Robbing the Jews

Robbing the Jews reveals the mechanisms by which the Nazis and their allies confiscated Jewish property; the book demonstrates the close relationship between robbery and the Holocaust. The spoliation evolved in intensifying steps. The Anschluss and Kristallnacht in 1938 reveal a dynamic tension between pressure from below and state-directed measures. In Western Europe, the economic persecution of the Jews took the form of legal decrees and administrative measures. In Eastern Europe, authoritarian governments adopted the Nazi program that excluded Jews from the economy and seized their property, based on indigenous antisemitism and plans for ethnically homogenous nation-states. In the occupied East, property was collected at the killing sites – the most valuable objects were sent to Berlin, whereas items of lesser value supported the local administration and rewarded collaborators. At several key junctures, robbery acted as a catalyst for genocide, accelerating the progression from pogrom to mass murder.

Martin Dean is an Applied Research Scholar at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies in Washington, DC. He received a scholarship in history from Queens’ College, Cambridge, in 1980 and was awarded his PhD also at Queens’ in 1989. His publications include Collaboration in the Holocaust: Crimes of the Local Police in Belorussia and Ukraine, 1941–44 (2000); Austrian Policy during the French Revolutionary Wars, 1796–99 (1993); and numerous articles. He has also worked as a Staff Historian for the Australian Special Investigations Unit and as the Senior Historian for the Metropolitan Police War Crimes Unit in London (1992–97). He has held a DAAD grant and was awarded the Pearl Resnick Post-Doctoral Fellowship by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1997. He has acted as an expert witness in Nazi war crimes cases in Australia and Germany.

Martin Dean

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© United States Holocaust Memorial Museum 2008

This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press.

First published 2008

Printed in the United States of America

A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Dean, Martin, 1962–
Robbing the Jews : the confiscation of Jewish property in the Holocaust, 1933–1945 /
Martin Dean.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-521-88825-7 (hardback)
1. World War, 1939–1945 – Confiscations and contributions. 2. Holocaust, Jewish
(1939–1945) – Economic aspects. 3. Jewish property – Europe. 4. Aryanization. I. Title.
D810.C8.D43 2008
940.53′18132 – dc22 2008008538

ISBN 978-0-521-88825-7 hardback

The assertions, opinions, and conclusions in this book are those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect those of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council or of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Contents

List of Photographs

Acknowledgments

Very many persons have supported my extensive research on this book over the past nine years, including archivists, scholars, librarians, colleagues, and administrators. It is not possible to name every one, but I wish to express my thanks here to many of those who have given me some of their most precious possessions – their time, energy, and expertise.

Foremost thanks must go to Paul Shapiro, Director of the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, for assigning me to this research project at the end of the 1990s and gently encouraging its completion along the way. Of my many colleagues in the Center, special thanks must go to Juergen Matthaeus, Wendy Lower, Severin Hochberg, Avinoam Patt, Suzanne Brown-Fleming, Ann Millin, Peter Black, Lisa Yavnai, Patricia Heberer, and many others, for their advice and support on a daily basis. Reference archivists Aaron Kornblum and Michlean Amir have been especially patient and helpful, and I have also benefited enormously from the Museum's outstanding collections of photographs and books. Thanks go also to Benton Arnovitz, Director of Academic Publications, for skillfully steering this project through to completion, and to Michael Gelb for his diligent and incisive editing.

Many archives and other institutions, especially in Germany, have assisted with the research, making available photocopies and granting me in some cases privileged access to specific collections. Among these, particular thanks should go to Klaus Dettmer at the Landesarchiv and Frau Kube of the Oberfinanzdirektion in Berlin, Alfons Kenkmann and his colleagues at the Villa ten Hompel in Münster, Gerd Blumberg of the Zollstelle Münster, Manfred Pohl and the staff of the Historical Archive of Deutsche Bank in Frankfurt, the staff of the Bundesarchiv in Berlin-Lichterfelde, and many other archivists.

I have had the opportunity to present draft versions of parts of several chapters as conference papers or guest lectures during the gestation of the book. For these welcome opportunities to test my ideas, thanks go to Susanne Meinl and the Fritz Bauer Institute; Claus Füllberg-Stolberg at the University of Hannover; Saulius Suziedelis and the organizers of the Annual Holocaust Conference in Millersville, Pennsylvania; the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies; the Society for European Business History; the Max-Planck Institute for European Legal History, Frankfurt am Main; the Institute for Contemporary History, Munich; and especially Florent Brayard and Marc-Olivier Baruch and their respective institutes in Paris.

Many other scholars, including a series of distinguished Visiting Fellows at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, have influenced and assisted me with my work, both through their own research and in numerous discussions and scholarly exchanges. Again, these individuals are too legion to mention all by name, but my thanks go to Jean Ancel, Götz Aly, Claire Andrieu, Britta Bopf, Richard Breitman, Bernhard Chiari, Jeanne Dingell, Bernward Dörner, Jean-Marc Dreyfus, Wesley Fisher, Wolf Gruner, Christian Gerlach, Peter Hayes, Susanne Heim, Helen Junz, Eric Laureys, Ingo Loose, Bernhard Lorentz, Regula Ludi, Marc Masurovsky, Lynn Nicholas, Ilana Offenberger, Ilaria Pavan, Jonathan Petropoulos, Dieter Pohl, Steven Sage, Kurt Schilde, Tatjana Toensmeyer, Philipp Ther, Bob Waite, James Ward, Susanne Willems, and Dieter Ziegler.

A particular word of appreciation is owed to the late Raul Hilberg, who not only founded the modern field of Holocaust studies but also integrated the role of expropriation directly into his comprehensive analysis of the Holocaust. Needless to say, his seminal work, The Destruction of the European Jews, is cited more frequently than any other in this book. In addition to the loss of Raul Hilberg, another severe blow just prior to publication was the sad loss of Gerald Feldman, whose outstanding work in German economic history I have admired since my student days. Gerry always gave me tremendous inspiration and support, as both a friend and a colleague during the research and writing of this monograph.

Very special thanks also go to Ralph Banken, Frank Bajohr, Constantin Goschler, Joe White, and Sarah Harasym for their careful reading of the manuscript, and their useful comments, suggestions, and corrections. Despite all this help, I must remain solely responsible for any mistakes that may have crept into a book of this length and breadth, and I thank in advance you the reader, for your patience and any comments you may wish to offer. Finally, I wish to dedicate this work to my charming daughter Iris, who came into this world shortly after I started this project.

Martin Dean

July 2008