Hitlers Life Part III

Between December 1918 and March 1919 Hitler worked at a prisoner-of-war camp at Traunstein before returning again to Munich.
After he gave evidence at an investigation on which he had witnessed a takeover bid by local Communists,
he was asked to become part of a local army organization which was responsible for persuading returning soldiers not to turn to communism or pacifism.

During his training for this tasks and subsequent duties he was able to sharpen his oratory skills. Part of his duties was to spy on certain local political groups, and during a meeting of the German Workers' Party he became so furious by one of the speeches that he delivered an angry tirade to the speaker. The founder of the party, Anion Drexler, was so impressed by Hitler's tirade that he asked him to join their organization. He finally agreed to join the committee and became their seventh official in September 1919.

Hitler was given responsibility for publicity and propaganda, and first succeeded in attracting over a hundred people to a meeting in held October where he delivered his first speech to a large audience. The meeting and his elocution were a great success, and afterwards in February 1920 he organized a much larger event for a crowd of nearly two thousand in the Munich Hofbrauhaus. Hitler himself was not the main speaker, but when his turn came he calmed a rowdy audience and presented a twenty-five point programme of ideas which were to be the basis of the party. The name of the party was itself changed to the National Socialist German Workers Party (or Nazi for short) on April 1st 1920.

Not long after the February speech he was discharged from the army. Hitler continued to expand his influence in the party and began to form a private group of thugs which he used to quell disorder at party meetings and later to break up rival party's meetings. This group later became the Sturmabteilung or S.A. - Hitler's brown shirted storm troopers. He also became the regular speaker at party events from then on, attracting large crowds for each meeting. During the summer of 1920 Hitler chose the swastika as the Nazi party emblem.

By 1921 Adolf Hitler had virtually secured total control of the Nazi party, however all Nazis did not like this. In July of that year, while Hitler was in Berlin, the disgruntled members of the party proposed a merger with a like-minded political party in Nuremburg in the hope that this would weaken Hitler's authority. On hearing the news of the proposed merger, Hitler rushed back to Munich to face the party and threatened to resign. The other members were aware that Hitler was bringing in the lion's share of funds into the party, from the collections following his speeches at meetings and from other sympathetic sources. Now they knew they couldn't afford his resignation. Hitler then proceeded to turn the tables on the committee members and forced them to accept him as formal leader of the party with dictatorial powers.

Up to November 1923 Hitler continued to build up the strength of the Nazi Party. During this time he also plotted to overthrow the German Weimar Republic by force. On November 8th 1923 Hitler led an attempt to take over the local Bavarian Government in Munich in an action that became known as the "Beer Hall Putsch." Despite initially kidnapping the Bavarian officials in the Buergerbraukeller beer hall in Munich and proclaiming a new regime using their names, the coup was not successful. The officials were allowed to escape and re-gain control of the police and the armed forces. The coup was ended on the morning of November 9th, when a column of three thousand SA men headed by Hitler and General Ludendorff (one of the most senior generals of the First World War) were halted on their way to the centre of Munich by armed police. After a brief gunfight, only General Ludendorff and his aide had made it through to the central Plaza, where they were arrested. Hitler had fled the scene and was later arrested and charged with treason. After his trial for treason he was sentenced to five years in Landsberg prison, however he had successfully used the trial itself to gain publicity for himself and his ideas. During his term in prison Hitler began dictating his thoughts and philosophies to Rudolf Hess which became the book "Mein Kampf" (My Struggle).

Israel Marks Holocaust Memorial Day

President Shimon Peres vowed the Jewish state would never allow the Jewish genocide to be repeated as Israel begins marking it's Holocaust Remembrance Day.

At the main ceremony at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, he said," We will never forget, we will never hide and we will never stop asking ourselves what we must do to prevent what happened to ever repeat itself". Six torches were lit to honor the six million Jews who were killed during WWII.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said that anti semitism and Holocaust denial was on the rise across the world. "Still 63 years later, who would believe, the ugly face of the hatred of Jews and Israelis appears on different stages across the planet. You wish to deny the right of existence of the Jewish state, and you are wrong to believe the the Jewish state was created due to Holocaust". He was referring mainly to Iran.

Iran's firebrand President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has branded the Holocaust a "myth" and in 2006 Tehran hosted a controversial revisionist Holocaust conference, sparking an international outcry.

A study published by Tel Aviv University earlier on Monday, said the worldwide number of anti-semitic incidents in 2007 increased be nearly 7% from the previous year.

May 2nd marks the day of remembrance for 2008

Ann's Story Continued

Her Father had a hard time recognizing them with the condition they were in. And her father was a wizard with his hands. He had golden hands. He could create anything. And so he gets a job in a German factory in the Warsaw ghetto, becomes a manager. But then the raids begin and he and her mother are at the factory and to protect her he fashioned a false bottom in a chest. And she and Lila her sister would stay in that.
Her mother called it a vegetable bin. A chest that would hold things. You lifted the top and you would store things in it. Her father put all rags and old newspapers on top so if it was lifted , it didn't look very nice. But underneath he had built two little chairs, and a potty and when they went to work, they left with them whatever they had, some water, whatever bread they had, and they put them into this furniture, and put it against the wall and went to work.

If you ask her today how did you do this, it's very hard for her to explain. Having grandchildren it's not very easy to keep children quiet. Different time and place. Children in Europe were supposed to be seen and not heard. As her mother later on in life tried to explain to two obedient daughters. And I think it was, they knew. They grew up very fast and realized that this was a matter life and death. That they had to be quiet. . Once they were in there they had to be quiet. There were times because when everybody went to work, older people, or able people go to work, the Germans would come through the building. They could hear them walking up the stairs. They could hear them talking. Yet they weren't found.

She always thought back, had they brought with them the German Shepard dogs, of course they would have been found. But somebody was looking over them and they didn't. And her parents would come back and at night they'd be with them. There were many things she can't explain, that for some reason she thinks the Almighty was looking over them

The Story of Ann Levy ,Survivor. Part I

Ann Levy was a normal four year old child when the Nazis attacked and occupied Poland in September 1939. She and her family survived two years living in the Warsaw ghetto, before escaping with her family.
This is her story.

Ann was born on July 2 1935. She lived in a nice apartment with her Mother, Father and Sister. She remembers Sundays when her and her Father would stroll through the park and he would buy her ice cream and balloons. Her Father had his own lumber business and her Mother stayed home with the children. Her Mother even had help that came in.
She and her family took vacations in the countryside and to the beach. She remembers being a daredevil when she was young. When they were on vacation once she climbed in a dog house with a large German Shepard and was not afraid. This behavior probably helped her later in her life.

The war started for them on September 7, 1939. Her first memories of the war was seeing her family upset and crying and looking out the windows. Out of curiosity she did too. There was a large reform orthodox temple across the street. Everybody was upset because the Germans were taking out all the prayer shawls and prayer books and putting them in a heap in front of synagogue and finally torched it. This is how she remembers the beginning of the war.

Her mother dictated a memoir and in it she says that the Germans handed out cookies and candy to the non-Jewish population who stood and watched as the synagogue burned.
That was for their propaganda. To show people that everything was all right for them. It was a happy time for them. It was a hard time for the Jewish population.

Then she and her family was made to wear the yellow star of David on their clothes front and back. Even her little Sister in her stroller had to wear the Star of David. She never thought of herself as anything but a child, and now she was different. She was Jewish, and being Jewish was something that caused grief. Then she knew that was just part of the struggle that was to begin.

Her father fled to Russia thinking that the Nazis would not harm the women or children. He left the three of them together, her sister, her mother and herself. Her Mother received orders to vacate the premises. It was such a large building it would be taken over by the Germans. They had a couple hours before to clear out and to make sure the linen on the bed was changed. And the table was set for company. The family was only able to take two little suitcases to carry for her sister, Mother and herself. It was a terrible, terrible time for her. Having to leave everything that she owned and not knowing what happen.

Her father tried to get them back to Russia. But they never made it. Her sister was ill. Her Mother became frightened and decided to go to Warsaw. And when they went to Warsaw, the ghetto was there. They saw more and more Jews coming into the Warsaw ghetto. Her Mother went there because their Uncle lived in Warsaw and his wife was a Doctor. They imagined by having a sister in law who was a physician they’d be better off there. Of course it turned out to be the worst place that they could have gone to.

How to describe the Warsaw ghetto? In the beginning her Mother would work. In the beginning they stayed with her Mother’s family. Her Mother found a room where they would stay. The three of them. For food her Mother decided that she would work and she would collect from whoever had cooked something that night. She would go from one room to another and collect in a pot whatever people had. If they had a potato, carrot or cabbage that night, all in one pot it went. They tried to share it with people who didn't have anything.

There were almost 500,000 Jewish people and a quarter of them died of starvation.

She knew exactly how they felt because as they lived in Warsaw ghetto it was progressively getting worse and worse. The atrocities in streets were horrendous. You could look out the window and you would see dead bodies in the street, you would see a wagon picking up corpses and trying to clean up. The worst thing she remembers was people that just dropped in street. They were dead. But because they had socks or shoe, pants or some kind of clothing on somebody passing by they saw these articles a dead body he doesn't need, cover up the body with newspaper and take possession anything the poor soul had. Clothing. Anything. And to this day the worst thing she can see is somebody putting a newspaper over themselves because it just brings back the memory. This is what she saw. And people, children, were starving.

And she was on the verge of death and all of a sudden her father returned. He smuggled himself into the Warsaw ghetto coming from Russia when the war between Germany and Russia broke out. It was a Saturday morning, her mother wrote, in December 1941. Her Mother went to the door and passed out because of the shock. It was two years that they were separated. By this time her sister and she, like the rest of the population were emaciated from hunger. They were at the point just sitting around in bed not moving a lot because of weakness. And she remembers her father saying that when he saw them he was afraid to touch them. He was afraid to touch them because they looked so frail. He brought them back to life. He brought bread, butter, and he cut up bread cubicles. Gave them that a little at time, knowing full well if he gave too much, not used to that they would become ill. That's the reason when she says what happened to us they wouldn't be here if he hadn't. Her mother, sister and she would have perished as every one else did.

Part II the story continues tomorrow.

New Stories

I will continue the History of Hitler, but in between I will interject with stories of survivors. Just to keep the perspective of where this is going. Please come every day to read the next chapter.

Hitler's Early Days Part II

Between December 1918 and March 1919 Hitler worked at a prisoner-of-war camp at Traunstein before returning again to Munich.
After he gave evidence at an investigation on which he had witnessed a takeover bid by local Communists,
he was asked to become part of a local army organization which was responsible for persuading returning soldiers not to turn to communism or pacifism.

During his training for this tasks and subsequent duties he was able to sharpen his oratory skills. Part of his duties was to spy on certain local political groups, and during a meeting of the German Workers' Party he became so furious by one of the speeches that he delivered an angry tirade to the speaker. The founder of the party, Anion Drexler, was so impressed by Hitler's tirade that he asked him to join their organization. He finally agreed to join the committee and became their seventh official in September 1919.

Hitler was given responsibility for publicity and propaganda, and first succeeded in attracting over a hundred people to a meeting in held October where he delivered his first speech to a large audience. The meeting and his elocution were a great success, and afterwards in February 1920 he organized a much larger event for a crowd of nearly two thousand in the Munich Hofbrauhaus. Hitler himself was not the main speaker, but when his turn came he calmed a rowdy audience and presented a twenty-five point programme of ideas which were to be the basis of the party. The name of the party was itself changed to the National Socialist German Workers Party (or Nazi for short) on April 1st 1920.

Not long after the February speech he was discharged from the army. Hitler continued to expand his influence in the party and began to form a private group of thugs which he used to quell disorder at party meetings and later to break up rival party's meetings. This group later became the Sturmabteilung or S.A. - Hitler's brown shirted storm troopers. He also became the regular speaker at party events from then on, attracting large crowds for each meeting. During the summer of 1920 Hitler chose the swastika as the Nazi party emblem.

Hitler's Early Days Part I

Adolf Hitler was born on April 20th 1889 in Braunau-am-Inn, Austria. Adolf had four other sibling, two of which died in infancy, one died at the age of six and one Sister who outlived him. His Father had died when he was thirteen . Adolf did very poor in school finally leaving without completing his tuition. His real ambition was to be an artist. Between the ages of sixteen and nineteen he neither worked or went to school, instead developed and interest in politics and history. In October of 1907 he applied to the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts and was rejected. In October of 1908 he applied for a second time and did not even make it to the test.
His Mother Klara died when he was nineteen and since he had no relatives able or willing to support him,
So, in 1909, he moved to Vienna in the hope of somehow earning a living. Within a year he was living in homeless shelters and eating at charity soup-kitchens. He had declined to take regular employment and took occasional menial jobs and sold some of his paintings or advertising posters whenever he could to provide sustenance.
In 1913 still penniless he moved to Munich. At the start of World War one in 1914, he volunteered for the German army and was accepted into the 16th Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment . He fought bravely and was promoted to corporal and decorated with both the Iron Cross Second Class and First Class. He wore this medal until his dying day. Ironically the Captain who recommended him for the award was a Jew.
The day the Armistice was announced Adolf was in Hospital recovering from temporary blindness caused by a British gas attack in the Ypres Salient. In December 1918 he was back with his regiment.

Picture is a portrait by Hitler himself