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Gas Van
A gas van or gas wagon (russian: душегубка, ''dushegubka'', literally "soul killer"; german: Gaswagen) was a truck reequipped as a mobile gas chamber. During the World War II Holocaust, Nazi Germany developed and used gas vans on a large scale as an extermination method to murder inmates of asylums, Poles, Romani people, Jews, and prisoners in occupied Poland, Belarus, Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, and other regions of German-occupied Europe. One case of usage of gas van by Soviet NKVD during the Great Purge was documented. Nazi Germany The use of gas vans by the Germans to murder Jews, Poles, Romani people, mentally ill people, and prisoners in occupied territories during World War II originated with the Nazi Euthanasia Program in 1939. Ordered to find a suitable method of killing, the ''Technical Institute for the Detection of Crime'' ("Kriminaltechnisches Institut der Sicherheitspolizei", abbreviated KTI) of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt (RSHA) decided to gas victims ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aktion T4
(German, ) was a campaign of mass murder by involuntary euthanasia in Nazi Germany. The term was first used in post- war trials against doctors who had been involved in the killings. The name T4 is an abbreviation of 4, a street address of the Chancellery department set up in early 1940, in the Berlin borough of Tiergarten, which recruited and paid personnel associated with Aktion T4. Certain German physicians were authorised to select patients "deemed incurably sick, after most critical medical examination" and then administer to them a "mercy death" (). In October 1939, Adolf Hitler signed a "euthanasia note", backdated to 1 September 1939, which authorised his physician Karl Brandt and ''Reichsleiter'' Philipp Bouhler to begin the killing. The killings took place from September 1939 until the end of the war in 1945; from 275,000 to 300,000 people were killed in psychiatric hospitals in Germany and Austria, occupied Poland and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was of the (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party of Germany. Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and a main architect of the Holocaust. As a member of a reserve battalion during World War I, Himmler did not see active service, and did not fight. He studied agriculture in university, and joined the Nazi Party in 1923 and the SS in 1925. In 1929, he was appointed by Adolf Hitler. Over the next 16 years, he developed the SS from a 290-man battalion into a million-strong paramilitary group, and set up and controlled the Nazi concentration camps. He was known for good organisational skills and for selecting highly competent subordinates, such as Reinhard Heydrich in 1931. From 1943 onwards, he was both Chief of German Police and Minister of the Interior, overseeing all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo (Secret State Police). H ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soldau Concentration Camp
The Soldau concentration camp established by Nazi Germany during World War II was a concentration camp for Polish and Jewish prisoners. It was located in Działdowo (german: Soldau), a town in north-eastern Poland, which after the Nazi-Soviet invasion of Poland in September 1939 was annexed into the Province of East Prussia. The camp was founded in the former Polish Army barracks by ''SS-Brigadeführer'' Otto Rasch with the approval of Reinhard Heydrich. The first prisoners were brought by the end of September 1939. They were the Polish Army defenders of the Modlin Fortress who were forced to capitulate due to lack of ammunition and food. The camp served different purposes throughout its existence. The Polish intelligentsia, priests and political prisoners were secretly executed there,Henry Friedlander (1995). ''The Origins of Nazi Genocide: From Euthanasia to the Final Solution'', p. 139. The University of North Carolina Press. . in addition to 1,558 patients from all the psychi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wartheland
The ''Reichsgau Wartheland'' (initially ''Reichsgau Posen'', also: ''Warthegau'') was a Nazi German ''Reichsgau'' formed from parts of Polish territory annexed in 1939 during World War II. It comprised the region of Greater Poland and adjacent areas. Parts of ''Warthegau'' matched the similarly named pre-Versailles Prussian province of Posen. The name was initially derived from the capital city, Posen (Poznań), and later from the main river, Warthe (Warta). During the Partitions of Poland from 1793, the bulk of the area had been annexed by the Kingdom of Prussia until 1807 as South Prussia. From 1815 to 1849, the territory was within the autonomous Grand Duchy of Posen, which was the Province of Posen until Poland was re-established in 1918–1919 following World War I. The area is currently the Greater Poland Voivodeship. Invasion and occupation of Poland After the invasion of Poland, the conquered territory of Greater Poland was split between four ''Reichsgaue'' and t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kaiser's Kaffee Geschäft
Kaiser's may refer to: * Kaiser's (Evansville, Indiana), listed on the National Register of Historic Places in Vanderburgh County, Indiana * Kaiser's (Racine, Wisconsin), listed on the National Register of Historic Places in Racine County, Wisconsin * Kaiser's (supermarket), a German supermarket chain {{disambig ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herbert Lange
Herbert Lange (29 September 1909 – 20 April 1945) was an '' SS-Sturmbannführer'' and the commandant of Chełmno death camp until April 1942; leader of the ''SS Special Detachment Lange'' conducting the murder of Jews from the Łódź Ghetto. He was responsible for numerous crimes against humanity including the murder of mental patients in Poland and in Germany during the ''Aktion T4'' "euthanasia" programme and becoming one of the key originators of the Holocaust. Biography Lange studied law, but failed to obtain a degree and he subsequently joined the NSDAP (Nazi Party) on 1 May 1932. He enlisted in the ''Sturmabteilung'' (SA) three months later, and the following year, he joined the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS). He subsequently joined the police force, becoming a deputy commissioner in 1935. Crimes against humanity Lange entered Poland with '' Einsatzgruppe'' Naumann ( EG VI) during the September campaign. On 9 November 1939, following a Nazi German victory, Lange was prom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous member state of the European Union. Warsaw is the nation's capital and largest metropolis. Other major cities include Kraków, Wrocław, Łódź, Poznań, Gdańsk, and Szczecin. Poland has a temperate transitional climate and its territory traverses the Central European Plain, extending from Baltic Sea in the north to Sudeten and Carpathian Mountains in the south. The longest Polish river is the Vistula, and Poland's highest point is Mount Rysy, situated in the Tatra mountain range of the Carpathians. The country is bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukraine to the east, Slovakia and the Czech Republic to the south, and Germany to the west. It also shares maritime boundaries with Denmark a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eastern Prussia
East Prussia ; german: Ostpreißen, label=Low Prussian; pl, Prusy Wschodnie; lt, Rytų Prūsija was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1773 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 1871); following World War I it formed part of the Weimar Republic's Free State of Prussia, until 1945. Its capital city was Königsberg (present-day Kaliningrad). East Prussia was the main part of the region of Prussia along the southeastern Baltic Coast. The bulk of the ancestral lands of the Baltic Old Prussians were enclosed within East Prussia. During the 13th century, the native Prussians were conquered by the crusading Teutonic Knights. After the conquest the indigenous Balts were gradually converted to Christianity. Because of Germanization and colonisation over the following centuries, Germans became the dominant ethnic group, while Masurians and Lithuanians formed minorities. From the 13th century, East Prussia was part of the mona ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pomerania
Pomerania ( pl, Pomorze; german: Pommern; Kashubian: ''Pòmòrskô''; sv, Pommern) is a historical region on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea in Central Europe, split between Poland and Germany. The western part of Pomerania belongs to the German states of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Brandenburg, while the eastern part belongs to the West Pomeranian, Pomeranian and Kuyavian-Pomeranian voivodeships of Poland. Its historical border in the west is the Mecklenburg-Western Pomeranian border '' Urstromtal'' which now constitutes the border between the Mecklenburgian and Pomeranian part of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, while it is bounded by the Vistula River in the east. The easternmost part of Pomerania is alternatively known as Pomerelia, consisting of four sub-regions: Kashubia inhabited by ethnic Kashubians, Kociewie, Tuchola Forest and Chełmno Land. Pomerania has a relatively low population density, with its largest cities being Gdańsk and Szczecin. Ou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Poznań
Poznań () is a city on the River Warta in west-central Poland, within the Greater Poland region. The city is an important cultural and business centre, and one of Poland's most populous regions with many regional customs such as Saint John's Fair (''Jarmark Świętojański''), traditional Saint Martin's croissants and a local dialect. Among its most important heritage sites are the Renaissance Old Town, Town Hall and Gothic Cathedral. Poznań is the fifth-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. As of 2021, the city's population is 529,410, while the Poznań metropolitan area (''Metropolia Poznań'') comprising Poznań County and several other communities is inhabited by over 1.1 million people. It is one of four historical capitals of medieval Poland and the ancient capital of the Greater Poland region, currently the administrative capital of the province called Greater Poland Voivodeship. Poznań is a center of trade, sports, education, technology a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
