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Timeline of Events: Europe and the Frank Family

By amaze

  • World War I Ends

    The Central Powers declare defeat and an armistice agreement is signed.

  • The Treaty of Versailles is Signed

    The Treaty of Versailles is Signed
    The Treaty of Versailles stripped Germany of its colonies; severely limited the German military; forced Germany to concede 13% of its prewar territory, which included 10% of its population; and make enormous reparation payments to the Western Powers. The Treaty also contained the "War Guilt Clause," which held Germany solely responsible for starting World War I.

  • Constitution of the Weimar Republic Goes Into Effect

    After Imperial Germany is defeated by the Western Powers, a new federal republic government is established centralized around a president, a chancellor, and the Reichstag (German Parliament).

  • Hitler Joins the German Workers Party

    As part of his intelligence gathering position within the German Army (Deutsches Heer), Hitler attends a meeting of the German Workers Party (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, DAP). A month later, Hitler officially joins as member number 555.

  • NSDAP is Established

    The DAP changes its name to the National Socialist German Worker's Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP), also known as the Nazi Party. The Nazi Party sets out certain aims, such as national unity based on racial criteria, expansion of Germany's territory, and expulsion of Jews from Germany.

  • Hitler Becomes Fuhrer

    After being voted in as party chairman, Hitler named himself absolute Leader (Fuhrer) of the Nazi Party.

  • The Nazi Party Grows

    Membership continues to rise due to Hitler's charisma and passionate speeches, the unhappiness with the current government and Germany's economic problems. With the creation in 1921 of the Sturmabteilung (SA) known as the "storm troopers", appealed to many veterans and young men. The SA was a party created militia that was served as the violent wing of the party.
    By November 1923, Hitler, along with Nazi leaders Ernst Rohm and Hermann Goering, the party grew to 55,000 members .

  • The Beer Hall Putsch

    Hitler leads the Nazis in a failed attempt to overthrow the local Bavarian government with the intent of marching on Berlin to depose the federal government. After the putsch fails, Hitler is arrested and the Nazi Party is banned by the German government.

  • Hitler is Sent to Prison

    Hitler is convicted of treason and sentenced to five years imprisonment, of which he only serves nine months. While serving his sentence, he dictates the first volume of his now famous autobiography Mein Kampf (My Struggle).

  • Volume One of Mein Kampf is Published

    Volume One of Mein Kampf is Published
    Volume one is an autobiographical account of his life. The first run of 10,000 copies quickly sells out but sales decline soon after.

  • Schutzstaffel-SS is Formed

    A paramilitary group known as the Protection Squadron (Schutzstaffel-SS) is established to serve as Hitler's personal bodyguards. By 1939, the SS will evolve into the elite guard of the Nazi Reich and be charged with carrying out the "Final Solution."

  • Otto Frank and Edith Hollander are married in Aachen, Germany

  • Volume Two of Mein Kampf is Published

    Volume Two of Mein Kampf explicitly outlines Hitler's race-based nationalist agenda. He expounds that the only way to secure Germany's survival is through military conquest and the seizure of Lebensraum ("living space") in the East, which would be built upon the slave labor and extermination of "inferior" races living in Poland, the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and the Baltic States.

  • Margot Frank is born in Frankfurt, Germany

  • 1928 Parliamentary Elections

    The Nazi Party secures just 2.6% of the national vote.

  • Annelies (Anne) Marie Frank is born in Frankfurt, Germany

  • "Black Tuesday"

    The American Stock Market crashes, sending a rippling effect throughout economies around the world. Germany, in particular, is hit devastatingly hard due to the previous inflation experienced as a result of reparations.

  • 1930 Parliamentary Elections

    The Nazi Party secures 18.3% of the national vote.

  • 1932 Parliamentary Elections

    The Nazi Party receives 37.3% of the national vote.

  • The Gestapo (Secret State Police) is established.

    Created by Hermann Goring by combining various police agencies into one organization. This organization had the power to imprison people without judicial proceedings.

  • The Frank family moves to Amsterdam in the Netherlands due to increasing tensions in Germany.

    Summer

  • Hitler is Appointed Chancellor of Germany

  • Reichstag Fire Decree

    Reichstag Fire Decree
    After the Reichstag is deliberately burnt down, President Hindenburg, at Hitler's urging, issues Article 48, the Decree for the Protection of People and the Reich (Reichstag Fire Decree). This suspends all individual rights as well as gives the central government the authority to overthrow state and local governments. It provided Hitler and the Nazi party with the legally putting anyone that disagreed with the Nazis in prison.

  • Dachau Concentration Camp is Established

    Dachau Concentration Camp (Konzentrationslager -- KL) is founded outside the town of Dachau (Germany) to incarcerate political opponents. Dachau is the only camp to remain active throughout the entire Nazi period (1933-1945).

  • Anti-Jewish Boycott

    The Nazi leadership declares a national boycott on all Jewish businesses and medical and legal practices. The one day national boycott was relatively unsuccessful and ignored by many individual Germans; however, the boycott marked the beginning of anti-Jewish measures enacted by the regime.

  • Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service

    Jews and political opponents are excluded from all civil service positions.

  • Law Against Overcrowding in Schools and Universities

    Jewish enrollment in public schools and universities is severely restricted. Educators are encouraged to teach students love for Hitler, obedience to state authority, militarism, racism, and antisemitism.

  • Book Burning

    University students burn books written by Jews and political enemies as well as any other books deemed "un-German."

  • Law for the Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases

    This new law mandates the forced sterilization of certain individuals with physical and mental disabilities. It provides a basis for the eventual involuntary sterilization of people with physical and mental disabilities, Roma/Sinti (Gypsies), “asocials,” and Afro-Germans.

  • Night of the Long Knives

    In order to garner support with the German army commanders, Hitler orders the violent purge of all top leadership of the paramilitary SA (Sturmabteilungen).

  • Death of President Von Hindenburg

    President von Hindenburg's death played a crucial role into the Hitler's dictatorship. Prior to his death, the cabinet had passed a law stating that upon Hidenburg's death, the powers of the president would be merged with those of chancellor. Upon the President's death, Hitler became head of state as well as head of government and was named Fuhrer and Chancellor. Hitler then eliminated the last legal way for him to be removed from office.

  • Nuremberg Laws

    The Nuremberg Laws contained two key pieces of legislation. The Reich Citizenship Law stripped Jews of their German citizenship and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honor outlawed marriages between Aryans and Jews. The laws outlined a definition of who was Jewish and who was Aryan based on factors. The Nuremberg Race Laws provided the legal framework for the systematic persecution of Jews in Germany.

  • Germany Annexes Austria

    Germany annexes Austria in what is known as the Anschluss.

  • The Evian Conference

    Delegates from 32 countries and representatives from a multitude of aid agencies meet to discuss options for settling Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution as immigrants in the Americas, other areas of Europe, Asia, and Australia. The majority of countries, including the United States, are unwilling to lessen their strict immigration restrictions. The Dominican Republic was the only country to accept Jews.

  • Executive Order on the Law on the Alteration of Family and Personal Names

    The Executive Order on the Law on the Alteration of Family and Personal Names requires German Jews bearing first names of “non-Jewish” origin to adopt an additional name: “Israel” for men and “Sara” for women.

  • Germany Annexes the Sudentenland (German speaking territory of Czechoslovakia)

  • German Jews' Passports Declared Invalid

    Reich Ministry of the Interior invalidates all German passports held by Jews. Jews must surrender their old passports, which will become valid only after the letter “J” has been stamped on them.

  • Kristallnacht

    Kristallnacht ("night of broken glass") is a state sponsored pogrom in Greater Germany (Germany, Austria, and the Sudetenland), which results in the destruction of hundreds of synagogues and thousands of Jewish owned businesses.

  • Tiergarten (T4) Program

    Beginning in August of 1939 children under the age of three who showed signs of mental or physical disability were murdered. Beginning in October 1939, authorities were encouraging parents to admit their handicapped children to clinics to essentially be murdered. Beginning in September handicapped adults were euthanized.

  • German authorities begin to establish ghettos in the General Government (Occupied Poland).

    Ghettos were enclosed districts that isolated Jews by separating Jewish communities from the non-Jewish population. The Germans established at least 1,000 ghettos in German occupied and annexed Poland and the Soviet Union. The first ghetto was established in Piotrkow Trybunalski Poland in October 1939. Other ghettos established were in the cities of Lodz, Warsaw, Krakow, and others. The majority of ghetto inhabitants died from disease, starvation, shooting, or deportation to killing centers.

  • The German military occupies the rest of Czechoslovakia

  • Germany invades Poland, leading Great Britain and France to declare war

  • Jews are mandated to wear a white armband with a blue Star of David at all times in the General Government (occupied Poland).

  • German occupation of the low countries

    Germany begin the invasion of the Low Countries (Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Belgium), as well as France.

  • Establishment of Auschwitz

    Auschwitz I served as a concentration camp for political prisoners.
    Auschwitz II (Birkenau) was designed to be an extermination camp where most of the prisoners would be gassed upon arrival, while some would work until their death.
    Auschwitz III was a labor education camp for non-Jewish prisoners who were perceived to have violated German imposed labor discipline.

  • Warsaw ghetto is sealed

    German authorities order the Warsaw ghetto to be sealed, confining more than 350,000 Jews in an area of about 1.3 square miles.

  • Nazi Germany invades Yugoslavia and Greece

  • Nazi Germany invades the Soviet Union in "Operation Barbarossa."

  • All Jews in the Reich must wear a star of David

    All Jews in the Reich are mandated to wear a badge which consists of a yellow Star of David with the word "Jew" inscribed inside the star in German or in the local language.

  • German authorities begin deportations of German, Austrian and Czech Jews to ghettos, concentration camps, or extermination camps in occupied Poland

    Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS, tasks the SS with implementing what later becomes known as “Operation Reinhard,” the extermination of the Jews residing in the Generalgouvernement (occupied Poland).

  • Japan attacks the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor, causing the United States to enter the war.

  • Germany declares war on the United States

  • Sobibor, Belzec, Chelmno,and Auschwitz-Birkenau become fully operations extermination camps, followed by Treblinka II in July.

    Extermination camps were created where prisoners were destined to die. Upon arrival prisoners were killed.

  • Wannsee Conference

    Reinhard Heydrich, chief of the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA), convenes the Wannsee Conference, he presents plans to coordinate a European-wide “Final Solution of the Jewish Question” to leaders of the German State and the Nazi Party. The "Final Solution" was the code name for the systematic annihilation of European Jews. While Jews were being murdered prior to this meeting, the Conference was where the "final solution" was revealed to non-Nazi leaders. No one present objected to the policy

  • Auschwitz II (Birkenau) becomes operational and serves as a concentration camp, labor camp, and killing center. Between 1940-1945, approximately 1.3 million people are deported to Auschwitz camp complex, of which 1.1 million are murdered.

    The vast majority of Jews killed at Auschwitz-Birkenau are murdered between March 1943 and November 1944, when gassing of newly arrived transports ceased.

  • Anne Frank receives a diary for her thirteenth birthday

  • Margo receives a call-up notice to report for deportation to a labor camp and the family decides to go into hiding the next day.

  • The Van Pels family, another German-Jewish family in Amsterdam, joins the Frank family in hiding.

  • Fritz Pfeffer joins the Franks and Van Pels family in hiding in the Secret Annex

  • Germany is defeated at Stalingrad, Soviet Union, which turns the tide of the war from Axis to Allied victories.

  • Warsaw ghetto uprising

    On the morning the Warsaw ghetto is to be liquidated, individuals and small groups of Jews take part in an armed uprising. Despite being vastly outgunned and outnumbered, they are able to off the liquidation for a month before finally being overrun.

  • Jewish prisoners at the Sobibor killing center begin an armed revolt. About 300 escape, of which 100 are recaptured and killed.

  • Hermann Van Pels is gassed shortly after arriving at Auschwitz-Birkenau.

    September

  • Anne and Margot Frank are transferred to Bergen-Belsen, a concentration camp located within the interior of Germany.

    October

  • German troops occupy Hungary and immediately set out to deport the Hungarian Jewish population, the last intact Jewish community in occupied Europe.

  • The Allies invade Western Europe (D-Day).

  • German military officers attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler in his East Prussian headquarters at Rastenburg.

  • The residents of the Secret Annex are discovered and arrested. They are taken to a police station in Amsterdam before being transferred to Westerbork transit camp.

  • All eight residents of the Secret Annex are deported to Auschwitz. They are on the last transport to ever leave Westerbork.

  • Prisoners assigned to Crematorium IV at Auschwitz-Birkenau lead an armed uprising after learning that they are going to be killed.

  • Himmler orders troops to destroy the crematoria at Auschwitz-Birkenau to hide evidence of war crimes from the advancing Russian Army.

  • Fritz Pfeffer dies at the Neuengamme concentration camp in Germany.

  • Anne and Margot Frank die at Bergen-Belsen within days of each other.

    March

  • Deaths of Mrs. Van Pels and Peter Van Pels

    At the Theresienstadt camp in Czechoslovakia. Peter Van Pels, after surviving a death march from Auschwitz, dies in Austria at the Mauthausen Concentration Camp, just days before it was liberated.

  • Fifteen hundred copies of Anne’s diary are published by Contact Publishers in Amsterdam.

    November

  • Edith Frank dies at Auschwitz-Birkenau

  • SS units begin the evacuation of the Auschwitz camp complex by forcing prisoners on "death marches" into the interior of Germany ahead of the Soviet Army advance.

  • Otto Frank is liberated from Auschwitz by the Russian Army. He is first taken to a displaced persons camp in Odessa, Russia and then to France before making his way back to Amsterdam.

  • Bergen-Belsen concentration camp is liberated by the British Army.

  • Hitler commits suicide in his command bunker in Berlin, Germany.

  • Otto Frank arrives in Amsterdam, where he is reunited with Miep and Jan Gies. He concentrates on finding Margot and Anne

  • The German armed forces surrender unconditionally to the Western Allies.

  • Otto Frank visits a Mrs. Brilleslijper who was with his daughters in Bergen-Belsen. She tells him of Anne’s and Margot’s deaths in Bergen-Belsen.

  • The United States drops the atomic bomb on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan.

    August 6 & 8

  • Japan surrenders unconditionally. World War II officially ends.

  • Nuremberg Trials

    The International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg, Germany, begins a trial of 21 (of 24 indicted) major Nazi German leaders on charges of crimes against peace, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and conspiracy to commit each of these crimes. It is the first time that international tribunals are used as a postwar mechanism for bringing national leaders to justice

  • The diary is translated into English.

    Summer

  • The Diary of Anne Frank, a play by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, premieres on Broadway.

  • The first film version of The Diary of Anne Frank opens in theaters across the United States.

  • Otto Frank dies in Switzerland.