by Heath, Tim
Girls could be fined for leaving anything lying around, such as personal items or pieces of clothing, etc. The particular item would be returned to the girl only after the fine was paid. Sometimes, the fine would be replaced by certain duties such as extra washing and cooking.
Life on the eight to ten-day summer camps adhered to a very regimented timetable. Flag-raising, meals and training all had specific time allocations, so girls had to be punctual to ensure that the timetable was kept.
The day normally began early when the girls were roused by their leaders. They then washed, had breakfast, combed their hair and brushed their teeth. The agenda for each day differed. Sometimes the girls began their day with a song, while on others they went on a march or a swim in lakes and rivers.
The main reason behind the summer camp was to study contemporary political events occurring in Germany at the time away from their parents’ eye. A BDM leader would give a lecture on the current political events, done in a way that the girls could easily understand. Of huge importance were subjects that dealt with the Treaty of Versailles, and the shame that it had brought upon Germany during the slump into economic depression and anarchy after 1918.
Adolf Hitler’s foreign policy and the need for Lebensraum, or living space, were also discussed in detail. The whole of summer camp was designed for a single specific educational objective. The activities in which the girls took part, such as hiking, dancing, swimming and play, were merely sweeteners to make the whole thing more attractive.
BDM household schools were also built, the first of which came into existence in 1936. Here too, the whole idea of these schools was to train girls in domestic management and childcare. The schools ran intensive home economics-style classes for the girls, covering everything from cooking, gardening, needlework and nutrition, to caring for infants, the elderly and the sick. Theory lessons were also devised where the individual could be tested for sound knowledge of the subject. Racial science was included, as was the understanding of the national economy and sports. It was an extension of the ‘human-factory’ principle.
For girls who came from small families, where there were no infant brothers or sisters, a compulsory placement scheme was implemented, where the girl would be placed with a woman who had four or more children. This way she would learn firsthand all the necessary skills required for her future motherhood. Girls could also be placed to work with farmer’s wives, which was something most girls who lived in the cities did not mind. The authorities were keen for the city, and Mitte girls in particular, to experience life in a rural community. In a broader sense, it would also help them to feel closer to their homeland.
Kirsten Eckermann:
By the end of my first year with the BDM, I found that I was so much more confident and perhaps, rather foolishly, independent, at least that is how I felt. I felt that I had learned and accomplished quite a lot of new skills and also understood our country’s stance on the world stage at that time. To me it was all made justifiable through political necessity and maybe divine will.
I found that my parents were very wary of me in certain ways. For example, if I argued with my father, something I would not have dared to have done before the BDM, he would not discipline me in the manner he used to. He used to take his belt from his trousers and hit us with that. As a BDM I became the property of the state, and if any girl was beaten and the schoolteachers or those at the BDM meetings became aware of it, often the police were informed. The father could be arrested and imprisoned. This put an immense strain upon certain parents and there were many times when my father and I just could not talk to each other. The Nazis had created a kind of generation gap and we were of differing generations and had been taught different things, and as a result we had this mutual fear and misunderstanding of each other, and talking to Father became awkward. My father’s generation wanted a decent economy and wage so as they could feed their families. This the Nazis gave them to a degree, but the BDM regime taught us to hate Jews and not to accept the old submissive ways of our parents. My parents were not stupid, they understood what was going on and they lived with it as best as they could. I know that after several years there were times when perhaps both they and I wished that Hitler was dead.
Another young girl who joined the BDM in the 1930s was Ursula Sabel.
Sabel was a pretty schoolgirl who lived in Duisburg, Wedau, with her mother and father and brother. Her parents, like many, embraced the National Socialist cause at first, but later their views were to change very drastically. Now living in fulltime residence in the beautiful town of Heidelberg in Germany, she reflects on some of her memories with the BDM:
Throughout all of my school years, there was an evening of every week where we attended the Hitler Youth for girls [the Bund Deutscher Madel]. I had a great desire to become involved in music when I was older. The Hitler Youth supplied all of the girls with a uniform; it consisted of a dark blue skirt, a buttoned-in white blouse, a so-called travel cloth, and a black tie was also worn.
My parents were loyal to the National Socialist cause, though rather sceptically. From the messages broadcast over the radio, one experienced only what was accordingly censored for the population, and none of the broadcasted material was therefore of a critical nature. So one also had to be content with discovering news from word of mouth. My parents suspected bad things, my father, being a civil servant, had guessed that the Nazi Party would inevitably happen. It took quite some time for me to get my uniform and decorations, though I was still allowed to go to the weekly meetings. When I received my complete uniform I had my picture taken wearing it, and I still possess it today.
In the summer of 1939, I travelled with my BDM group from Duisburg up the Rhine on a steamer boat. Our small unit then rode along to Mannheim, and then we moved along the beautiful Neckar. We stayed overnight in youth hostels, a wonderful experience for me. The high point of the trip was the attendance at the realm festivals in the brightly illuminated Heidelberger lock.
From my early years with the BDM, two particular things are very memorable to me. After I had participated a long time in the weekly Hitler Youth meetings held in evenings and afternoons, and without finding the politics of it all too noticeably unpleasant, I was entrusted, after agreement with my parents, with a group of younger girls, who I would be in charge of at the weekly meetings of the BDM. I assumed the role with great joy, but the fun of independence did not last for too long, the reason being my mother. I had no more time for the school, and had to give it up.
Another experience fresh in my mind was when I went to the Mülheimer forest. We moved as a group from Wedau about two hours walking distance into the forest, which belonged to the Mülheim Ruhr. An important man from the top management of the steel industry, Mr Kierdorf lived there in a mansion (though we did not get to see it). He celebrated a special birthday on the day we arrived, and because the industriebosse for Hitler was so important, both Hitler’s and our attendance had more or less been assured. We girls with our small uniforms sat in the grass at a roadside for what seemed like a long time. With several hours of delay the first automobile came, then gradually behind it other vehicles began to appear, and we immediately stood up to see who were in the cars. We were surprised to see in the first vehicle Rudolf Hess the deputy Führer. It was an open car and we could see him very clearly. Other cars drove past then and in the last open car was Adolf Hitler. He looked full of pride for his youth and greeted us with a raised right arm; we children returned the salute by raising our right arms and calling ‘Welfare, welfare!’ The cars were soon gone, but the waiting had been worthwhile itself, we had seen Hitler and Hess, a great experience was had by us all.
Former BDM girl Helena W. Wessel best tells some of the lesser-known incidents, regarding in particular the issue of ‘moral conduct’ expected within the BDM.
It is quite an amusing little story, which I will have to tell to you. It was an incident which occurred at one of the church hall dances in a town nea
r Essen. There was this young woman and man, both aged around sixteen years. The pair had shared a romantic dance but their chaperone, a big old lady named Frau Ebner, certainly would not let this couple out of her sight. The couple somehow managed to sneak outside through a door after some friends created a diversion by knocking over some coffee pots and cups, distracting Frau Ebner’s attention. The women were busy cleaning the mess up and did not notice Albert and the town Burgermeister’s niece disappear. They were gone for around eight to ten minutes and were able to get back in through the same door.
During one of the summer camps three weeks later, we girls gathered around and she told us what she and Albert had done. We giggled like mad things as she told us in great detail how she had given Albert what would be known as ‘hand relief’ nowadays. God knows how risky that must have been, and what would have happened had they got caught or found out.
Some of the BDM girls got away with sheer murder, and it was not uncommon for one or two of the older girls to play around a little. It was one way of learning about real sex, and some of the girls found out about it from their older brothers who brought their girlfriends home sometimes. One girl told us that she had seen her brother on top of his girlfriend ‘pumping away’, as she put it. We roared with laughter as she asked, ‘Well, do you know how it is done?’, then proceeding to explain in great detail.
There were always certain characters who could be relied upon to tell us all the details, and as we were comrades, we kept it all to ourselves and did not betray each other to the superiors. It was a kind of rule we had amongst our closest girlfriends, and helped to keep us informed of what was really happening outside of the BDM and in the real world. Subsequently we could not write such things in our diaries or notebooks for fear of it being discovered either by parents or BDM seniors, though I did manage to keep a diary for quite some time.
The BDM in a way was really nothing special; it was just another example of how Hitler’s influence permeated everyday society. The BDM was created to bring young girls and women under control of the state, so as the state could do what it wanted with them and manipulate them accordingly. Hitler wanted us to be good Nazis and produce good Nazi offspring, who in turn would be poisoned with the same shit. That I believe was the principal idea of the BDM – it was a means of creating an Aryan race stereotype.
Heidi Koch remembers the total change in attitude of the elders of her small community when she had become a member of the BDM.
One afternoon I was very anxious to visit the Süßwarengeschäft [sweet shop], to buy my favourite treat of liquorice, and after my mother gave me a small amount of money off I went. I always looked forward to buying some sweets because we were not often allowed to have them. Anyway, I chose what sweets I wanted and gave the shopkeeper’s wife my money. She handed me my small brown paper bag and I said ‘Danke’ [thank you], and I turned away and began to walk out of the door when she called out to me, ‘Heidi, have you not forgotten something girl?’
I stopped, turned around and I was embarrassed and puzzled for a moment, as everyone in the shop stopped and glared at me like I was a thief or something, and I could not think what she could possibly mean. As I stood looking at her puzzled, she deliberately pulled up a part of her apron and began to polish the badge she wore on her breast with it. The badge had the Swastika on it and was one worn by all those who were closely associated with the Nazi Party. I quickly apologized saying, ‘Sorry Frau Mühlbauer,’ and quickly thrust up my right arm and gave her a loud ‘Heil Hitler!’
I could not believe that she had scalded me for not saluting, but that is exactly how much things were changing. It would be ‘Heil Hitler’ this and ‘Heil Hitler’ that, and before long it was used in place of the usual greetings such as those we used to say, like ‘Good morning’ or ‘Goodbye’, or even ‘Thank you’. As a BDM girl it was very important that you remember your ‘Heil Hitler’ salute at all times.
The BDM was obsessive where physical prowess was concerned. Some girls possessed a natural ability with sports and physical exercise classes, whilst others did not. Those who were obviously talented at sports were encouraged to train in order to master a multiplicity of sporting disciplines. The training was of a very high standard, but hard, aggressive, and sometimes a little too excessive, even for the most gifted of BDM students.
For girls, the standard sporting outfit consisted of a pair of plimsolls or dancing shoes, a pair of black shorts, and a white vest with the triangular Hitler Youth badge bearing the swastika emblem in its centre.
BDM girl athletes competed at numerous high and low-profile sporting tournaments around the world before and up to the outbreak of war in 1939. It was clear that many of these girls, having been raised in such a totalitarian regime as that of Nazi Germany, where fitness, health and strength were requisite female virtues, were incredibly gifted athletes, who could sometimes outperform their adult sporting counterparts. One particular BDM girl who notched up an impressive record of awards was Doris Schriber.
Schriber was born on August 1924, in the town of Villingen in southwest Germany. The author was able to obtain copies of Schriber’s sporting-award certificates gained while a member of the BDM. The first award dates from March 1939, when she was fifteen years old. She had won first prize in the Gau Baden figure-skating championships of that year and awarded the prized golden oak leaf. Other awards soon followed, including:
March 1940: Second prize in the Gau Baden figure-skating championships, and awarded the silver oak leaf.
June 1940: First prize in the Hitler Jugend District 407 in the triathlon discipline.
11 January 1941: Awarded the Fourth Class figure-skating qualification certificate.
July 1941: Hitler Jugend swimming certificate and covering letter from the Villingen BDM leader. For some reason, Doris had not bothered to collect some previous awards from the BDM office.
Dates unknown: First prize in the Hitler Jugend District 407, 4 x 100 m relay race. Second prize in the Hitler Jugend District 733 in the high-jump discipline.
1941: Second prize certificate for Hitler Jugend District 407 national sports contest, Villingen team. Second prize certificates for the Hitler Jugend District 407 in javelin throwing, the pentathlon event and the long-jump event.
17 January 1943: First prize in the Hitler Jugend District 407 awarded in an unknown sporting event. This was her last recorded sporting event at the age of nineteen years.
During work on the manuscript for this book, I attempted to make contact with Doris through the Villingen-Schwenningen Rathaus (city hall) to talk about her experiences in the BDM and Second World War Germany, but she declined to be interviewed.
Chapter Seven
A White Rose Remembered
It was during the writing of this work and while talking with Kirsten Eckermann and her husband in a teashop in Dover in July 2000, that she asked the author if he had ever heard of Sophie Scholl. Her name was not familiar, and upon being asked who she was, Kirsten replied, ‘You must include something about Sophie Scholl in your work, as she, along with her brother Hans, were two heroes of the student resistance against Nazism in Germany.’
The obvious concern with which Kirsten spoke and the fact that the author had not heard of Sophie Scholl and her brother Hans, prompted him to research and write this chapter.
There is, even today, a general misconception present in much of the military history taught to young people, particularly in school, that there were few attempts by the German people at resisting Adolf Hitler’s Nazi dictatorship. The general belief is that the populace, especially Germany’s youth, largely gave their full support to the political and social changes being made by the Nazi regime. There were, of course, those who were silently sceptical, but bound to conformity. Then there were those who, with time, began to analyze their political and social surroundings under Hitler and the Nazis.
Though the primary objective of this work was to concentrate purely on the female issues of
the Third Reich, one has to examine in detail the important activities of Sophie Scholl and her family in resisting the Nazi regime. The Scholl children, particularly Sophie and Hans, due to the strong and committed Christian influence of their parents, became the driving force behind the student anti-Nazi movement at Munich University. Both brother and sister, and their accomplices, would meet the same fate under the so-called Nazi people’s law system.
Sophie Scholl was born to Robert and Magdalene Scholl on 9 May 1921. The fourth of five children, she was born in Forchtenberg-am-Kocher, a riverside town east of Heilbronn, Germany, where her father was mayor of the town. The little town was a little isolated from the rest of Germany. Its only real connection to the outside world was a small, yellow-coloured post coach that ran back and forth to the nearby railway station.
Robert Scholl, recognizing that Forchtenberg lacked in certain basic travel amenities, was able to get the rail track extended to the town. He also had a community and sports centre erected, which was greatly appreciated by the children of the town. Not everyone supported Robert Scholl’s ideas of expansion for the town, however, and he was voted out of office in 1930.
Sophie and her brothers Hans and Werner and two sisters Ingeborg and Elisabeth were raised in the Christian faith. At the age of seven, she entered grade school, where she learned easily. She was a likeable child and so had a carefree childhood. Known for her bubbly and happy personality, Sophie made friends very easily and got on with everyone. In Sophie’s eyes, race and religion was no barrier to friendship.
In 1930, after Robert Scholl was voted from his mayoral office, the Scholl family moved to Ludwigsburg. And then two years later they moved to Ulm, where her father had acquired a business and tax-consulting office. Scholl had the habit of living a little beyond his means, and had rented a huge apartment for his family on the cathedral square. Ulm lacked the lush countryside of Forchtenberg, but Sophie and her siblings played in the large palace park nearby, which was some slight consolation to the energetic Scholl children.