Tag Archives: 1930s Germany

A Village in the Third Reich by Julia Boyd

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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.

When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit by Judith Kerr

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When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit cover

When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit by Judith Kerr was first published in 1971 but it was only when I was watching the BBC’s Imagine programme which featured Judith Kerr that I thought it was about time I got around to reading it. She’s probably better known as the author of the children’s books The Tiger Who Came To Tea and the Mogg books. I had it in my mind that this book was an account of Judith Kerr’s experiences as a child in Germany in the 1930s – which it is – but I just didn’t realise that it is written from a child’s perspective with Judith being able to recount how she felt as everything in her comfortable life in Berlin changed due to Hitler’s increasing persecution of the Jews. Although it’s autobiographical Judith changed the girl’s name to Anna. In some ways her family was much luckier than most as her father Alfred Kerr had a high profile job as a journalist, he was a theatre reviewer for a Berlin newspaper and was hated by Hitler so he knew that he had to get out of Germany sooner rather than later and didn’t leave it until it was too late as so many did.

A telephone tip off from a friendly policeman telling Alfred that his passport is about to be seized means that Alfred has to leave his wife, Anna and son Max and make his way to Switzerland as soon as possible. He’s gone by the morning and it isn’t long before the family joins him. It’s a frightening time for them all and even in Switzerland they aren’t safe as Nazis holiday there. As the blurb on the back says: This is the start of a huge adventure, sometimes frightening, very often funny, and always, always exciting.

This was a great read and there are two more books in this autobiographical series:
Bombs On Aunt Dainty and
A Small Person Far Away.

I’ve just requested Bombs On Aunt Dainty from the library, so much for me not borrowing any more books!

You can watch the Imagine documentary below.