Major Crimes and True Crime

Did you know that Audrey Hepburn helped the Dutch resistance during the Holocaust?  Audrey Hepburn was born in Brussels, Belgium, on May 4, 1929. Her mother was a Dutch noblewoman and so she grew up in the Netherlands, mainly in Amsterdam. When the Nazis invaded Amsterdam, Audrey went by the name “Edda van Heemstra” as having an English sounding name was dangerous under occupation.  In 1942, her uncle was executed by the Nazis and her half brother was deported to a concentration camp. Her other half brother went into hiding shortly thereafter. Audrey witnessed the horrors of the Holocaust from the outside. After the war, she said: “more than once I was at the station seeing trainloads of Jews being transported, seeing all these faces over the top of the wagon. I remember, very sharply, one little boy standing with his parents on the platform, very pale, very blond, wearing a coat that was much too big for him, and he stepped on the train. I was a child observing a child.”...

At age 27, with no prior trial experience, Ben Ferencz prosecuted what was then called “the biggest murder trial in history.” He secured guilty verdicts against 22 perpetrators, including Nazi officials, at the Nuremberg trials. They were tried for the murder of over a million people, most of whom were Jewish. Ben was a recent Harvard Law graduate when he was tasked with helping to set up the United States’ first war crimes branch in Europe. He collected evidence of Nazi crimes as the Allies liberated concentration camps. "I had peered into hell," Ben said of what he witnessed. Ben became a prosecutor only because no one else was available when new evidence was uncovered.  After the trials, he devoted his life to fighting for peace and justice.  Photos 1 and 2: USHMM, courtesy of Benjamin Ferencz #OTD #Holocaust #Birthday

During the Holocaust, many heroic women resisted the Nazis in any way they could. Some fought the Nazis directly, while others offered covert help to those in harm's way, assisted with rescue efforts, or aided the underground resistance. After escaping the Lenin ghetto, photographer Faye Schulman joined a partisan group and documented its activities through her photographs. A non-Jewish Danish woman, Ebba Lund, helped smuggle Jews by boat out of German-occupied Denmark to safety in Sweden. In the Netherlands, Frieda Belinfante produced convincing fake ID cards for those hiding from persecution. Ala Gertner paid with her life after trying to help destroy a crematorium in Auschwitz. While imprisoned in the Warsaw ghetto, Vladka Meed smuggled information, forged documents, weapons, and more between the ghetto and the outside world. We honor these women and the many others who spoke out and fought back against the Nazis. Click the link in our bio to learn more about one of these brave ...

Even with their lives on the line, these Jews stood up to the Nazis.  Nearly half a million Jews had been trapped inside the Warsaw ghetto since fall 1940, living and dying in terrible conditions. Over the following years, hundreds of thousands were sent to be killed. In the winter of 1943, sensing that the Nazis wanted to deport everyone left in the ghetto, Jewish resistance forces planned to fight back. #OnThisDay in 1943, their armed resistance against the Nazis began. Armed with pistols, homemade grenades, and a few automatic weapons, about 700 ghetto fighters—mostly young adults—held off Nazi forces for 27 days. The Nazis were shocked by the strength of their resistance. Eventually, Nazi forces took back control of the ghetto by burning it down block by block.  By the end of the uprising, more than 7,000 Jews had been killed. Nearly 50,000 Jews were sent to concentration camps and killing centers where most were killed. As the first large Jewish armed uprising during Worl...

In 1943, Stefania Podgórska, a young Polish woman, made the riskiest decision of her life—to hide 13 Jews in German-occupied Poland. As a teen, Stefania began working at a local grocery store owned by the Diamant family. She quickly became close with them. The Diamants and other Jews from their town were forced to live in a ghetto. Despite the danger, Stefania helped the family by exchanging their valuables for food.  In summer 1943, fearing the Germans would soon liquidate the ghetto, Josef, one of the remaining Diamant family members, asked Stefania if she would be willing to find a larger home to hide him and other Jews. She quickly found a cottage with a large attic, and Josef became the first of 13 Jews to find refuge there.  Stefania and her younger sister, Helena, cared for the hidden Jews throughout the war. The sisters brought them food, washed their clothing, and made sure they didn’t raise suspicion—especially when Germans forcefully moved into their home for severa...

While imprisoned in Auschwitz, Dr. Otto Wolken made a daring decision—he risked his life to help save a 12-year-old boy.  Despite having his medical degree stripped by the Nazi regime, Otto was selected to work as a camp doctor. He tried to help those whom he could, but many of his patients died from disease or were sent to the gas chambers. "There are ... incidents that remain with me, which I have not been able to forget," Otto reflected.  In 1944, a young Italian Jewish boy, Luigi Ferri, arrived in Auschwitz, where he met Otto. Determined to keep Luigi alive, Otto first hid him in the barracks for weeks. Luigi was later put to work as an errand boy, protecting him from the gas chambers. When the camp was evacuated and its prisoners placed on death marches in early 1945, Luigi hid once again, this time with Otto. They survived, and are pictured here after their liberation. Photo: USHMM, courtesy of Frieda Fisz Greenspan #Holocaust #History #NationalDoctorsDay

Horrifying Nazi Experiments Conducted On Humans For those born after the Cold War era, it's hard to imagine a time when the entire world wasn't aware of the medical experiments conducted in World War II-era Germany. When looking back on the medical experiments of WWII, it may be easy to feel like we're reading science fiction. However, the actions committed by military scientists in WWII Germany were very real. Decades later, researchers still debate whether or not there's a moral quandary in using the findings of Third Reich scientists in modern medicine. From seemingly innocuous experiments on eye pigmentation to procedures involving the creation of conjoined twins and the examination of internal organs, all of the worst experiments the Nazis conducted on people are on this list. Artificial Insemination Heinrich Himmler, a leading SS member, ordered Dr. Carl Clauberg  to artificially inseminate concentration camp prisoners through various e...

Woman who survived Auschwitz when gas ran out is about to turn 101 Klara Marcus was a 30-year-old Auschwitz prisoner in 1944 when she was forced to strip naked and march into the gas chamber — only there was no more gas left. “God was watching over me that day,” said Marcus, who is about to celebrate her 101st birthday, the Central European News reported. “I was chosen towards the end of the day with a large group of other women and we were made ready for the gas chamber,” said Marcus, of Sighetu Marmatiej in northern Romania. “But when they put us inside and went to turn the gas on, they found they had run out,” she said. “One of the guards joked that it was our lucky day because they had already killed so many, they didn’t have any gas left for us.” She then managed to escape from the infamous Nazi death camp in southern Poland, where more than a million people were killed. “After I got free, I managed to make my way back to my home to look for my family,” said Marcus — but she disco...

Poland confirms Minnesota man as Nazi commander Poland will seek the arrest and extradition of a Minnesota man exposed by The Associated Press as a former commander in an SS-led unit that burned Polish villages and killed civilians in World War II, prosecutors said Monday. Prosecutor Robert Janicki said evidence gathered over years of investigation into U.S. citizen Michael K. confirmed "100 percent" that he was a commander of a unit in the SS-led Ukrainian Self Defense Legion. He did not release the last name, in line with Poland's privacy laws, but the AP has identified the man as 98-year-old Michael Karkoc, from Minneapolis. "All the pieces of evidence interwoven together allow us to say the person who lives in the U.S. is Michael K., who commanded the Ukrainian Self Defense Legion which carried out the pacification of Polish villages in the Lublin region," Janicki said. The decision in Poland comes four years after the AP published a story establishing that ...

Execution by guillotine of Sister Maria Restituta Kafka for refusing to remove the crucifix by nazis Execution by guillotine of Sister Maria Restituta Kafka strongly criticizes Nazi regime  Maria Restituta Kafka working as a nurse at the municipal hospital in the Lainz Hospital. she met members of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity and joined their community at the age of 20 and was given the religious name of Maria Restituta. During World War 1, Kafka serve as a nurse in the hospital. she was called 'Sister Resolute'. after the Anschluss in which Germany annexed Austria. Kafka strongly criticize the Nazi government and against the implementing the Nuremberg Laws. The Nazi authorities demanded that the crosses to be removed, but she refused. she was arrested by the Gestapo, the Nazi Secret police for hanging the crucifixes, and  also of having writing a poem mocking Hitler. she was sentenced to death by the guillotine for conspiracy to commit treason. She was beheaded...

Eva Mozes remembers waking up in Auschwitz-Birkenau on January 27, 1945. "It was quiet," Eva recalls. "It was very eerie to have such a quiet morning. We thought maybe this would be the day that we would be free." That afternoon, Soviet troops arrived, liberating the remaining prisoners. In footage taken after the camp's liberation, Eva and her twin sister, Miriam, can be seen walking hand in hand out of Auschwitz. Eva and Miriam were born in a small village in Romania in 1934. When the twins were just six years old, their town was annexed by Hungary, and when they were 10, it was occupied by Nazi Germany. Hungarian and German authorities sent Eva, Miriam, their parents, and their two older sisters to a ghetto in the nearby town of Szilágysomlyó (Simleu Silvaniei) in 1944. From there, they were then deported to Auschwitz. Upon their arrival, Eva and Miriam were separated from their family and selected by SS doctor Josef Mengele for his notorious experimentation ...

In the fall of 1944, ten-year-old Thomas Buergenthal found himself all alone in Auschwitz, destined for the gas chamber. Thomas had already survived the Kielce ghetto and a forced labor camp by the time German authorities deported him and his parents to Auschwitz in August 1944. Typically, children were taken on arrival and murdered in the gas chambers, but, because there was no selection when Thomas and his family arrived there, he managed to survive. His mother was taken to the women's section of the camp, but Thomas and his father remained together. However, Thomas remained in grave danger. The SS guards regularly selected prisoners to be murdered in the gas chambers and as a child Thomas stood out. While he had survived a number of selections by hiding, this time, Thomas had been caught. "They saw me as a child, and they motioned me to go one way, and my father go the other way," Thomas remembered. "And that's the last I saw of ... my father." Thomas and...

Agi Geva’s mother made her promise never to remove the tattoo inked on her arm at Auschwitz-Birkenau. “This is proof of us being there,” she told her daughter. “The letter A and the number.” At age 14, Agi was registered as a prisoner at Auschwitz-Birkenau, and was forcibly tattooed with her prisoner number. For Agi, the pain of receiving the tattoo was surpassed by the pain of being stripped of her identity. “They kept on telling us, "You have no names from today. You are just numbers." Agi, her mother, and sister survived four camps, forced labor, and a death march before they were liberated by American troops in April 1945. During the Holocaust, Auschwitz was the only camp where prisoner numbers were tattooed. After liberation, Auschwitz survivors were able to shed the uniforms, but the tattoos remained. #HolocaustSurvivor #HolocaustRemembranceDay #HolocaustMemorialDay

“In Auschwitz, I never cried, and people around me never cried.” Irene Weiss was just a teenager when she learned to turn off her feelings in order to survive. When a Nazi officer selected Irene to perform forced labor at Auschwitz-Birkenau, it gave her a chance to survive that was denied to her mother and younger siblings, who were murdered upon arrival. She was assigned to a unit responsible for sorting through the stolen personal belongings of Jews. The storage barracks where she worked were next to one of Auschwitz's gas chambers. Irene often saw the faces of those unknowingly headed toward their deaths. Sometimes they would stop and talk to her. Other times, she heard their screams. “When we worked night shifts … this place was close enough to the train platform that you could hear in the night the whistle of the train and then you would hear the humming noise of large crowds. You could hear people in the distance. Within a few minutes or so the large column of young women, mo...

One of Maria Dworzecka’s earliest and strongest memories was when she was separated from her mother at two and a half years old. “I still have shivers when I think about it,” Maria later testified. Born to Jewish parents in Bialystok in June 1941, Maria was only a few days old when the Germans invaded Soviet-occupied Poland. Her father was killed shortly after the invasion. While Maria and her mother, Bela, were forced into the Białystok ghetto, they later escaped and fled to a nearby town where they lived under false Christian identities. In spring 1944, the German occupiers rounded up and deported non-Jewish Polish civilians at random as a reprisal for anti-German activity in the area. Maria and Bela were walking down the street when her mother was suddenly grabbed by German authorities, as they believed she was a non-Jewish Polish woman. Maria cried out for her mother, but Bela pushed her away, hoping to protect her. All alone, Maria was left to wander the streets. She eventually sa...

Irene Meyer was born in Paderborn, Germany, on July 31, 1925. She was Jewish, the daughter of Henriette and Julius Meyer. She had a little sister, Ellen.  In 1942, Irene and her family were deported to the Terezín camp in Czechoslovakia. They were held there for two years. On October 9, 1944, the family was sent to Auschwitz. Irene’s parents and little sister were sent directly to the gas chamber after they arrived in the camp.  Irene, however, was selected for forced labor in the camp. She was only in Auschwitz for a short time, and soon she was sent to the Gross-Rosen concentration camp. Once again, she was there for a short time. She was then sent to the Buchenwald camp, and from Buchenwald, she was sent to Bergen-Belsen.  Irene fell ill with typhus in Bergen-Belsen, but survived long enough to see the camp’s liberation on April 15, 1945. Irene, an orphan at age nineteen, was completely alone after liberation. She was extremely weak from her time in the camps, and neve...

American tank commander George Gross encountered “an outburst of pure, almost hysterical relief” from an abandoned trainload of Jewish prisoners found near Farsleben, Germany, at the end of the war.  #OnThisDay in 1945, two US Army units came across a train carrying 2,500 Jewish prisoners from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Nazi officers guarding the train fled when they saw American vehicles, leaving the passengers locked inside the train.  As American soldiers opened the doors, Gross remembered the prisoners looked like “skeletons.” They had been starved in Bergen-Belsen for months and spent days in the train with inadequate food, water, and sanitation. SS officers were transporting the prisoners from Bergen-Belsen to the Theresienstadt ghetto in occupied Czechoslovakia to prevent the prisoners from being liberated. The officers had orders to blow up the train if it could not reach its destination.  Upon encountering the train, one of George’s fellow soldiers cal...

Even with their lives on the line, these Jews stood up to the Nazis.  Nearly half a million Jews had been trapped inside the Warsaw ghetto since fall 1940, living and dying in terrible conditions. Over the following years, hundreds of thousands were sent to be killed. In the winter of 1943, sensing that the Nazis wanted to deport everyone left in the ghetto, Jewish resistance forces planned to fight back. #OnThisDay in 1943, their armed resistance against the Nazis began. Armed with pistols, homemade grenades, and a few automatic weapons, about 700 ghetto fighters—mostly young adults—held off Nazi forces for 27 days. The Nazis were shocked by the strength of their resistance. Eventually, Nazi forces took back control of the ghetto by burning it down block by block.  By the end of the uprising, more than 7,000 Jews had been killed. Nearly 50,000 Jews were sent to concentration camps and killing centers where most were killed. As the first large Jewish armed uprising during Worl...

After the Nazis killed most of their family, three surviving brothers formed a rescue and resistance group that welcomed Jewish refugees. Escaping to the swampy woods in German-occupied Poland (today Belarus), Tuvia, Asael, and Zus Bielski saved more than 1,200 Jews from the Germans. They not only preserved the lives of those hiding with them but created a community for Jews in the middle of war-torn Europe.  Tuvia was determined to accept and protect all Jews regardless of age or gender. Under his leadership, the community thrived. Workshops employed over 200 people, including tailors, carpenters, and blacksmiths. The partisan leaders also managed a primitive infirmary, a school for the children, and a synagogue. This vibrant Jewish forest community recreated a sense of belonging that the Nazis aimed to destroy.  The partisans also fought against the Germans by disabling trains and blowing up bridges, even as they were hunted by the Nazis and their collaborators. After the wa...