One of the defining features of the Nazis’ regime was their apparatus of terror. This image shows the devastation of Kristallnacht, an antisemitic pogrom which took place in November 1938. Over the course of this pogrom alone, over 25,000 people were sent to concentration camps, over 7,500 businesses had their windows smashed, over 1,000 synagogues were destroyed and just under 100 people were murdered.
Courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library Collections.
The Nazis came to power in 1933, and were defeated at the end of the Second World War in 1945.
During their twelve years in power their ideology and actions shaped almost every aspect of life in Germany and the countries that they occupied.
This section will give an overview of the Nazis’ Third Reich.
On 1 April 1933, the Nazi Party led a nationwide boycott of Jewish-owned businesses across Germany.
On 25 April 1933, the Law Against Overcrowding in Schools and Universities was issued, restricting the number of Jewish students.
On 7 April 1943, the SS shut down the Chełmno death camp for the first time. They would later reopen it to liquidate the Łódź ghetto.
On 19 April 1943, the beginning of the liquidation of the Warsaw ghetto was met with organised armed resistance by its residents.
On 11 April 1945, the US army liberated Buchenwald camp.
On 15 April 1945, Bergen-Belsen camp was liberated by the British Army.
On 30 April 1945, Hitler took his own life in his bunker underneath the Reich chancellery in Berlin.
