German gold medal winners in gymnastics at the 1896 Olympics: (left to right) Herman Wein gärtner, Alfred Flatow, and Karl Schumann. In 1942, Flatow, then 73 years old, was ordered to be deported because he was Jewish. Schumann pleaded with the Reich Sport Leader to intervene, but was rejected. Flatow was sent to the Theresienstadt concentration camp where he quickly died of starvation. (Original photo by Albert Meyer in public domain.)
Pursuant to the 1931 Weimar decree, Flatow registered several weapons. In October 1938, several weeks before the Night of the Broken Glass, he surrendered his registered arms pursuant to the Nazi action to disarm the Jews. The police verified that the weapons were registered but handed him over to the Gestapo anyway. His arrest report is reproduced below. (Document courtesy of Landesarchiv Berlin. Bericht über einen polit. Vorfall, 4.10.38, Alfred Flatow. A Rep PrBrRep. 030/21620 Bd. 5 Haussuchungen bei Juden 1938-39.)
Translation:
Police Station 106
Berlin, SW 68, on October 4, 1938
Report Concerning Political Incident.
1. Perpetrator
a) Person: Alfred Flatow Born: October 3, 1869, Danzig
b) Address: Berlin SW 19, Alexandrinenstraße 50.
c) Political affiliation: Jew
3. Crime scene and time: Berlin SW 68, Curdtdamm 16, at 1:50 p.m. [Note: this was the address of the police station, not a crime scene. Flatow was surrendering his arms there.]
6. Weapons Found: Surrendered
a) Slashing and thrusting weapons: 1 dagger, 31 knuckledusters.
b) Firearms: 1 revolver, 2 pocket pistols, 22 rounds of ammunition
7. Type of police intervention
b) Use of special police forces? Special operation
Hans Reichmann, a lawyer and syndic for the Jüdischer Central Verein (C.V., or Jewish Central Association), Germany’s mainstream Jewish organization. In October 1938, Munich officials told a C.V. representative that “weapons in the hand of Jews were deemed extremely dangerous.” Reichmann himself had to surrender his new Browning firearm. When Kristallnacht descended, Reichmann would be imprisoned in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. He would later escape with his wife Eva Gabriele to England. (Herbert Sonnenfeld, Porträt Hans Reichmann, Berlin Oktober 1936. © Jüdisches Museum Berlin, Ankauf aus Mitteln der Stiftung Deutsche Klassenlotterie Berlin.)
Page 2 of Flatow’s arrest report
Translation:
8. Criminal act (include pertinent statutory sections) Possession of weapons.
9. Statement of facts: The Jew Alfred Flatow was found to be in possession of 1 revolver with 22 rounds of ammunition, 2 pocket pistols, 1 dagger, and 31 knuckle dusters. Arms in the hands of Jews are a danger to public safety.
Police First Sergeant Weiser
The arms were registered at Police Station 13 on January 26, 1932. Written confirmation is there.
Page 4 of the report (not shown) concluded: “The perpetrator listed under item 1 of this report has been turned over to the Gestapo.” In 1942, he died of starvation at the Theresienstadt concentration camp.
(Left to right) SS Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, an Italian police official, Berlin Police President Wolf Heinrich Graf von Helldorf, and Kurt Daluege, head of the uniformed Order Police. As Police President, Helldorf disarmed the Berlin Jews in the weeks before the pogrom known as the Night of the Broken Glass. (Photo courtesy of Bundesarchiv. BArch, Bild 121-0174/CC-BY-SA 3.0))
That the Jews were being disarmed well before the pogrom is strong evidence that the attack was carefully planned well in advance. (Source: Völkische Beobachter, Nov. 9, 1938.)
Translation:
Disarming the Berlin Jews
Provisional Results: 2,569 Stabbing and Cutting Weapons, 1,702 Firearms, and About 20,000 Rounds of Ammunition
In view of the Jewish assassination attempt in the German Embassy in Paris, Berlin’s Police President made known publicly the provisional results so far achieved, of a general disarming of Berlin’s Jews by the police, which has been carried out in recent weeks.
The Police President, in order to maintain public security and order in the national capital, and prompted by a few individual incidents, felt compelled to disarm Berlin’s Jewish population. This measure was recently made known to Jews by police stations, whereupon—apart from a few exceptions, in which the explicit nature of the ban on possession of weapons had to be articulated—weapons until now found by the police to be in the possession of Jews who have no weapons permit were voluntarily surrendered.
The provisional results clearly show what a large amount of weapons have been found with Berlin’s Jews and are still to be found with them. To date, the campaign led to the taking into custody of 2,569 stabbing and cutting weapons, 1,702 firearms, and about 20,000 rounds of ammunition.
Upon completion of the weapons campaign, if a Jew in Berlin is found still to possess a weapon without having a valid weapons permit, the Police President will, in every single case, proceed with the greatest severity.
Heinrich Himmler, the SS Reichsführer and German Police Chief, with Adolf Hitler on Reich Party Day, September 1938. (Photo #05459 courtesy of U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.)
Himmler’s order that Jews possessing any weapon may be imprisoned in a concentration camp for twenty years, published the day after the Night of the Broken Glass. (Source: Völkische Beobachter, Nov. 10, 1938.)
Translation:
Jews Forbidden to Possess Weapons By Order of SS Reichsführer Himmler
Munich, November 10.
The SS Reichsführer and German Police Chief has issued the following Order:
Persons who, according to the Nürnberg law, are regarded as Jews, are forbidden to possess any weapon. Violators will be condemned to a concentration camp and imprisoned for a period of up to 20 years.
The contents of a cabinet lie strewn around a dining room in a Jewish home vandalized during Kristallnacht. Nazis claimed to be searching for weapons when they went on a rampage against Jewish homes, businesses, and synagogues. (Photo #81485 courtesy of U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.)
On November 10, 1938, persons walk by a Jewish-owned business that was destroyed during Kristallnacht. Nazi propaganda claimed that the pogrom was a “spontaneous” manifestation of Germans, but in reality it was a carefully orchestrated attack by the SA approved by Hitler, who ordered that the police not intervene. (Photo #86838 courtesy of U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.)
Buchenwald concentration camp, November 10, 1938, showing some of the ten thousand Jewish men, heads shaved, who would be incarcerated there during and following Kristallnacht. One pretext for arrest was possession of a firearm by a Jew. (Photo #79914 courtesy of U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.)
Credits for Illustrations
The following are published by permission of the listed entities. All other illustrations are in the public domain.
Bundesarchiv:
Heinrich Brüning (Bild 119-2600/CC-BY-SA 3.0)
Wilhelm Groener (Bild 102-01049/CC-BY-SA 3.0)
Werner Best (Bild 183-B22627/CC-BY-SA 3.0)
Heinrich Himmler and others (Bild 121-0174/CC-BY-SA 3.0)
Issuance of Weapons Permits to Jews (Erteilung von Waffenscheinen an Juden, R 58/276)
Jüdisches Museum Berlin:
Hans Reichmann (Herbert Sonnenfeld, Porträt Hans Reichmann, Berlin Oktober 1936. © Jüdisches Museum Berlin, Ankauf aus Mitteln der Stiftung Deutsche Klassenlotterie Berlin)
Landesarchiv Berlin:
Report Concerning Political Incident (Bericht über einen polit. Vorfall, 4.10.38, Alfred Flatow. A Rep PrBrRep. 030/21620 Bd. 5 Haussuchungen bei Juden 1938-39)
U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum:
Heinrich Himmler and Adolf Hitler (Photo #05459)
Vandalized home, Kristallnacht (Photo #81485)
Broken windows, Kristallnacht (Photo #86838)
Buchenwald concentration camp (Photo #79914)
Index
A
Aachen, Germ
any, 188
Adler, Alois, 151–53, 154–55, 157
Allenstein, Germany, 39, 123–24
Allen, William, 59–60
ammunition
in Decree Against Jews’ Possession of Weapons, 177
hollow-point bullets, 126, 134
license for purchase of, 17, 43, 131
overview, 159
See also Law on Firearms and Ammunition of 1928; license to obtain a weapon or ammunition
Angriff (newspaper), 165
Anschluss of Austria, 131
anti-Nazi elements, 138–39
“Anti-Semitic Measures of the Reich” (newspapers in Paris and Geneva), 162
Arendt, Hannah, xxii
“Assassination Plans in Jewish Circles” (Reich Main Security Office), 138–39
atonement fine on Jews for damage on Reichskristallnacht, 179–80
Attack on Peace (Diewerge), 176
Austria, 131, 173, 178, 190, 198–99
B
Baden-Baden, Germany, 181
Baden, Free State, 38–39
Bad Tölz, Bavaria, Germany, 55, 63
Baer, Dorothy, 196
Bard, Mitchell, 198
Bavaria, 5, 10, 13, 16, 88, 102, 164
Bavarian People’s Party (Bayrische Volkspartei), 50–51
Bavarian Soviet Republic, collapse of, 10
Bavarian Supreme Regional Court in Munich (Bayerisches Oberstes Landesgericht München), 13
Bavaud, Maurice, 206
Berliner Börsenzeitung (newspaper), 136–37
Berlin, Germany
Adler’s arrest in, 151–53, 154–55, 157
Christmas political truce, 32
fighting without firearms, 12–13
firearms restrictions, 22
firearms seizures, 7, 49, 64–65, 67, insert–2
Flatow’s arrest in, 145, 146–50, 153–54, 155, 157, insert–4
Gold’s arrest in, 150–51, 154, 155
police station attacked by Spartacists, 4–5
and Reichskristallnacht, 192–93
Sohn’s prosecution in, 153, 155, 182–83
Berlin Turnerschaft (gymnastics society), 146
Best, Werner
about, 112–13, insert–3
Boxheim documents, 29–30
on Decree of February 28, 1933, 52–53
directive on weapons permits for Jews, 111–13, 158, insert–3
preventive detention procedure, 149
report on British citizen arrested in Vienna, 198–99
Bismarck, Gottfried, 215, 216
Black Guards (Schwarze Korps), 180
Bloch, Peter, 197
Block (chief judge of Berlin District Court), 153
Blomberg, Werner von, 128
“Bloody Sunday,” Altona, Hamburg, 43
Böhmcker, Johann Heinrich, 166–67
Börgermoor Concentration Camp, 98
Börsen Zeitung (newspaper), 165
Boxheim documents, 29–30
Brandenburg Province, 35–38, 69–76, 71–73, 208
Braunschweig, Germany, 49–50
Brazilian gun control laws, xix
Bredow, Wichard von, 197–98
Bremen legation, 31–32
Breslau (Wroclaw), Poland, 66
British Home Guard, 214–15
Brotherhood of St. Sebastian (Erzbruderschaft vom hl. Sebastianus, or EB), 120–21
Brüning, Heinrich, 29–30, 32, insert–1
Buchenwald Concentration Camp, 174, insert–8
Buerckel, Joseph, 173
C
censorship / book burning, 67
census data, 67–68, 147
Chicago Tribune (newspaper), 199
Christianity and firearms registration system, 26
citizen of Germany, defining, 106
civilians’ right to possess firearms controversy, xvi, xviii
civil service, racial and political restrictions in, 65–66
Cohn, Bruno, 105
Colisle (police sergeant), 148, 150
Communists
as catchall for enemies of the state, 54, 68, 102
Nazi repression of, 22, 49, 51–52, 53–57, 67
concentration camps, 77, 97–99, 101, 168–71, 210. See also specific camps
Coren, Henry, 198–99
Corner, Fritz, 211
Czechoslovakia, Sudeten German territory in, 160, 174, 178
D
Daluege, Kurt, insert–6
Daniel, Jakob, 114
Danzig/Gdansk, Poland, 180
Davos Murder, The (Ludwig), 117
Davos, Switzerland, shooting of Nazi by a Jew, 115–19, 165
Dawson, Gertrude, 198
Day of the Movement (Tag der Bewegung), 164
Decree for the Protection of the Germany People, 89
Decree for the Protection of the People and the State (February 28, 1933), 51–53, 120
Decree for the Surrender of Weapons, 60, 62–64
Decree of an Atonement Fine for Jews with German Citizenship, 179–80
Decree of the Council of People’s Representatives on Weapons Possession (1919), 4–5, 11–12, 28
Decree/Regulation Against Jews’ Possession of Weapons, 173–75, 176–78
Der Strümer (newspaper), 118, 181
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung (newspaper), 19
Deutsche Hollerith Maschinen Gesellschaft (Dehomag), IBM subsidiary in Germany, 67–68, 107, 138
Deutsche Juristen-Zeitung (periodical), 19–20
Diewerge, Wolfgang, 117, 176
Dingell, John, xviin
Dinslaken, children’s orphanage in, 187
discrimination. See political discrimination; racial discrimination
District of Borken, 191
Dodd, Thomas, xviiin
Dodd, William, 101, 115–16
Dominian, Leon, 50
Dortmund, Germany, 190–91
Dowden, A. E., 200
Dresden, Germany, 56, 195
Düsseldorf, Germany, 50, 54, 114
Dzialowski, Frau, 188
E
Eberswalde Province firearms registration, 37
Ebert, Friedrich, 4
Ebert, Friedrich, widow of, 56
Effi Briest (Fontane), 194
Eichmann, Adolf, 126
Einstein, Albert, 58–59
Eisleben, Germany, 49
Elfes, Wilhelm, 25, 30–31
Elser, Georg, 205
“Enabling Law,” Law to Remove the Distress of the People and the State (March 24, 1933), 60, 130, insert–1
enemies of the people and the state
disarming of, 101–2
and firearms law amendments, 83–85, 86, 87, 90–92, 124–26, 127
Gypsies, 16, 17, 125, 183
penalty for possession of a weapon, 108, insert–7
registration of, 126–28
repression of, xi, xvi, 49, 53–57, 58–67
for “Subversive attitude of a Jew,” 151–52
See also Jews; political discrimination; racial discrimination
“Explanation of the Decree Against the Possession of Weapons” (Völkische Boebachter), 176–78
F
Fähnrich, Kurt, insert–2
fascism in Italy, 8
federalism, Nazism vs., 51
Feuchtwanger, Lion, 59
Finsterwalde, Germany, 76
firearm industry
appeals to Hitler, 81
and firearm laws, 39–40, 41–43
See also license for manufacturing, repairing, or selling firearms
firearms
and government regulation, 217–19
laws on testing of, 137–38
prohibitionist position, xvi, xx
Weimar officials’ ban recommendation, 30–32
See also Law on Firearms and Ammunition of 1928
firearms registration system
Brandenburg Province, 35–38, 69–76
in Breslau, Poland, 66
court hearings for failure to register, 92–93, 123–24
German states on, 35–39
Gestapo’s regulations, 207–8
Göring in Brandenburg Province, 69–76
Hitler’s version, 69–76
license for manufacturing, repairing, or selling, 16–17, 20
license to carry a weapon, 17–18, 19, 20
overview, xvii, xviin, xix, 23, 25
in Potsdam, 35–36, 38, 73
protection of forms, 35
Supreme Court ruling on, 92–93
U.S. Congressional debate of 1968 on Gun Control Act, xvii
See also entries beginning with “license”
firearms seizures
Decree for the Surrender of Weapons, 60, 62–64
Hitler’s campaign, 49–51, 53–57
from Jews, 64–65, 72, 73, 74, 141
Nazi disarming of politically unreliable, 69–76, 112–13
Nazi plans to seize arms of Reichswehr, 40–41
Nazi prohibition of compensation for, 134, 174, 178
Nazi’s statistics on, 67–68
overview, 113–14
police reports on, 181–82
searches and arrests related to, 97–99, 151–56, 157, 187–92, insert–2
vandalism related to, 166–68, 171, 179, 192–93, 196, 198, insert–8
violent treatment during, 59–60
by Weimar Republic, 37–38, 39–40
See also Reichskristallnacht
“Firefight in Hamburg, Communist Snipers Armed with Carbines” (Völkische Boebachter), 54
First Decree of the New Order of the Reich (February 2, 1934), 125
Fischer (Prussian Interior Ministry), 86
Flatow, Alfred
arrest of, 145, 146–50, 153–54, 155, 157, insert–4
overview, xv, 218–19
Flatow, Gustav Felix, 146, 150
Flegel, Dr., 27
Fontane, Theodor, 194
Fourth Decree of the Reich President on the Protection of the Economy and Finance and on the Defense of Civil Peace, 32–35
France, 207
Frankfurt am Main, Germany, 189–90, 196–97, 200
Frankfurt an der Oder (Frankfurt/O), 70–73, 75
Frankfurter, David, 115–19, 165, 175–76
Frankfurter, Felix, xvii
Frankfurt, Germany, 67
Free Corps (Freikorps), 4–7. See also Nazism
Free State Baden, 38–39
Freisler, Roland, 184, 216
Freud, Arthur, 190
Frey, Herr, 27–28
Frick, Wilhelm (Reich Interior Minister)
ban on importation of pistols, 82–83
on Communists dressed as SA destroying Jewish shops, 61
Gun Control in the Third Reich Page 30