History

• Key words

  • swastika
  • symbol of the Nazi Party
  • opposition
  • group of people who disagree with you
  • coup
  • violent overthrow of government
  • putsch
  • violent overthrow of a government
• Adolf Hitler joined the small Nazi Party at the end of World War I
• Adolf Hitler became the leader of the Nazi Party in 1921
• Adolf Hitler set up armed groups of supporters who wore a uniform of brown shirts
• The armed groups of supporters became known as the Storm Troopers
• In German, the Storm Troopers were called the SA, short for Sturmabteilung
• The SA organised marching parades

  Dressed in brown uniforms and carried flags with the Nazi symbol, the swastika on it
• The SA's motto was 'All opposition must be stamped into the ground'
• The SA had no rules against the use of violence and often beat up people who disagreed with them
• Hitler and the Nazis tried to overthrow the Weimar government in 1923 in a military coup or putsch
• Hitler was sent to jail for nine months after the failed coup in 1923
• While in jail, Hitler wrote his famous book called Mein Kampf or 'My Struggle'
• The Holocaust was the genocide of Jewish people in Europe through the deliberate extermination of six million Jews
• The Holocaust was the end of a long process of anti-Semitism
• Five million non-Jews were also ultimately affected by the Holocaust
• The Holocaust did not happen suddenly, it was the end of a long process of anti-Semitism
• Six million Jewish people were killed in an effort to completely annihilate the Jews
• Five million non-Jews also ultimately lost their lives
• Genocide


  Intended to destroy a national, ethnic, or racial group of people
• Holocaust


  Refers to a particular genocide, the mass slaughter of Jews by the Nazis
• Concentration camp inmates were dressed in striped pyjama-like uniforms
• Heinrich Himmler was the ruthless leader of the SS
• Einsatzgruppen


  • Death squads
• Final Solution


  • The name for Nazi Germany's plan for the systematic killing of European Jews
• SS men were taught racial hatred and told to harden their hearts to human suffering
• In 1941, a group of SS men called Einsatzgruppen became special mobile killing squads
• Shooting by firing squads was inefficient and too personal for the Nazi killers

  Many Einsatzgruppen were psychologically negatively affected
• In 1942, the 'Final Solution' became the name for Nazi Germany's plan for the systematic genocide of European Jews
• The Nazis used the term 'Final Solution' to refer to their plan of annihilation, to disguise the true nature of their crimes
• Extermination camps process


  1. Victims were crowded into cattle trucks and taken to the extermination camps

  2. Victims were ordered to undress and forced into gas chambers disguised as shower rooms where Zyklon B gas was released

  3. They died within fifteen minutes

  4. After the gassing, valuables were taken from their bodies

  5. The bodies were pushed into giant ovens