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The Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin presents the year 1938 through the eyes of Jews, whose personal documents detail their experiences and the hardships they suffered as well as the growing tensions in Europe and diminishing hope for Jews in Germany and Austria.

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26

SATURDAY

26

The future of humanity and culture

A call to action in bad times

“If ever there was a need for brave hearts, clear minds and strong fists, it is today, as nothing less than the future of humanity and culture is at stake!”

New York

No one reading the November issue of the Aufbau could have missed the front-page editorial message in bold print: under the heading “The Great Trial,” forceful language is employed to decry the abject failure of “the heads of state of the so-called democracies,” who have sacrificed Czechoslovakia to Nazi Germany. Jewish refugees are left stranded in no man’s land in Bohemia, in Germany, the Nazis are dealing an “economic death blow” to the Jews, the British are jeopardizing the Zionist project, and “little more than a faint memory” remains of the Evian Conference, summoned in July to tackle the problem of resettling Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. Surely, this is “an era of complete sinfulness.” Will those under threat finally brace up?

TAGS: commentary, dispossession, economic persecution, Evian conference, Jewish property, Journalism, media coverage, Munich Agreement, New York, November 26, politics, press article, refugees, Sudetenland, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

"Die große Prüfung," Editorial, Aufbau, Vol. 4, No. 12, p. 1

31

MONDAY

31

Politics and farewell

Adolph Markus's diary addresses political shifts and preparations for emigration

“Chamberlain and Daladier explained after their return to their people that now peace was secured for a long time and that it was agreed by Hitler to get together again for a new conference in the case of further possible difference.”

LINZ

At the end of October, Adolph Markus looked back on an eventful month. Preceded by the Munich Conference, at which representatives of Germany, Great Britain, France and Italy decided that Czechoslovakia was to cede its borderlands (“Sudetenland”) to Germany in exchange for peace, German troops had occupied these areas, which had a sizeable German population totaling about 3 million. As Markus points out, with the Sudetenland, Czechoslovakia had lost its line of defense. According to his diary entry, both in Britain and in France, people’s relief that war had been averted was soon followed by deep suspicion regarding Hitler’s true intentions. On a more personal note, the author mentions a hair-styling course and English classes which he has been taking in Vienna, clearly in preparation for emigration. Meanwhile, due to the expectation that soon all Jews would be expelled from his home town, Linz, half of the contents of his apartment had been sold.

TAGS: Anschluss, diary, emigration, expulsion, Jewish property, Language skills, Linz, Munich Agreement, October 31, politics, prominent people, Sudetenland

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Diary, February 1938–December 1939, Adolph Markus, ME1090

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Source available in English

25

TUESDAY

25

Sudeten Jews under attack

Attacks on Sudeten Jews after the Munich Treaty

“The program for expulsion of thousands of Jews from Czechoslovakia and restriction of the economic activities of those who remain, outlined by minister without portfolio Stanislav Bucovsky, was adopted in its entirety yesterday as a resolution by the Committee of the Sokol Communities, representative body of the Czech youth athletic organization.” [original]

Prague

On September 29, 1938, the signatories of the Munich Treaty had decreed that Czechoslovakia was to cede to Germany its northern and western border areas, the Sudetenland, which was inhabited predominantly by Germans. Immediately after the incursion of German troops, there were eruptions of violence against Jews. Of the 25,000 to 28,000 Jews living in the area, thousands were driven to flee. On October 25, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reports on the catastrophic material effects of the mass flight: the losses were estimated at 7 billion crowns at least in wages and property left behind. To make things worse, since Munich, open expressions of antisemitism had also proliferated on the Czech side—both by the populace and those representing the government.

TAGS: antisemitism, dispossession, economic persecution, expulsion, impoverishment, Jewish property, Journalism, JTA, media coverage, Munich Agreement, October 25, politics, Prague, refugees, Sudetenland, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Collection:

“7 Billion Kronen Abandoned by Sudeten Refugees; Billion Salvaged” „7 Billion Kronen Abandoned by Sudeten Refugees; Billion Salvaged“

Source available in English

11

TUESDAY

11

Driven to suicide

Suicide of a democratically-minded editor-in-chief

PRAGUE

Since 1876, the Prager Tagblatt was known as a bastion of liberal- democratic positions. Over time, it acquired a staff of first-rate writers, including greats such as Franz Kafka, Max Brod, Kurt Tucholsky, Egon Erwin Kisch and Alfred Döblin – to name but a few. The paper was valued for its excellent reporting, its outstanding feuilleton and its unique style: even the political reporting was not devoid of humor. As a liberal-democratic paper with a predominantly Jewish staff, the Tagblatt had unequivocally positioned itself against the Nazi regime. Several of the roughly 20,000 political adversaries of the Nazis who had escaped to Czechoslovakia joined the ranks of the publication’s contributors. After the entry of the German Army to the Sudetenland in early October of 1938, the situation of German-speaking democrats came to a head in Czechoslovakia, too: according to this report from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, dated October 11, the editor-in-chief of the Prager Tagblatt, Rudolf Thomas, and his wife committed suicide out of despair over the situation.

 

TAGS: displacement, emigration, Journalism, JTA, media coverage, Munich Agreement, October 11, politics, Prague, prominent people, refugees, Sudetenland

SOURCE

Institution:

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Collection:

"Praha Jewish Editor Dies After Suicide Pact with Wife"

Original:

Box 3, folder 35

Source available in English

1

SATURDAY

1

Desecration and devastation

The Mellrichstadt synagogue is desecrated

The mob had it in for the Jewish congregants. When they didn't show up, people broke into the synagogue and desecrated it.

Mellrichstadt

During the night of September 30th going into October 1st, the synagogue of Mellrichstadt in Lower Franconia was completely devastated. In fact, the mob had it in for the congregants: Sudeten German refugees had incited the public to ambush worshippers on their way to the synagogue. However, the Jewish congregation had been warned with sufficient time and services canceled. Now the angry mob of Sudeten Germans and residents of Mellrichstadt stood before the door of the synagogue. Stones were thrown, the door was broken open and the interior destroyed. The mob did not spare the Torah scrolls and other ritual items. After that night, the synagogue could no longer be used.

TAGS: antisemitism, Jewish Community, Jewish property, Mellrichstadt, October 1, photo, public sphere, religion, Sudetenland, Synagogues, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Exterior of the synagogue in Mellrichstadt

Original:

F 3335

29

THURSDAY

29

Mass exodus

More than 20,000 Jews leave the Sudetenland

“Only about 2,000 Jews of a population of 22,000 have remained in the Sudeten German districts, which have also been deserted by the Czech population.” [original version in English]

Munich

When on September 29th the so-called “Munich Agreement” between Hitler, the British Premier Chamberlain, the French Premier Daladier, and the Italian dictator Mussolini was concluded, over 20,000 Jews had already fled from the regions of the Sudetenland. This was reported by the Jewish Telegraph Agency on the day of the Agreement. With a months-long propaganda campaign by the Nazis and raucous threats that the Wehrmacht would invade Czechoslovakia, it had already been clear to many Jews for weeks that they would have no future in the Sudetenland. With the Agreement, the Czech regions, in which the Sudeten German minority lived, would be surrendered to the German Reich. Czechoslovakia did not sit at the bargaining table in Munich.

TAGS: displacement, Journalism, JTA, media coverage, Munich, Munich Agreement, politics, press article, prominent people, refugees, September 29, Sudetenland

SOURCE

Institution:

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Collection:

“20,000 Jews Evacuate Sudeten Area”

Source available in English

Chronology of major events in 1938

The Munich Agreement

Many Jewish lawyers had already been leaving Germany and Austria. Among them was Joachim Weichert of Vienna, who had been practicing law in Vienna for decades. Weichert Family Collection, Leo Baeck Institute.

Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy sign the Munich Agreement. In the absence of Czechoslovakia, which, like the Soviet Union, was not invited to the conference, the participating nations resolve that Czechoslovakia must cede the “Sudetenland” to the German Reich. The agreement calls for the evacuation of the narrow band of territory along Czechoslovakia’s northern, western, and southern borders within ten days. Two days after the agreement is signed, the Wehrmacht enters the Sudetenland. By allowing the conflict over the autonomy of ethnic Germans in Czechoslovakian borderlands to escalate into an international crisis, Hitler has succeeded in first isolating and then breaking up Czechoslovakia.

View chronology of major events in 1938

15

MONDAY

15

Vacation idyll

A sunny letter to father

"We're having a great time. The sun has been shining for two days now, so we were able to go swimming, but the radio is forecasting rain again tomorrow."

Nespeky/Prague

Hitler’s plans for Czechoslovakia could not have been clearer: on May 30th, 1938, he declared to the Wehrmacht (German army) that it was his “immutable resolve” to shatter the country “in the foreseeable future.” Already months before, he had incited the leader of the Sudeten German Party, which was partly bankrolled by Nazi Germany, to conjure up a confrontation by making unreasonable demands on behalf of the German minority in the country. Under the influence of events in Germany, anti-Semitism had increased. But, so far, it had only led to boycotts and physical violence in the border areas of Northern and Western Bohemia, which were predominantly inhabited by Germans. While this crisis was brewing in the background, the psychiatrist and writer Josef Weiner, his wife, Hanka, and their two young daughters were on vacation in the central Bohemian town of Nespeky. Hanka’s letter (in Czech) to her father, the renowned Prague lawyer Oskar Taussig, smacks of a perfectly idyllic holiday atmosphere and spares its reconvalescent recipient anything unpleasant.

TAGS: antisemitism, August 15, children, family, Jewish Community, letter, Munich Agreement, Nazi policies, Nespeky, politics, Prague, prominent people, Sudetenland, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Winn Family Collection, AR 25493

Original:

Box 1, folder 5

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