Himmler

Himmler

  • Submitted By: yngmea
  • Date Submitted: 01/21/2009 12:27 PM
  • Category: English
  • Words: 723
  • Page: 3
  • Views: 329

World War II was a horrible time for every one. During WW2 there was the Holocaust which was a time of systematic selection and killing in mass of people because of their ethnic background, religious/political beliefs, physical defects, or failure to fall into the "Aryan" ideal. During this time, roughly 11 million people were killed with 6 million being of Jewish decent. Others targeted by the Nazi regime included handicaps, Gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, Catholics, Poles, Soviet prisoners of war, political dissidents. The Holocaust did not occur overnight, but started out with small measures taken by the Nazi government to segregate the undesirables from the True Germans. These measures grew with intensity over time until people were shipped off to concentration/death camps. The first concentration camp was set up in Dachau by Heinrich Himmler, a follower of Hitler since his earlier attempts to rise to power.
“Born in Munich, Bavaria, on Oct 7, 1900, Heinrich Himmler was the son of the former tutor of one of the Bavarian princes” (Encyclopedia of World Biography 398). Himmler received a diploma in agriculture from the Munich Technical high school in 1922. Himmler had turned 18 during the post World War 1 depression in Germany and developed a hatred for the Weimar Republic. During the next few years, Himmler was employed as a salesman for a fertilizer manufacturing firm before joining a Para-Military organization. “He was a follower of Adolf Hitler from the days of Hitler’s unsuccessful attempt to gain power in 1923” (World Book 2001 234). Himmler joined the Nazi party in 1925 and by 1929, was appointed leader of Hitler’s elite guard, the SS.
“In 1933, he had set up the first concentration camp in Dachau and in the next few years, with Hitler’s encouragement, greatly extended the range of persons who qualified for internment in the camps” (Heinrich). “In April 1934 Himmler was appointed assistant chief of the Gestapo...

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