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The Wise Men

Disguised as an Austrian private, former SS-Obergruppenführer Karl Oberg (1897−1965) was captured in June 1945 by American troops. Oberg was responsible for Nazi security forces (e.g., Schutzstaffel, Gestapo, and Sicherheitsdienst) in occupied France from April 1942 until the country’s liberation in August 1944. He was directly responsible for the deportations to KZ Auschwitz II-Birkenau of more than forty thousand Jews. Originally convicted of crimes against humanity by the British and then separately by a French court in 1954, Oberg’s death sentence was commuted to life in 1958 by the French president. A year later, the life sentence was further reduced to twenty years. In 1962, President Charles de Gaulle pardoned Oberg and he was set free. An aberration of justice in a case of a former Nazi convicted of crimes against humanity? No. Unfortunately, this was not an exception but rather the norm during the early postwar years.

Former SS General Karl Oberg in custody of the American army. Photo by anonymous (c. June 1945). PD-U.S. Government. Wikimedia Commons.
Former SS General Karl Oberg in custody of the American army. Photo by anonymous (c. June 1945). PD-U.S. Government. Wikimedia Commons.

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Ghetto Girls

Thousands of books, articles, movies, and personal testimonials are now part of the written, visual, and audio records for World War II. Declassified information over the past twenty years has allowed historians to fill in the gaps or correct previous historical accounts of events. Every once and a while, newly discovered information pops up and an author can turn it into a book perhaps on a previously well-covered topic but with a different perspective. Or sometimes an author gathers information on a topic that has not been covered in the past and creates a new opportunity for us to add to our knowledge of a particular event or series of events.

Our story today is based on Judy Batalion’s new book, The Light of Days (see below). Click here to learn more about the book.Screen Shot 2021-07-12 at 3.34.57 PM

Ms. Batalion has written about young Jewish women in Polish ghettos who cleverly resisted the Nazis. Like many resistance fighters during the war, the brave exploits of these women were lost to history until Ms. Batalion stumbled across a long-forgotten book, Freuen in di Ghettos, or Women in the Ghettos (1946). Written in Yiddish, the book’s 185-pages recount the individual stories of dozens of the “ghetto girls” who resisted by supplying arms and ammunition to the fighters inside the ghettos as well as other acts of bravery. Read More Ghetto Girls