The Terezin Concentration Camp and How Libraries Impact History
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The Terezin Concentration Camp and How Libraries Impact History Louise S. Johnson Simmons College Prague 2010 Summer Course Sponsored by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Professor Barbara Wildemuth June 16, 2011 Introduction In the summer of 2010 I traveled to the Czech Republic with a group of librarians and graduate students to study a variety of library institutions. We attended lectures at the public and the university libraries in Prague, we visited small towns and toured the libraries there, we viewed many large and small archives, and had access to castle libraries and private libraries in monasteries. We spent time with a number of the leading librarians in the country and were privileged to speak with the staff of many different kinds of institutions that served to preserve present and past materials and to provide organized access to Czech citizens and their visitors who want to study about a specific subject or time. During this trip a small group of us went to the Terezin Concentration Camp (Theresienstadt in German) and listened in on a tour group from the United States (Boston area) that included some survivors of the camp. What could have been a somber, but somewhat mysterious tour of an empty concentration camp came alive as these survivors told of their day-to-day lives during this period. It became clear to me that not only is the physical and written history that libraries, museums and archives provide important in learning about our past, but the narratives and one- to-one conversations need to also be a part of our library experience. Upon my return I sought out the group Facing History and Ourselves that was started 35 years ago in my hometown of Brookline, Massachusetts as a project to educate youth about the holocaust. Their mission, which has evolved, is to link the past and the present together, 2 specifically around moral issues facing human beings when confronting such events as the holocaust, the Rwandan genocide or the civil rights movement in the United States. They do this by study and dialogue with those who lived through these times and those who are growing up and will possibly face similar events and decisions in their lifetimes. The choices that we make as an individual do have an impact with what happens to the lives of others. Facing History and Ourselves has created, over the last 35 years, an international organization and series of libraries to keep this aspect of our human history alive so that we may strive to be citizens of the world that work to eradicate genocide and injustice from our lives. History of Terezin The Terezin Concentration Camp began its history as a fortress built in the 1780s. Constructed on the orders of Emperor Joseph II of Austria; it was to be part of a defense system for the empire that was never fully realized (Chladkova, 1995). The small fortress (Kleine Festung) was the prison and the main fortress was a walled garrison town, and was named for the Emperor’s mother, Theresa (Theresienstadt in German or Terezin in Czech). In the 1800s, up until World War II, the small prison was used to house a select number of prisoners; mostly those convicted of military or political crimes. The larger fortress became a sort of military base consisting of large brick office style buildings surrounding a town square and a warren of smaller streets tightly packed with worker’s cottages. With the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1939 there was a need on the part of the conquerors to house many political prisoners. The small fortress was taken over by the Nazis and used for the duration of the war as a prison/ torture chamber known for horrendous conditions and as a place were almost no one emerged alive once seen going through its gates. The larger fortress/ 3 town (Grosse Festung) became a bizarre Nazi propaganda fantasy world whose legacy lives on to this day. Towards the end of November 1941 the town of Terezin was taken by the Nazis to be used as a processing center and work camp. By early 1942 the non-Jewish inhabitants of Terezin had been removed and the “town” was now exclusively Jewish with Nazi overseers. The vast majority of Jews from Czechoslovakia (approximately 80,000) were forcibly removed to Terezin along with others who came from other parts of occupied Europe (Karny, 1996 and Volavkova, 1993). The work done by Jews interned at Terezin involved reprocessing clothes (in particular, underwear) that had been confiscated from other Jews as they were sent to the death camps. This clothing was sorted and packaged into bundles that were then sent to Germans in need of clothing due to the shortages resulting from the war. Other work performed at Terezin was the splitting of locally-mined mica to be used in the war effort, building coffins, boxes and spraying military uniforms white, for camouflage purposes, so that they might be used during the winter fighting at the Russian front (Chladkova, 1995). In the early 1940s many Jews saw Terezin as the lesser of two evils. When faced with deportation, many Jews agreed to sign their assets over to the Third Reich in exchange for the whole family being allowed to stay together and be sent together to Terezin. There was a perception that within this walled city the Jewish population might have a chance of surviving the war. Jewish Elders administered the town under the direction of the Nazis. A system of bargaining by the Council of Jewish Elders with the Nazis was established to supply labor and 4 produce goods in exchange for the lives of the Jewish inhabitants of Terezin (Chladkova, 1995). However, the terms of this Faustian bargain were constantly altered as the Nazis’ real motive for the camp was to have a temporary holding facility until all the inhabitants could be sent to the gas chambers of Auschwitz or die of “natural causes.” “Vernichtung durch Aussiedlung” (annihilation through evacuation) was a term coined by the Nazis that expressed well what “natural causes” really meant. The trials and indignities endured by the Jews before they even got to the relocation camps hastened the deaths of many thousands of people (Karny, 1996). By the mid 1930s many of the racial segregation laws had been implemented in Germany and as the Nazi influence expanded over Europe these same policies were quickly implemented in the captured countries, including in the Czech Republic. Jews were not allowed to practice law, medicine and many other professional careers. They were banned from socializing with non- Jews. There was a curfew, which could result in imprisonment by the Gestapo and/or death if one was found on the streets after dark. Jews were not allowed to own businesses and had to sell them at “bargain prices” to Germans (Aryans) that wanted buy. The Nazis limited how and where Jewish people could live, most were forced to leave their homes to live in designated areas or to sign over their homes to their non-Jewish employees. Certain foods were not to be sold to Jews and other items were off limits as well (Karny, 1996). Many of these policies were designed to demoralize, isolate, and create a sense of second-class status for Jews as the Nazis tightened the noose towards the coming genocide. Those non-Jews that expressed anger at the policies or solidarity with their Jewish friends or family found themselves in the same boat or worse as the Nazi made sure that the annihilation would be all encompassing. 5 The genocide would take time to accomplish, as it involved a total transformation of German society and the conquered countries. There was also labor that was needed to supply the war effort. Terezin was to serve both of these evil policies and the Nazis created a management structure that allowed this strategy to flourish. There were privileges for some of the Jews, with regards to work and living arrangements, such as better food rations, less crowded living quarters and a choice of who was allowed to stay versus who would be deported farther east to the death camps that were given in exchange for their cooperation with the Nazis (Massachusetts College of Art, 1991). There was a perception that to be sent to Terezin was far better than to be on the transports to the east, the figures are grim and speak for themselves. After three years and a total of 87,000 people sent east on the transports leaving from Terezin, only 3,000 of those people were to survive the war (Chladkova, 1995). Terezin bought people a small amount of time before they were eventually murdered. The Nazis fostered the notion that Terezin was; either a sort of “old age home” or a “family style community” as it helped them to get people to sign over (to the Third Reich) their worldly possessions relatively quietly, many being unaware of the deception until they walked through the gates of Camp Terezin (Chladkova, 1995). As those Jews with influence and assets bought their way into the camp, the Germans began to realize that they were accumulating a wealth of intellectual and artistic talent in one small town. Heinrich Himmler, in particular, would use this accidental grouping to further his own twisted agenda in the years to come. 6 On the part of the Jewish inhabitants of Terezin two main philosophies began to unfold: First was to save and educate the children at all costs. The children’s barracks were staffed by Jewish teachers, artists and musicians who gave their knowledge and encouraged the children to learn.