Germany's Black Holocaust: 1890-1945

by Carr, Firpo

  Today the right of citizenship, as mentioned above, is primarily achieved by birth within the borders of a state. In this, race or nationality plays no role whatever. A Negro, who formerly lived in the German protectorates and now has his residence in Germany, gives birth to a ‘German citizen’ in the person of his child. Likewise every Jewish or Polish, African or Asiatic child can be declared a German citizen without further ado. … Racial objections play no role whatever in this. … The former Zulu Kaffir [Black Nigger] in question is informed: ‘You have hereby become a German!’[110]

  In Hitler’s distorted version of Nazi taxonomy, such classifications were, in his own words (though not included in the quote above), “erroneously designated.”

  But just how many of these “erroneously designed” Black Germans were there? Is there a reliable count?

  What Was Germany’s Black Population?

  Apparently, no one knows for sure how many Blacks were in Germany during WWII. Nevertheless, fairly educated guesses abound.

  Unfortunately, a Black man in Germany was like a Black man in the United States, of which famed author Ralph Ellison wrote a book appropriately titled, The Invisible Man (1952).

  It seems the Black man, woman, or child, was, for the most part, a non-entity that fit neatly in the background of the American scenery, if that. Either of them was, well, invisible. Yes, far too many Blacks were never taken into account.

  Because Blacks were “invisible, yet visible” in Nazi Germany too, two questions may come to mind: If they were indeed “visible,” just how many were there? If they were “invisible,” how could anyone know for sure?

  The fact is, as stated above, it appears that no one really knows for sure just how many Black people or African Germans there were during the Nazi reign of terror. But, as noted, guesstimates abound.

  Black population statistics in Germany have not been researched during the Holocaust, but caution is required if Nazi census statistics are to be used. However, some black census figures can be located in the publications of Benno Mueller-Hill (Murderous Science: Elimination by Scientific Selection of Jews, Gypsies, and Others; Germany, 1933-1945, trans. George R. Fraser, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988) and Christian Pross and Goetz Aly (The Value of a Human Being: Medicine in Germany 1918-1945, Berlin: Edition Hentrich, 1991) There are some figures in the Records of the Deutscher Gemeindetag, etc. Based on those figures, my guess is approximately 1,000 to 1,500 blacks were living in Germany from 1933 to 1936.[111]

  In the light of a few other sources (mostly written), the figures of 1,000 to 1,500 are very conservative. The general consensus regarding the number of Blacks in Germany from 1933-1945 appears to be from 20,000 to 24,000.

  In any event, there is abundant evidence that a number of Blacks were indeed in Germany during the Holocaust. Black POWs have been actually captured on film in Nazi prison or work camps. Actual photographic prints are also available to shock the senses.

  And, of course, there are, in a few cases, actual court records that verify the existence of Black victims of the Holocaust. Take, for example, the case of a nameless Black person who was a casualty in the Gardelegen Massacre:

  Original Buchenwald Register for Male Inmate, 44,001 to 45,000, ca. 1942-1945, National Archives Record Group 238, National Archives Collection of War Crimes Records, book 45, p. 14,196. Witness Statements of Abrham [sic] Stahl, Erhart Richard Brauny, Josef Fischer, Icek Halicewicz, and miscellaneous correspondence to include but not limited to the following lists of Dora-Mittelbau inmates by nationalities, photograph of an unidentified black victim taken by the U.S. Army Signal Corps at Gardelegen, lists of unknown victims buried at Gardelegen, SHAEF Court of Inquiry Report on the Gardelegen Massacre, National Archives Record Group 153, JAG, War Department, War Crimes Division., series 143, file 12-480 and National Archives Record Group 338, JAG, ETOUSA, War Crimes Branch, file 000-50-037.[112] (Italics supplied.)

  Perhaps no one will ever know for a certainty just how many Black lives were silenced in Germany during World War II.

  The unknown notwithstanding, there is one fact that cannot be questioned: However many Blacks there were in Nazi Germany, that number was dramatically reduced, attributable directly to Nazi-sponsored terrorism and mass murder.

  Nevertheless, a few Blacks did not go quietly to the slaughtering house. There were some creative and ingenious Blacks who occasionally caused a barely noticeable sputter, however inconsequential, in the well-oiled Nazi machine.

  The Black Resistance

  One could randomly select any period of oppression in human history and find that in nearly every case a hero (or heroes) emerges from the ranks of the oppressed.

  True to form, Germany’s assault against the Black race produced the Nat Turners and Denmark Veseys of the National Socialistic or Nazi Era.

  No, their names are not as well-known as Marcus Garvey, W.E.B. DuBois, Martin Luther King, Jr., Elijah Muhammad, or Malcolm X. Instead, they went by the names of George Padmore, Larry Gilges, and the electrifying Johnny Nicolas.

  Although the Atlantic Ocean has proven to be, not just an ocean, but a world that has separated their bold, courageous, tremendous feats from the pages of history, their unparalleled acts of incomparable fortitude cannot be forever kept in isolation.

  George Padmore, a Black labor union leader, was the A. Philip Randolph of Nazi Germany. Larry Gilges was Germany’s version of Huey P. Newton, co-founder of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. And Johnny Nicolas was anything he wanted to be.

  George Padmore, Union Leader

  A. (Asa) Philip Randolph was a very prominent figure in the labor and trade unions in 20th-century America, especially as these related to Black men. He was either affiliated with or was on the ground floor of a few different Black trade unions or organizations.

  After starting the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in 1925, and holding various posts in subsequent years he eventually founded the Negro American Labor Council in 1960.

  In 1942 [during World War II] New York City’s Mayor Fiorella La Guardia appointed him to the New York Housing Authority. In 1955, the year the American Federation of Labor (AFL) merged with the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), Randolph was appointed to the AFL-CIO executive council. In 1957 he became vice-president of the union.[113]

  Given this background on Randolph, we can now better appreciate what Padmore did. The two of them had at least a few things in common. First off, here is the short book on George Padmore in the context of certain events that gravely affected the national Black community in Germany.

  Goering ordered his men to round up all Negroes and deport them from the country. Among the first to be arrested was George Padmore, the militant black leader and secretary of the International Trade Union of Negro Workers. Padmore was dragged out of his bed by Nazi police, imprisoned for about two weeks and afterwards deported. Seeing the imminent danger, many blacks fled Germany to France and England. Negro musicians and artists were banned from performing in Germany except those that Hitler used in his propaganda films. Broadcasting of Jazz music over the radio or even playing it at home was banned as it was considered to be “Nigger Music.” The choice of entertainment became viewing Nazi instructional films and anti-Semitic material.[114]

  Aside from the fact that both were officials in Black labor unions, Padmore was described as “a militant black leader,” and socialist Randolph was characterized, in his twilight years, as one whose “socialism became less militant.”[115]

  There is a major difference though.

  While Randolph should be given due credit for all his struggles against racism and discrimination, it must be acknowledged that Padmore appears to have operated under the most trying of circumstances.

  After all, while Randolph, who through hard work, perseverance, and the patience of Job, toiled at overcoming seemingly insurmountable obstacles, he nonetheless won the respect and accolades of White politicians up to and including the president of the United S
tates himself.

  Padmore, on the other hand, doubtlessly went down a path not too dissimilar from Randolph’s, but was ignominiously rewarded with being dragged out of his bed, and booted out of town--scratch that—that is to say, out of the country of his birth.

  Randolph ended up in encyclopedia sets of all sorts gracing libraries across the world. Padmore’s name is associated with, well, perhaps a “padlock.” His legacy has most certainly been locked out of history.

  Is this also true of another Afro-German standout who lived during the time of the Nazi regime?

  Larry Gilges—the African

  German Activist

  Although his name, “Larry,” has been Americanized, his real name is “Hilarius.” (The fact is, what happened to him was anything but funny). And the actual spelling of “Larry” is “Lari,” (short for Hilarius) four letters instead of five.

  The mild significance of this fact is that he is almost a mirror image of another man with a four-letter first name: Huey P. Newton.

  And, yes, in his own way, Larry Gilges repeated the mantra that Black Panther leader Huey P. Newton embraced from his adopted mentor, Malcolm X. The mantra has become a universally familiar one; a quasi-religious one for diehards. The credo? “By any means necessary.”

  And, yes, like Malcolm X and Huey Newton, Hilarius Gilges was murdered. It happened in 1933, and his murder is, to this day, shrouded in mystery. Sounds familiar?

  “He was taken away by 20 or 30 SS men … apparently for interrogation,” says his daughter, “but instead, they brought him here to the Rhine … and murdered him in an unimaginably bestial manner. They stabbed him, shot him, [and] then suffocated him in the sand.”

  It would not be surprising if the authorities denied any involvement in the death of Gilges.

  According to Maria Wachter, a White German woman who was a fellow freedom fighter of Gilges, he was like a magnet to Nazis. She knew him personally and had firsthand knowledge of such matters. There were primarily two things about him that irresistibly drew the Nazis’ to him.

  “Lari was a red rag to a bull,” says Maria. “He fought in a militant group, and he was Black. Both were crucial factors to those murderers.”[116] Sounds familiar?

  Larry was a professional dancer from Dusseldorf, Germany. In the early part of the 1930s he single-handedly turned Dusseldorf into an anti-Nazi center of activity

  As a Black activist he started an organization called the Northwest Rann (also “Ran”), a loose but dedicated group of anti-Nazi entertainers. Maria Wachter was a White member of this group of “radicals.”

  What drove Larry Gilges to fight so vigorously against the Nazis? After all, he had so much to lose. When he was dancing (apparently, he was very good), his audience of White Germans loved him.

  So, what was wrong with the status quo? What on earth could have possibly turn Gilges into the “frightening” “intimidating,” “radical,” “militant” Black man that he turned out to be?

  Hilarius (Lari) Gilges, an African-German dancer, was subjected to racism and discrimination by white Germans. Nevertheless, he had been a member of the KJVD (German Communist Youth Organization) in 1926. As a performer, he founded the leftist actors group “Nordwest Ran” which organized anti-Nazi demonstrations.

  He was eventually arrested by the Gestapo, on June 30, 1933, and the following day his body was found under a bridge in Dusseldorf, Germany.[117][††††††††]

  It is no longer a mystery. Larry Gilges grew weary of being “subjected to racism and discrimination by white Germans.” He had had enough, and was willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for the cause.

  “Lari was a real fighter, in his ordinary life as a Black man,” continues Maria. “He suffered numerous indignities. While performing, though, he was well liked. He was a Black hero. He helped organize resistance to the Nazis. This reinforced his determination to fight.”[118]

  “[There] is [a] memorial to my father,” says his adult daughter. “It’s been here for about six years. Everyone says he was a good man. Yet he had to die at 24 [years of age] leaving a wife and two children.”[119][‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡]

  Johnny Nicolas, the

  Colorful Black Hero

  Johnny Nicolas was perhaps the most colorful of any Black person who has every lived anywhere in Europe during the Nazi Germany era. Of all of the paltry records in existence that have been made known to the public, few stories contained therein can match the exploits of Jean Marcel Nicolas, a.k.a. “Johnny Nicolas.”

  And, what is perhaps even more fascinating about the entire, breath-taking story of this Black hero is that a rather famous enemy age-mate of his shared the same quarters, as it were. This age-mate’s name is rather well known in scientific circles. He is none other than Dr. Wernher von Braun, an infamous Nazi scientist.

  Ironically, there is no evidence suggesting that they knew each other. Whatever the case, they were complete polar opposites.

  Jean (Johnny) Marcel Nicolas, a Haitian-Creole, was arrested by the Gestapo in Paris. Survivor testimonies from the concentration camp of Rottleberode confirm that Nicolas attended to the physical maladies of Jewish slave laborers and provided them with excuse forms not to report for work details. They referred to him as a “doctor.” On April 4, 1945, approximately 2,000 inmates were marched from Rottleberode to Niedersachswerfen, Germany, then dispatched on two trains, seemingly for another camp. Nicolas was reported to be among those on the trains. After an Allied air attack, the trains had to be abandoned at Mieste and Zienau, Germany. Nicolas disappeared from history.[120]

  Of course, this is one version of what happened to the Black “Walter Mitty,” as some would probably call him. Walter Mitty was a common man with a very vivid imagination. He would pretend to be all sorts of interesting, adventurous persons.[§§§§§§§§]

  Another reputable source gives more detail as to the heroic adventures of the utterly amazing Johnny Nic(h)olas.

  The year was 1943, and the place was Camp Dora, which was near the city of Nordhausen in the heart of Nazi Germany. There and then, hell for Johnny Nicholas, and thousands of slaves from all over Europe (Russians, Poles, Gypsies, members of the French Resistance, Jewish children) was an underground factory called Mittelwerk, which manufactured Hitler’s “wonder weapon,” the V2 rocket.

  How did Johnny Nicholas end up in this hell? It all began in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, where he was born into a prosperous and well-connected family. During these early years, Johnny Nicholas spent much of his time dreaming about the American way of life. He learned English from the British, and American gestures and accents from the U.S. Marine Corps stationed in Haiti, and told everyone he met that he was an American. So obsessed was he with America that he changed his name from Jean Marcel Nicholas to the all-American Johnny Nicholas.

  After getting in trouble with the law in his teens, Johnny Nicholas fled to France where, as J. Carl Ganter writes in his short Black History Month article for MSNBC, “Forgotten Black WWII Chameleon,” Nicholas reinvented his identity as an American. He was rich, a big-time gambler, a charming playboy who had film stars for friends and a luxurious apartment near the Eiffel Tower. Even after the Nazis marched into France in June 1940, handsome and athletic Johnny managed to live on in comfort as the rest of Paris suffered. He owned a big car, had lots of cash to spend, and held a German pass that permitted him to drive around the city after curfew hours. He also reinvented himself as a gynecologist, and displayed a fake medical degree from some Boston university in his office.

  Johnny, who rescued downed American and French pilots in his spare time, might have breezed through the nightmare that consumed Europe had he not been turned in to the Gestapo by a heartbroken lover named Florence. He was then promptly sent to Camp Dora, where he was registered as Dr. Johnny Nicholas, a medical doctor and a captured American fighter pilot. “Like so many of those who were in the prison camp,” explained Huge Wray McCann, author of In Search of Johnny Nicholas, “he had to use his
wits to survive. If you couldn’t tell a good story then you didn’t stand a chance in the camps. And that is what Johnny did so well; he was a charmer who could tell a great story.”

  Despite his lack of any real qualifications, Johnny became something of a hero in Camp Dora, where he prolonged the lives of his fellow prisoners with improvised medical services. “He prescribed drugs, sutured wounds, performed surgery, set broken limbs in casts improvised out of paper,” J. Carl Ganter writes. “He relieved skull fractures using carpenters’ tools.” It was a “magnificent hoax” that kept hundreds of men, women, and children from death at the darkest hours of the war.

  While the 27-year-old Dr. Johnny Nicholas tended to exhausted slaves, a 27-year-old rocket scientist named Dr. Wernher von Braun worked hard to inflict more pain and suffering on the slave population at Camp Dora. The son of a baron and baroness, von Braun was the leading scientist at Camp Dora and an influential member of the SS. His fascination with rockets began in his mid-teens, and by age 20 he had designed his first weapon. His early rockets never flew, but his enthusiasm so impressed Nazi generals that he was hired to lead the military’s rocket artillery unit. By 1944, von Braun was the main man at Mittelwerk, ensconced in a comfortable office with a window that looked out onto the courtyard where any slaves caught attempting to sabotage his mad inventions were tortured and hanged.

  Near the end of the war, Johnny Nicholas escaped Mittelwerk and “hobbled 60 miles to the town of Lubz, where troops from the U.S. 87th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron evacuated him to a Paris hospital,” according to Ganter. Baron Wernher von Braun, on the other hand, left Mittelwerk in the comfort of a passenger train, for the welcoming arms of American “Counter Intelligence.” A month later, von Braun and 100 of his Nazi scientists were in the United States of America, where they were “deemed vital to national security” by the U.S. War Department.[*********] Meanwhile, Jean Marcel “Johnny” Nicholas, who had contracted tuberculosis while in Camp Dora, was in a hospital spending the last two months of his life composing a now-lost manuscript about the dreadful underworld that was the birthplace of the space age.