Under Nazi Rule

The Nazis brought many countries and vast areas of Europe under their control by annexing, invading, and occupying them, but this happened gradually, over several years. Austria, for example, was annexed in March 1938. Poland was invaded on 1 September 1939, which led to the outbreak of the war. Hungary, by contrast, was invaded by German troops as late as March 1944.

This means that there is no simple chronological story about what it was like to be a child living in an area under Nazi rule. Children's lives were very different, depending on where they lived and when, and of course the Nazis' policy toward the social groups the children belonged to played a crucial role. The Nazis persecuted many different groups in society, most notably Jews, Sinti and Roma, handicapped people, regime critics, or homosexuals.

Even within one country at one particular point in time, the fates of children belonging to the same social group could be very different: some Jewish children tried to escape the Nazis by hiding (either literally, in forests, attics or cellars) or by pretending they were not Jewish; others were forced to live in ghettos; and others were deported to concentration and extermination camps where they were murdered. In total, about 1.5 million Jewish children died in the Holocaust.

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The most famous Jewish child victim of the Nazis is Anne Frank (1929-1945). She and her family hid in an attic in Amsterdam for more than two years, but then they were betrayed and deported. Anne was murdered in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, together with most of her family members. Only her father survived. The diary that Anne wrote while in hiding has become one of the most well-known books in the world. (Photo courtesy of @ANNE FRANK FONDS Basel, Switzerland)

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Studio portrait of Buchenwald survivor Benek Wrzonski, wearing a prisoner uniform. The children went to a photo studio in town asking for a portrait of themselves in uniform. Weimar, Germany, 27 July 1945. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Jacques Ribons).

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Boy with raised arms during the liquidation of the Warsaw ghetto in spring 1943.  Jews captured by SS and SD troops are forced to leave their shelter and march to the ‘Umschlagplatz’ for deportation. The original German caption reads: 'Pulled from the  bunkers by force.‘  From the Stroop Report, a souvenir album for Heinrich Himmler.  (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College). 

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Robert Wagemann, a physically disabled Jehovah’s Witness child, sits on his hospital bed, Berlin 1942/43. The Nazis wanted to kill him as part of their clandestine 'euthanasia' programme, which was designed to murder physically and mentally disabled people. Listen to Robert telling his story of persecution and survival. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Robert Wagemann).

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A Gypsy child interned in the Rivesaltes transit camp in southern France, 1941/1942. It is unknown whether this girl was a Sinti or a Roma child. In 1941, there were about 3,000 child inmates in Rivesaltes (out of a total population of 8,000 prisoners). Most internees were deported to Auschwitz, but aid organisations managed to have almost 600 children removed to children's homes elsewhere in France. Sinti and Roma were persecuted by the Nazis as "asocials" and as members of an allegedly inferior 'race'. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Friedel Bohny-Reiter).

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Portrait of Alice Edinger (*1928) (later Dr. Alice Balazs), a member of the Hungarian Zionist youth resistance organization, Budapest, ca. 1944. The Hungarian Zionist Youth Movement engaged in resistance and rescue operations during the Holocaust, e.g. by warning Jews of planned deportations, by fabricating false identity papers, by assisting Jewish refugees, or by establishing safe homes for children. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Society for the Research of the History of the Zionist Youth Movement in Hungary, courtesy of David Gur).

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A member of the Hitler youth poses for a photograph, Germany, date unknown.  In 1936, the Nazis made membership in the Hitler Youth compulsory for German boys and girls aged 10-18. Here, the young were indoctrinated with Nazi ideology. Boys received paramilitary training, girls were prepared for motherhood. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Dan Lenchner).

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Child survivors of Auschwitz, wearing adult-size prisoner jackets, stand behind a barbed wire fence. Still from the Soviet film of the liberation of Auschwitz, shot by the film unit of the First Ukrainian Front over a period of several months after the Red Army had liberated Auschwitz on 17 January 1945. The Soviets found almost 200 child survivors in Auschwitz. Many of them had been singled out for medical experiments; others, who had passed themselves off as older than they were, survived as slave labourers. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Belarusian State Archive of Documentary Film and Photography).