Children of the Camps
During the Holocaust, millions of Jews, gypsies, and members of other groups were persecuted and murdered by Nazi occupied Europe. However, many forget to acknowledge that among these were children. It may never be known exactly how many children were murdered but it is said that as many as some 1.5 million children may have fell victim to the Nazi party.
Although children were not a main target of the Nazi’s violence, they did fall subject to persecution along with their parents. Jewish children were first exposed to persecution in school. Many of their friends who were not Jewish began not socializing with them and even began to treat them in prejudice ways. This was soon followed with the announcement
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If they were able to do work, they were sent into the camp and if they were unable to work they were sent in line for the gas chamber. Those children who fell in the third age group were often kept alive to do work in the camps. Those who refused or were unable to work were also sent to the gas chambers or just shot in the head right on the spot.
Life for children in the camps was extremely difficult. Often children were separated from their families and were forced to live in cells, tents, and fenced in cages with 50 other Jews witch they may not know. Once again, living conditions in the camps were those of the ghettos with an added stench of dead bodies and the disease that came from them. Children were usually sent to get the daily food for their cell. They had to walk down the narrow dirt paths and look at the ground. If they looked at a guard, they could be beaten or denied of their food.
Perhaps one of the greatest hardships children had to pay was the emotional and physiological toll it took on them. Even before their arrival at the camps, they were forced to witness their parents being arrested beaten and taken from their homes. Many of the children did not understand what was happening or why it was happening. Then once they did arrive at the camps, they were separated and place with people they did not know. Many of them became orphans within hours of their arrival. There were also those who knew their parents
The quality of life on the Relief camps were horrible .Majority of the men working on these camps were broke and tired farm boys. These men were treated like salves. They would receive 20 cents a day for manual labor. A few of their tasks would include: widening a trail, putting in a culvert, or cutting and stacking wood. These jobs were very physically demanding and stressful on the body. The camps were run by the Department of National Defence, so the workers were under “army law”. So, the people in charge could say or do whatever they wanted. An 18 year-old who experienced a relief camp said “{We} were treated like dirt”. The only semi-positive thing about these relief camps were that they kept the workers well
The conditions that the Jews and other were put through were super horrible. They were forced into boxcars that didn’t have anything in them and they wondered where they were and where they were going. They stood in the boxcars for days with no food or water to keep them alive. (Joseph)(Source 3) Along their way to the concentration camps they were exposed to harsh weather. In the summer it was scorching hot and in the winter it was freezing cold. Since they were shoved amongst each other they suffered from suffocation. Along their journey many young and old died along the way (“The Holocaust”)(Source 2). Inside the boxcars there was no windows or anyway to breath. It was also very unsanitary because of the abundance of people in them and they didn’t have any water to at least wash themselves with. All they could do was stand there in the dark and wait (Joseph) (Source
Over one million Jewish children died during the Holocaust. They were ripped out of their homes and taken away from their families, and stripped of their childhoods. Innocent lives were caught in a war that they were not able to stop. When Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933, he promised Germany that he would improve life their by getting rid of the one race that caused the problems, the Jews. Jews, including Jewish children, were sent to concentration camps, inspected, and if approved, were sent to work. All others would have been sent to be killed. Being sent to work did not ensure survival, children would be given very little food and water, and beaten severely, which caused their death. None of the children of the Holocaust will ever
The conditions of the camp were unbearable. The prisoners were barely fed, mainly bread and water, and were cramped in small sleeping arrangements. "Hundreds slept in triple-tiered rows of bunks (Adler 51)." In the quarters that they stayed, there were no adequate cleaning facilities or restrooms for the prisoners. They rarely were able to change clothes which meant the "clothes were always infested with lice (Swiebocka 18)." Those were sick went to the infirmary where also there were eventually killed in the gas chambers or a lethal injection. The Germans did not want to have anyone not capable of hard work to live. Prisoners were also harshly punished for small things such as taking food or "relieving themselves during work hours (Swiebocka 19)." The biggest punishment was execution. The most common punishment was to receive lashings with a whip.
The SS officers would put everyone through selection and only the grown and strong would survive. Truckloads of children “Babies! Yes...children thrown into the pit of flames”(Wiesel 32) and grown men hung for all to see, their bodies waving in the wind like a flag. For those who did survive selection, they lost their names and were tattooed with their new titles “‘A-7713?’ ‘That’s me.’”(Wiesel 51) The Jews were consistently treated like animals by the Nazi’s and if that was not enough, they were also told how worthless they were.
Throughout the Holocaust, “the Nazis killed over 1.5 billion children” (Children during the Holocaust). Of these children, one million of them were Jewish. The Nazis had no good reason to kill them; they only killed these innocent children because Hitler did not care for their race. The Nazis, a forceful, merciless power led by Adolf Hitler brainwashed the country of Germany into believing that Jews and other races were awful. These children bravely fought persecution and avoided death by hiding or receiving help, which makes us remember these people like Anne Frank, but it was not just the Jewish and other races that were in trouble, the German children got into trouble by joining Hitler Youth.
In today's world, people seem to worry about unnecessary things, like what they are going to wear or even if their hair looks good. Children living during the Holocaust had much more important things to worry about, like if they would survive. This inhumane carnage will haunt the survivors for the rest of their lives. The Holocaust was one of the worst genocides this world has ever seen. The children of the Holocaust were stripped from their beliefs, family, and endured the stress of wondering if they would see another day, the fright of concentration camps, and the strength to survive this massacre.
For thousands of Jewish children the only way to survive the holocaust was to hide. When World War two was in action all Jewish people that lived in Europe were ordered to be killed no matter their wealth, religion, age, health, beliefs etc.. When children were put into hiding they were most of the time crammed into small spaces such as attics or cellars with large groups of people which caused very tight living quarters for long periods of time. Almost all of the children that were in the Holocaust that were not hidden were killed and those who survived and continued in school had to be able to pass as “non-jews” including not having an accent or strong “jewish” features that could possibly give away them or their family that was in hiding.
Relationships, such as parents and kids relationships were torn apart, as parents had to pick “favorites” and which ever kid they didn’t pick, had to be deported (Weinstock 12). Kids also had to make sacrifices for their parents, like Elie said “i decided to give my father lessons in marching in step, in keeping time” (Wiesel 55) because he father didn’t know how to march properly, and Elie didn’t want to see his father get beat to death, or almost to death. Although some children made good sacrifices for their parents, such as trying to help them stay alive, some children weren’t as nice to their parents “a boy of thirteen, beat his father for not making his bed properly” (Wiesel 63) this boy didn’t to much care for his father’s life, as much as his own. He was too worried about himself not getting beaten by the SS officers, that he didn’t even care that it was his father he was beating. There was a “ ‘sacrifice of millions at the front’ “ (Hitler talks of Jewish annihilation’ 14) of German soldiers, American soldiers, and other soldiers fighting against the
Several conditions in the Nazi concentration camps and work camps made it very hard for children to survive. The camps were tremendously ruthless.The epidemics that broke out in the camps, including the awful living conditions were very diverse mainly during the years that the camps operated. They were also uniquely contrasting in each different camp. Whereas many other conditions such as, executions, hard labor, etc. had a great effect of death of the children, some conditions were worse than others causing the children to pass away real quick. Medical experiments and living conditions had the greatest effect of death of children in the Nazi work camps during WWII. Not only were the children involuntarily used for medical experiments they were also forced to live in brutal living conditions.
In the Holocaust, life was absolutely dreadful. They were treated like they were nothing, they were constantly starving, cold, and just didn’t feel like living anymore. The Nazi’s were awful and the Jews hated them.
Studies have concluded that Concentration Camp Syndrome is affecting generations beyond those present during the Holocaust. Some children of victims are affected, since their parent’s own psychological scarring limits their ability and energy as a parent. Studies have shown that children whose parents who are victims of the Holocaust must take on large amounts of responsibility while growing up. Some kids feel the need to act as “redeemers” for their parents, helping them through their daily struggles. Some children of Holocaust survivors have even shown some similar symptoms of CCS as their parents, waking up with nightmares of Concentration Camps, seeing things in their dreams that they wouldn’t have otherwise known about. The fact that the Nazis were able to not only able to destroy the minds of thousands upon thousands of Jews, but also their descendants is beyond
This was the result of Hitler’s anti semitism towards Jews and other religions/beliefs. Both camps had many similarities, but they also had their differences. The treatment the victims were given
A very shocking moment in people’s life is when they are kids and they live during the holocaust. Children in the holocaust were beaten, tortured and killed in either a concentration camp or death camp. If they did survive
The history of this film was on the liberation of the German concentration camps in 1945. However, the film was left unfinished, was missing soundtracks and a missing sixth reel. The directors that include Alfred Hitchcock, had developed a script to go with the pictures. In May of 1985, the frontline was first presented in this film. “Memory of the Camps” was a film that intended the conditions of the camps in order to shake the Germans. A variety of administrative and practical glitches delayed completion of the film. They worry that the film might increase the confusion and discouragement. Despite being abandoned for decades; five of the six reels had survived in a 55-minute without titles or credits. The missing sixth reel comprised of Russian