In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

CHAPTER 18 The Mystery of Individual Adjustments Much has been written about the tragedies of those victim of the Nazis who were starved, deported, tortured, and killed, and I cannot relieve the suffering of those who may still be alive by telling their stories . I can only add to the picture of Nazi Germany by describing the attitudes of individuals and groups within my range of contact. One evening in April 1933, two young women, one of them closely connected with my work, the other the assistant of an outstanding “Aryan” active in public life, invited friends and colleagues who were endangered by the racial doctrines or by their former party af‹liations for a discussion of their various plights and to make decisions. The “Aryan” and I, who were much the oldest, were asked to give our opinions. I said bluntly that all who were under forty years of age had better decide at once on emigration, that there was no future for them in Germany. My advice was not dictated by personal resentment —I believed that they should not be encouraged to hope for a change they could not help bring about. How modest it seems today! But my “Aryan” colleague was shocked. She could not understand that anyone loyal to her country could even think of such a solution. “This phase will pass,” she said, and in a tone that betrayed her scorn for the susceptibility of the “non-Aryan” woman. In spite of the misery and ruin that has come to the Jews and those of mixed ancestry, I have always considered them lucky in one thing. They did not have to make the wretched choice of accepting the Nazi creed or not. The Gentile had to make that choice. It was, “My position, my income, my family and their security, with my oath to Adolf Hitler—or for me and for them daily risk and danger.” It was far from easy. 181 The attitudes of my most intimate group of fellow workers, the staff of the School of Social Work and the Academy, most of whom were Protestant in predominantly Protestant Berlin, were typical of educated women. There were instances of human strength and human weakness. Some came out of the battle ‹ner and stronger personalities; others lost whatever moral poise they had ever possessed. There were some women on our staff who would have been considered irreproachable by Nazi standards but for having worked closely with me. They tried to atone for this with redoubled fervor, saying “Heil Hitler” twice where others said it once. Long before Aryans were forbidden to talk to the “wrong” people, it was painful for me to see them because with every word they felt a nervous urge to declare their new faith. On the other hand, we had a devout Catholic teacher, also a “hundred percent Aryan.” After the ferocious sterilization laws were enacted, it fell to her lot to instruct the students in this subject. She stated that she would explain the laws and even abstain from expressing her personal views about them but that she could not possibly speak in their favor, since this would violate the laws of her Church. She resigned of her own accord. If she had not resigned, she would have been denounced by some student sooner or later and dismissed.1 One of the Protestant teachers would have been perfectly acceptable to the Nazis but for her Jewish ‹ancé, a tenor who had been forced to leave the opera. They had known each other for years and had discussed marriage but never set a date. The woman now came into the open, discarding the position based on her university education, acquired at great sacri‹ce. She declared that she belonged to him and married him. Together they went to Palestine, where two children were born to them while they struggled desperately for a living. We had no full-time teacher on the school staff who was Jewish, but there was a widowed Jewish physician employed at the PestalozziFroebel Haus, with which we were af‹liated. She taught hygiene and looked after the health of our students. It developed that her six-yearold little boy, seeing that all the other children had swastika buttons on their coats, put one on too—and was brought home to his mother on one of the ‹rst days of the “new glorious period of German history,” beaten up beyond description. That same evening she left Germany...

Share