A Village in the Third Reich by Julia Boyd is about the village of Oberstdorf in Bavaria. I requested it from NetGalley because I have had a Bavarian penfriend since the early 1970s and I first visited her Bavarian village back in 1970 when I was 11 or so. It was a strange experience.
Anyway, this book goes into a lot of detail of how a small village reacted to the Nazis as they became more powerful and then took over most of the village with Nazis being put in positions of power. How did it happen that normal people and particularly their children were influenced by the regime and turned into Nazis? As the Nazis grip on power strengthened it was pure fear for some people that made them join the Nazis. With people like teachers being dismissed if they didn’t toe the National Socialist Party line it was easier just to sign up I suppose.
This is quite a depressing read in places as it goes into the details of who were euthanised/murdered for being less than perfect specimens of human beings, as well as the more usual poor souls targeted by the Nazis. At one point I’m sure the author implied that the German people were not particularly anti-Jew, but I’ve read a travel book by Cicely Hamilton which was published in 1931 and she wrote that everyone in Germany was against the Jews, which she was puzzled by,
This book is an interesting read but I’ve always wondered what would have happened if a similar cult had tried to take over the UK, and I can’t see it being able to happen somehow, and I don’t think that’s me just being optimistic. There were still Nazis in Bavaria in the 1970s, proudly displaying their medals in their china cabinets and complaining that the local church had been damaged by the RAF!! And that they had suffered badly as a prisoner of war at the end of it all! I forbore to mention that my own great-grandmother had been killed by the Luftwaffe and my father had been torpedoed several times by the German navy – and I’m still annoyed at myself for being so polite.
Anyway, if you’re interested in the rise of the Nazis you will probably find this book to be a worthwhile read. I received a digital copy of it from the publisher via Elliott and Thompson via NetGalley. Thank you.
My dad was in the US Army and spent a few years stationed in Berlin during the Cold War, he still talks about how so many of the Germans he interacted with were unapologetic about the Holocaust and thought that Germany was hard done by in having the Allies occupy their country!
Christine,
I think it must be part of their character to feel hard done by, no matter how awful they have been to others. I know that I was looked down on as being from a poor country, well I must say that their standard of living in the early 1970s was much higher than ours, but that was because after the war we were too busy contributing money to the rebuilding of Germany which was considered more important than rebuilding Britain – so that the Germans wouldn’t get disgruntled again as they did after WW1. We also had to repay our debt to the USA for leasing warships during the war from them, that debt was just paid off a few years ago. We had rationing here right into the 1950s and probably we still would have if it hadn’t been for a revolt of housewives who were at their wits end about how to feed their families!
Katrina,
I’m very interested in this one, and wonder if it’s being published here. I’ll look into it. I’m so sorry to learn what happened to your great grandmother. Where was she living when this happened? Was she on your mother’s or your father’s side?
Judith,
She was my dad’s beloved granny, she lived in Glasgow. She was deaf and couldn’t hear the air raid siren very well, but her neighbours used to bang on her window when they were running to the air-raid shelter. They think she must have been asleep so didn’t hear anything at all. She was sitting by her fireside and when a bomb fell nearby the whole fire grate was thrown into the air and landed in her lap so she was badly burnt and died shortly afterwards. Horrific.
Katrina,
How tragic, and how terrible for her family. I am sorry to hear that this happened, however many years ago.
Katrina,
I have to add another thought…
It’s daunting when we consider how a war trauma is felt and experienced by so many of the succeeding generations, just passed down and on and on from there. I have a friend who is a therapist and she calls it “inter-generational trauma.” So true, really.
Judith,
It’s just a sadness for her and my dad really, which is daft because he has been dead for over 40 years. But I remember that my mum had told me that when my dad was a youngster he had saved up his money to buy his granny her first coat as she had always worn a shawl before! I just hope that she got to wear her coat a lot before she was bombed.