The Importance of Getting the Historical Facts About the Holocaust Correct
I’m immersed in writing THE THIN EDGE OF THE WEDGE, a one-act Holocaust play (four actors, no scenery for ease of accessibility) based on firsthand accounts of survivors and saviors. Therefore, when I saw a picture of the entrance to the Nazi extermination camp of Auschwitz on the op ed page of the June 22, 2018, print edition of The Wall Street Journal, I read the accompanying piece by Jay Winik, whose historian status was included in the brief bio at the end of the op ed piece.
The article titled “Trump’s Critics Desecrate the Holocaust” had as its focus explaining why the U.S. southern border crisis had no comparison to the Holocaust.
What I found very disturbing was how an historian writing a piece about the Holocaust could get a very important fact so wrong.
True, we all get facts wrong, especially facts we cannot absolutely prove — such as the exact number of people (Jews and others) murdered at Auschwitz.
Yet Winik’s error of fact is particularly grievous. The Wall Street Journal article states in a stand-alone paragraph about Auschwitz:
“The SS separated the healthy males, slating them for work details while everyone else was taken to the gas chambers.”
The truth is that healthy females within a certain age range arriving at Auschwitz and not carrying a babe in arms and with no little children clutching onto their skirts were not immediately sent to the gas chambers. Instead they were sent to other parts of the concentration camp complex as were healthy males within a certain age range.
And the reason this error of Winik’s article is so grievous is that there is witness testimony from female survivors of Auschwitz. This important testimony should not be discredited by mistakes such as the one made by Winik in his op ed piece.
The Holocaust play I’m writing includes the firsthand account of a Lithuanian teen who survived Auschwitz. The following is one small piece of this account:
Hundreds died of starvation in the ghetto, and then came the day near the end of 1942 when Judith, her sister and mother were sent to Auschwitz. They survived the selections for the gas chamber, and in the summer or early fall of 1944 were transported to another concentration camp — Stutthof.
I hope that The Wall Street Journal op ed page editors will add a correction to Winik’s article. This is one grievous error that should be corrected by a prominent U.S. newspaper.
Click here to read more of Judith’s harrowing Holocaust survivor account.
Recommended book of Holocaust firsthand accounts: I’m currently reading Arnold Geier’s book HEROES OF THE HOLOCAUST. The author collected firsthand accounts of Jews from a wide range of countries including his own account as a Jew from Germany.
From the Amazon description of HEROES OF THE HOLOCAUST:
A collection of true-life tales about people who risked their lives in order to save others includes those of the ship’s captain who dumped his cargo so that six hundred Jews could be hidden from danger and a German general who saved a Jewish family through his personal intervention.
Arnold Geier’s own survival account includes this:
On November 8, 1938, one night before Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass), a German man appeared at the Berlin apartment of Geier’s grandfather. The man said:
“Herr Geier, do you remember when you saved a solder on the battlefield many years ago [during WWI]? I am that soldier. I work with the Chief of Police in Berlin and have kept track of you for a long time. Tomorrow night, police and SS will round up adult male Jews all over Germany. I have seen the list, and your name is on it. Do whatever you wish. My debt to you is paid.”
Click here to check out HEROES OF THE HOLOCAUST on Amazon.
Click here to read blog post “Holocaust Remembrance Day 2018: Is the Holocaust Fading From Memory” and view video testimony of Auschwitz survivor Sally Marco.
UPDATE: Click here to learn how you can help in the proposed Kristallnacht 80th anniversary commemoration in November 2018.
© 2018 Miller Mosaic LLC
Phyllis Zimbler Miller (@ZimblerMiller) has an M.B.A. from The Wharton School and is the author of fiction and nonfiction books/ebooks. Phyllis is available by skype for book group discussions and may be reached at pzmiller@gmail.com
Her Kindle fiction ebooks may be read for free with a Kindle Unlimited monthly subscription — see www.amazon.com/author/phylliszimblermiller — and her Kindle nonfiction ebooks may also be read for free with a Kindle Unlimited monthly subscription — see www.amazon.com/author/phylliszmiller