Trinity College Trinity College Digital Repository Senior Theses and Projects Student Scholarship Spring 2015 Ordinary Women: Female Perpetrators of the Nazi Final Solution Haley A. Wodenshek Trinity College,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.trincoll.edu/theses Part of the European History Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Recommended Citation Wodenshek, Haley A., "Ordinary Women: Female Perpetrators of the Nazi Final Solution". Senior Theses, Trinity College, Hartford, CT 2015. Trinity College Digital Repository, https://digitalrepository.trincoll.edu/theses/522 Ordinary Women: Female Perpetrators of the Nazi Final Solution Haley Wodenshek History Department Senior Thesis Advisor: Allison Rodriguez Class of 2015 2 Table of Contents Acknowledgements……………..………………………………………………………... 1 “We believe in Adolf Hitler, our Eternal Führer”………………………………………... 2 An Introduction to the Role of Nazi Women Chapter 1: “Power would tame [Hitler’s] extremism, they said”………………………. 22 The Rise and Fall of the Weimar Republic Chapter 2: Hitler’s Girls………………………………………………………………… 43 Chapter 3: Hitler’s Girls Go East……………………………………………………….. 67 Chapter 4: The Case Studies of Herta Oberheuser, Irma Grese & Ilse Koch…………... 85 The Case of Herta Oberheuser ............................................................................. 87 The Case of Irma Ilse Ida Grese, #9 ………………………………………....... 108 The Case of Ilse Koch ........................................................................................ 127 Conclusion: Fleeing the East, The Final Retreat ……………………………………... 149 “My [sic] wife, sir, wouldn’t hurt a fly.” Works Cited…………………………………………………………………………… 158 3 Acknowledgements *** This work is dedicated to my mother Anne Wodenshek, who has always pushed me to become the strong and independent woman I am today, and who gave me the gift of education. *** I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to my Thesis advisor, Professor Allison Rodriguez for helping me through this yearlong process.