such as romantic relationships with Dutch SS members or German soldiers, the desire to escape from social relationships perceived as disadvantageous, and the wish to gain (financial) independence carried far more weight than antisemitic or pro-National-Socialist views. With this analysis, a more complete picture of Dutch female perpetrators emerges and offers perspectives for future research focusing on the relation of gender and genocides.

Supervisor:
Prof. Dan Michman

This thesis examines the conditions and characteristics of the Pionki forced labor camp for Jews in the Radom District of Nazi occupied Poland during World War II. It examines the prisoners’ views and reactions to the conditions. The inmates, along with Polish civilians, worked in gunpowder production. The findings indicate that Pionki fits into the narrative of survival through labor as the workers were necessary for the Nazi war effort. This being the case, imprisonment in Pionki helped, though did not guarantee, survival.

The research reveals that despite the difficult conditions, including dangerous labor, survivors often viewed Pionki as a “good” camp, in comparison to other camps that they experienced. This is not to belittle the horrific experiences of the survivors. Characteristics of a good camp, based on Pionki, include working alongside Polish civilians with whom prisoners could barter and in turn receive extra food. Alcohol was used in the gunpowder production process and thus prisoners had relatively easy access to alcohol for consumption and bartering purposes. Additionally, relative to its population, which was about 3,000 at its height, Pionki had many survivors.

This is the first study conducted about Pionki, which functioned as a camp from 1942 to 1944. The research is largely based on oral and written survivor accounts from various archives, as well as personal interviews. Pursuing research based on survivor testimony allows readers to gain insight into the feelings and reactions of survivors. The survivor voices thus humanize and add depth to the story of the camp, which the research would otherwise not possess.

Supervisors:
Dr. Idit Gil
Prof. Wolf Gruner

In this thesis the topic of isolation and the Lodz Ghetto will be addressed. The isolation of the Lodz Ghetto contained features that in their extremity make the case of Lodz unique. While the notion that the ghetto in Lodz was isolated has been well-recorded, research about the exact meanings and consequences that such a major characteristic had on its population has so far been lacking in scholarly literature. Accordingly, by turning to diaries, memoirs, testimonies, and other forms of egodocuments, this thesis aims at finally addressing the question: How did the Jewish population in the Lodz ghetto experience their isolation? This will be achieved by first discussing the extent of the isolation and investigating continued connections between the ghetto and the outside world. Then, the portrayals that the ghetto population expressed regarding their isolation will be in focus, by looking for articulations dealing with the state of being more or less cut off from the rest of the world. Finally, this thesis will also research the consequences of isolation by taking a closer look at how isolation affected how the ghetto inhabitants viewed their future and their ability to imagine themselves beyond the limits of the barbed ghetto wires.

Supervisors:
Prof. Dr. Andrea Löw
Prof. Gordon J. Horwitz