Witness recalls the horrors of Kristallnacht 80 years ago
(8 Nov 2018) Germany is marking the 80th anniversary of Kristallnacht, the anti-Jewish pogrom that's widely seen as the start of the Nazi Holocaust. The pogrom began in the early evening of 9 November 1938 and became known as Kristallnacht - the "Night of Broken Glass" - when Nazis terrorised Jews throughout Germany and Austria. They killed at least 91 people, perhaps many more, burned down hundreds of synagogues and Jewish homes, vandalised and looted 7,500 Jewish businesses, and arrested up to 30,000 Jewish men. Many were taken to concentration camps such as Dachau or Buchenwald. Hundreds more committed suicide or died as a result of the mistreatment in the camps years before the official mass deportations began. Walter Frankenstein was a 14 year old orphan when Kristallnacht happened, living at the Auerbach Jewish orphanage in Berlin. Now aged 94, Frankenstein used a walking frame as he slowly entered the compound where the Auerbach orphanage once stood. His memory, however, is still sharp and he remembers exactly how the events unfolded that night. He recalled a plain-clothes policeman coming to the orphanage and warning everyone to get out immediately before some Nazi stormtroopers turned up and said they intended to set fire to the building. Later that night, Frankensteinsaid he climbed up on the roof of the orphanage and saw fire lighting up the city. Kristallnacht got its name from the shattered glass from store windows that covered German streets. While Kristallnacht is often seen as the beginning of the Holocaust, it was some years later that the Nazis formally adopted their "Final Solution" for the Jews of Europe, when boycotts, anti-Jewish legislation and expulsions would evolve into a policy of mass murder. In the end, six million European Jews were killed in the Holocaust. Standing under an old poplar tree whose bright yellow leaves were falling to the ground, Frankenstein looked at a red brick wall, the only remainder of the orphanage in Berlin's Prenzlauer Berg neighbourhood. The building was badly destroyed during a World War II air raid in 1943, and the ruins were torn down in the 1950s. The wall was turned into a memorial for those Jewish orphans who did not survive the Holocaust. The names and ages of 140 children have been inscribed on the bricks. Frankenstein was one of the few who survived. Together with his wife Leonie, who he met at the orphanage, he went into hiding in 1943, as the Nazis were deporting thousands of Jews from Berlin to Auschwitz. Later they emigrated to what was then Palestine, and finally settled in Sweden. Nowadays, Frankenstein comes back to Germany several times a year. He often talks to school classes about his life. In 2014, he received Germany's highest civil honour, the Federal Cross of Merit. Every time Frankenstein travels to Berlin, he brings the medal with him. In its case, he also has the yellow star that the Nazis forced him to wear to identify him as a Jew. "This one here marked me, and this one honoured me. This one stands for Germany's dictatorship and this one here for democracy," he says as he slowly closes the lid. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter: / ap_archive Facebook: / aparchives Instagram: / apnews You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...
