The Holocaust: Origins, History and Aftermath C.1920-1945

Approximately 11 million people were killed during the Holocaust. No one will ever know the exact figure. Of those, some six million were Jewish, including one million children. The remainder comprised numerous ethnic and social groups deemed the Untermenschen, the subhuman species that, according to the German Chancellor Adolf Hitler and the ruling Nazis, were not fit to live.

When the implementation of the Final Solution - Reinhard Heydrich’s plan to exterminate the remaining Jewish population in Nazi occupied Europe - began in 1942, it was but the height of a brutally executed, systematic plan to rid the world of these ＂unwanted＂ peoples. But how did the Holocaust begin? How did it develop? And who was responsible?

The Holocaust explores the background to this most barbaric of crimes and contains several reproductions of moving and important documents, including a child’s drawing from the Warsaw Ghetto, the plans of the Theresienstadt concentration camp, and the Wannsee Protocol, the blueprint for the Holocaust itself.

There are 15 documents reproduced on the page, including:
Letter describing Kristallnacht and a diary extract about life in the ghetto
List of Jews to be transported, including place of departure and destination
Drawings by a child incarcerated at Theresienstadt concentration camp

Thomas Cussans is an editor and writer who has edited, written and contributed to many titles including History - The Definitive Visual Guide and The Times Atlas of European History.