1944 by Jay Winik
CHAPTER 15
The day before his inauguration: For these paragraphs see Franklin D. Roosevelt, Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1944–45 (Harper, 1950), 523; Samuel Rosenman, Working with Roosevelt (Harper, 1952), 516; and James MacGregor Burns, Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom, 1940–1945 (Harcourt, 1970), 558–63, from which this account is drawn. Interestingly, after the ceremony Roosevelt held the largest luncheon of his twelve years in the White House: two thousand guests. For “a stabbing pain” and “thoroughly chilled” (a symbolic omen of what was to come), see James Roosevelt and Sydney Schalett, Affectionately FDR (Harcourt Brace, 1959), 355; and Doris Kearns Goodwin, No Ordinary Time (Simon & Schuster, 1994), 572–73. On the large luncheon, Bess Furman, Washington By-Line (Knopf, 1949), 3. On Japanese Americans’ internment, Roger Daniels, Concentration Camps USA: Japanese-Americans and World War II (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970); Allen Bosworth, America’s Concentration Camps (Norton, 1967); Gordon Corrigan, The Second World War: A Military History (Thomas Dunne, 2011) 538; Allis Radosh and Ronald Radosh, A Safe Haven: Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel (Harper Perennial, 2010), 1. See also Bertram Hulen, “Shivering Thousands Stamp in Snow at Inauguration,” New York Times, January 21, 1945, 1.
worse place to meet than Yalta: On the preparations for Yalta and opening of the summit, see H. W. Brands, Traitor to His Class (Doubleday, 2008), 592; Sara Churchill, A Thread in the Tapestry (Dodd, Mead, 1967), 76, 79–80; Charles Bohlen, Witness to History, 1929–1969 (Norton, 1973), 174; Jean Edward Smith, 629–30; Robert Dallek, Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy (Oxford University Press, 1998), FDR (Random House, 2008), 507–21.
“terrible change”: On Roosevelt’s declining health, Frances Perkins found him “looking very badly,” although Bohlen insisted that “our leader was ill, but he was effective.” See Bohlen, Witness, 177–84; Smith, FDR, 630–31; Dallek, Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy, 519.
Roosevelt’s maneuverings with Stalin: He mentioned that de Gaulle compared himself to Joan of Arc; MacGregor Burns, Soldier of Freedom, 566.
he was a Zionist: Ibid., 577–78; Bohlen, Witness, 203; Radosh and Radosh, Safe Haven, 11, 25, Richard Breitman and Allan J. Lichtman, FDR and the Jews (Belknap Press, 2013), 301; Bohlen, 203.
what was to become of Poland: Supporters insist Roosevelt did all that could be done, while critics assert that he sold the Poles out; see Dallek, Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy, 514–15. For a very incisive account that is harshly critical of Roosevelt, see Amos Perlmutter, FDR and Stalin: A Not So Grand Alliance, 1943–1945 (University of Missouri Press, 1993); see also Jonathan Fenby, Alliance: The Inside Story of How Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill Won One War and Began Another (MacAdam/Cage, 2007). Goodwin, No Ordinary Time, 597, notes that after Yalta, relations between Stalin and Roosevelt reached a “point of crisis” because of the deteriorating situation in Poland. Stalin promptly violated his solemn promise that the Communist regime in Warsaw would hold free elections as well as broaden its base; instead, the Communists held on to power and took over, laying the groundwork for the Cold War.
Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia: For details of the meeting, see especially “U.S. Warship Becomes Arab Court in Miniature for Ibn Saud’s Voyage,” New York Times, February 21, 1945, 1; “White House Announcement of New Talks,” New York Times, February 21, 1945; William Eddy, FDR Meets Ibn Saud (American Friends of the Middle East, 1954), 31–32; Bohlen, Witness, 203–4, who basically recounts the meeting word-by-word, which stands as the basis for all other accounts; Breitmann and Lichtman, 302; MacGregor Burns, Soldier of Freedom 578–79; Radosh and Radosh, Safe Haven, 19, 26–27. Harry Hopkins, the president’s adviser, was unwell, but nonetheless would later write that he felt the president had not fully comprehended what Ibn Saud was saying, particularly the fact that the Arabs would take up arms against the Jews almost no matter what.
At Bergen-Belsen: For Bergen-Belsen and the Frank family, see, for instance, Martin Gilbert, The Holocaust (Norton, 2012), 784–92; and Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl (Longman, 1993).
“We cannot fail them again”: For the joint session, MacGregor Burns, Soldier of Freedom, 581–82; Smith, FDR, 632–33; and the candid observations of William Hassett, Off the Record with FDR (Rutgers University Press, 1998), 318.
“powers of concentration”: On Roosevelt’s sharp decline, see especially Hassett, Off the Record, 319–29; and Bohlen, Witness, 206.
Ohrdruf: On the liberation of Ohrdruf, a subcamp at Buchenwald, see, for instance, the first-person account by David Cohen, Jewish Virtual Library, online; and American Centuries, University of Massachusetts, oral history. Cohen was a radio operator with the Fourth Armored Division. Meanwhile, General Eisenhower, not prone to overstatement, called “the barbarous” treatment of the Jews “unbelievable.” And he summoned members of Congress to become spokesmen to the world for the horror rendered by the Nazis. For his part, General Patton screamed, “See what these bastards did!” See also War History Online, Liberation of Ohrdruf; Gilbert, The Holocaust, 790–92.
“that’s all we thought about”: Elie Wiesel, Night (Hill and Wang, 2006), 115.
“much better”: For Roosevelt’s death, Smith, FDR, 635–36; Brands, Traitor to His Class 605–7; Goodwin, 602–3; Hassett, Off the Record, 332–37. Hassett was quite poetic about Roosevelt’s passing, essentially making the point that everyone saw it coming, but nobody was really ready for it.
collapsed “as they walked” and “I saw their corpses”: Gilbert, The Holocaust, 790–96.
“Just the sight”: J. D. Pletcher, “The Americans Have Come—at Last!” in The 71st Came . . . to Gunskirchen, Witness to the Holocaust Publication Series, no. 1 (Emory University, 1979), 4–11; and reprint in Robert H. Abzug, America Views the Holocaust (St. Martin’s, 1999), especially 195–96.
funeral wreaths: Goodwin, No Ordinary Time, especially 613–15, is particularly moving; for her assessment of Roosevelt, see 606–11. For “There was much rushing,” see Robert Jackson, The Man: An Insider’s Portrait of Franklin Roosevelt (Oxford University Press, 2003), 167.
“You can’t be Jews”: For this marvelous quote, originally in German, see Roger Moorhouse, Berlin at War (Basic Books, 2010), 306.
A weary Abraham Lincoln: For comparison with Lincoln, see Jay Winik, April 1865 (Harper Collins, 2001), 247–49; Alan Guelzo, Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation: The End of Slavery in America (Simon & Schuster, 2006).
Estimates of war dead: Allis Radosh and Ronald Radosh, A Safe Haven (Harper Perennial, 2009), 2; Tony Judt, Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945 (Penguin Press, 2005, 17–18.
“How much his passing”: Jackson, The Man, 169, 158.
“He was one”: Isaiah Berlin, Personal Safe Impressions, Henry Handy, ed. (Viking, 1981), 26. For other assessments of Roosevelt, see the following. New York Times, April 13, 1945, 18: “It was his leadership which inspired freemen in every part of the world to fight with greater hope and courage.” Brands, Traitor to His Class, 613–14. Eric Larrabee, Commander-in-Chief: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, His Lieutenants, and Their War (Harper and Row, 1987), 644; Larrabee writes that Roosevelt’s conduct as commander in chief “bears the mark of greatness.” William Leuchtenberg, Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal (Harper and Row, 1963), 327; Leuchtenberg writes that under Roosevelt “the White House became the focus of all government—the Fountainhead of ideas, the initiator of action, the representative of the national interest. [He] re-created the modern presidency.” Roosevelt himself once said, “I am like a cat. I make a quick stroke and then I relax”; here, perhaps, was one secret of his greatness. See also James MacGregor Burns, Leadership (Harper and Row, 1978), 281.
“his enormous popularity”: Bohlen, Witness, 210.
INDEX
A note about the index: The pages referenced in this index refer to the page numbers in the print edition. Clicking on a page number will take you to the ebook location that c
Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations.
Abandonment of the Jews, The (Wyman), 576n
Abruzzi, German raid in, 398
Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, 361
Acheson, Dean, 320, 423, 519
Africa, Jewish refuge in, 385–86, 406
Afrika Corps, 275, 324, 334
Agudas Israel World Organization, 449
airfields, in Italy, 393, 398, 452, 469, 470
air force, British, see Royal Air Force, British
Air Force, U.S., 51, 431, 452–53
Air Ministry, British, 458
Akzin, Benjamin, 452, 454–55, 469, 592n, 594n
Albania, 268, 463
Albany, N.Y., 32, 33
Alexandria, 276, 355, 516
Alex Zink Felt Factory, 101
Algeria, 268, 277, 338, 340, 341
Algiers, 338, 340, 341, 517
Algiers conference (1943), 391
Allach, 505
Allenwood, 29–30
Alps, 64, 176, 178, 357, 393, 518
Ambrose, Stephen, 551n, 554n, 563n, 564n, 568n
America First Committee, 233, 244
American Agriculturist, 421–22
American Civil Liberties Union, 590n
American Jews, 269, 299, 301, 309–21, 388, 417, 513, 577n
rescue efforts of, 407
Riegner Telegram and, 306, 308
Amiens prison, 461–63, 469
Amsterdam, 201–3, 484
Anaconda Copper Mining Company, 282
Andersen, Hans Christian, 114
Anne Frank House and Museum, 566n
Anthony, George, 529
anti-Nazi demonstrations, 313
anti-Semitism, 33, 148, 209–21, 359, 387
Arabs and, 516
in Auschwitz (town), 92–93
history of Nazi, 209–14, 219
Hitler’s development of, 210–14, 220
Riegner’s experience of, 303
in Soviet Union, 257
in U.S., 218, 220, 223, 225–26, 227, 230, 232, 332, 415, 419, 423, 435
in Vienna, 362, 364, 581n
see also Auschwitz; Final Solution; Holocaust
Anzio, 179, 434
appeasement, 47, 241, 342–43
Arabs, 406, 516, 585n, 600n
Ardennes, 468, 496, 500–502, 501, 509
aristocracy, 284, 369, 480
Armenians, 420, 588n
army, British:
in Greece, 245–46
see also specific generals and troops
army, French, 49, 50, 125, 339
army, German, 242, 255, 257, 263, 324, 355, 374, 530
Hitler in, 364–66
increase in size of, 372
Stalin’s cutting in two of, 352
army, Italian, 396, 398
army, Slovak, 154
army, Soviet, see Red Army
army, U.S., 36, 51, 349, 411
in Battle of the Bulge, 500–502, 501
intelligence of, 446
Torch and, 338–41, 344, 356–57
Army Corps of Engineers, 411
Arnold, Hap, 192–93
Arrow Cross, 459
Aryan race, 114, 116, 205, 213, 266, 291, 325, 364, 366, 390
Associated Press (AP), 175, 190, 479, 596n
Atherton, Ray, 318
Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic theater, 196, 245, 247, 248, 276, 500
Torch and, 340, 341, 352
Atlantic Wall, 83, 157, 158, 184, 190, 200, 555n
atomic bomb, 410–13, 509, 531, 585n
Augusta, USS, 188
Auschwitz (concentration camp), 91–137, 169–73, 387, 404, 434, 460, 494–500, 514, 556n–57n
Anglo-American warning about, 498–99
arrival at, 93–95
barracks at, 107, 110, 123, 125, 126, 132, 155
beautification of, 113
benefiting from the dead at, 100–102, 117
black market at, 117
Block 11 at, 130, 264
Block 14 at, 126
bombing and, see bombing, Auschwitz and
casualty figures for, 503–4
cover up efforts at, 499–500, 502–3
crematoriums at, 95, 100, 107, 118, 120, 121, 133, 136, 155, 200–201, 203, 295, 297, 300, 326, 383, 453, 494–97, 499, 500, 503, 559n
Dutch Jews in, 11–12, 139
escapes from, see escapes from Auschwitz
evacuation of, 502–3, 508, 517–18
expansion of, 121, 127, 294, 296
fruit trees at, 11, 544n
gallows at, 122–23
gas chambers at, 91, 95–99, 107, 108, 111, 113, 118, 119, 121, 125, 133, 166, 201, 271, 295, 296, 300, 375, 417, 449, 453, 454, 464, 484, 496–500, 503
Himmler’s visits to, 291, 294–97, 575n
Hungarian Jews at, see Hungarian Jews, at Auschwitz
inner camp of, 123, 127
as labor camp, 93, 271
lack of German opposition to, 113–14
latrines at, 110, 132
liberation of, 503–4, 512, 599n
malnutrition and starvation at, 107, 108, 109, 112
music at, 109, 112–13, 121, 294, 498
as network of death, 111
numbers and tattoos at, 108, 117, 118, 120, 135, 203
outer camp of, 123, 127
photographs of, 128–29, 203, 431, 452, 453, 497, 498, 499, 559n, 591n–92n
private sector links of, 111–12
publicizing of, 326–27
registrars at, 118–20, 126, 127
removal of corpses at, 99, 100
repairs at, 100
rescue of Jews and, 449–58
response to, 536
roll calls at, 107, 108, 109, 125, 130, 131
secrecy of, 93, 111, 120, 166, 205, 323, 578n
security at, 123–24
selection process at, 94–95, 200, 295, 556n
sickness at, 107
sirens at, 124, 131
slave labor at, 106–11, 117, 119, 120, 129, 135, 557n
solitary confinement at, 109
Sonderkommando revolt at, 495–96, 499
Soviet advance on, 499, 502, 503
special camp at, 119–21
SS vacations from, 103–6, 557n
stench of, 94, 99, 100, 110, 136, 149
trains for, see trains, Auschwitz and
underground at, 118
Vrba transferred to, 116–17
weakest left behind at, 502, 503, 508
Auschwitz (town), 102, 112, 291
history of, 92–93
pubs in, 112, 113, 558n
Auschwitz I, 111
Auschwitz III, 111, 453
Auschwitz-Birkenau (Auschwitz II), 111, 118–19, 155, 168, 294, 450, 494–96, 544n
bombing of, 464, 472
construction of, 93, 271
evacuation of, 502–3
moat of, 123
photographs of, 203, 453, 499, 591n–92n
SS combing of grounds of, 131–36
Australian squadron, 462, 463
Austria, Austrians, 92, 113, 499, 517
Allied bombing of, 398
German annexation of, 214, 232, 288, 372
Hitler in, 360–64
Austrian Jews, 263, 304, 463
Axis powers, 241, 245, 274, 278, 333, 350, 378, 413, 441
French siding with, 341
map of North African operations of, 336–37
map of territories controlled by, 250
see also specific countries
Azalea, HMS, 158
Babi Yar, 259–60
Bad Nauheim, 25
Badoglio, Pietro, 397
Baer, Richard, 557n
Baghdad, 15, 18
Balfour Declaration (1917), 311
Balkans, 204, 232, 245, 252, 297, 355, 382, 436,
Allied bombing of, 393, 398
Ball, William, 142
Baltic Sea, 66, 253, 255, 500, 552n
Baltic states, 72, 552n
Baltimore, USS, 481
Barkley, Alben W., 240, 375–76
Baruch, Bernard, 33, 91, 139–42, 156, 422
Basra, 15, 16
Bastogne, 500, 501–2
Bavaria, 281, 367, 368
BBC, 190, 290, 325, 331, 332, 339, 435, 497, 504
beatings, 116, 284, 360, 523
at Auschwitz, 108, 109, 119, 120, 127, 143, 295, 296
Becker, Dr., 263, 264
Bedford, Va., 186, 564n
Bedford boys, 186–87, 564n
beer hall putsch, 367, 372
Belgian Jews, 133, 170, 297, 304
Belgium, 165, 181, 192, 236, 269, 271
blitzkrieg against, 48, 49, 288
liberation of, 493
refugees and, 218
Belgrade, Nazis in, 245
Belleau Wood, FDR’s walk in, 38
Belzec, 271, 304, 320, 326, 403, 434
Berchtesgaden, 198–99
Bergen-Belsen, 518, 527–28
Bergson, Peter H., 379–80, 401, 402, 415, 440
Berle, Adolf, Jr., 225
Berlin, 100, 102, 165, 179, 193, 258, 297, 302, 357, 371, 512
Allies in, 481
bombing of, 5–10, 53, 75, 102, 381, 409, 434, 543n–44n
bread lines in, 284
Breslau compared with, 282, 283
British ambassador to, 317
damage in, 8–9, 102
Goebbels’s speech in, 347–48, 397
Hitler’s panzer commander in, 260
Hitler’s speeches in, 205, 270, 324–25
Hitler’s welcome in, 52
Kristallnacht in, 212–13
Lindbergh in, 566n–67n
news of escape wired to, 136
in 1943, 347–48
revolution in, 365
Schulte in, 281, 282, 283, 288, 289, 300
slave labor in defense of, 518
surrender of, 530–31
synagogues in, 212
U.S. ambassador to, 318
Wannsee conference in, 264–70, 412
Washington compared with, 349
Welles in, 48
Berlin, Battle of, 6–10, 102, 543n–44n
Berlin, Isaiah, 58, 533
Bermuda conference (1943), 383–87, 391, 401, 415, 583n
Bern, 306, 307, 375, 408, 458
Besser, Aliza, 521
Bethesda Naval Hospital, 86–87, 438