X-Nico

21 unusual facts about Nazi Germany


Admiral of the navy

During World War II, the German Kriegsmarine referred to the senior most grand admiral as an admiral of the navy, known in German as Oberbefehlshaber der Kriegsmarine.

BMW 801

The BMW 801 was a powerful German air-cooled radial aircraft engine built by BMW and used in a number of German military aircraft of World War II.

Britain at Bay

The film opens with images of rural and urban Britain, and then depicts the rise of Nazi Germany through newsreel footage, including the recent Fall of France.

Daimler-Benz DB 604

The Daimler-Benz DB 604 was an experimental German 24-cylinder aircraft engine, which did not progress beyond the initial engine testing phase and was ultimately abandoned in September 1942.

Fédération nationale des déportés et internés résistants et patriotes

The Fédération nationale des déportés et internés résistants et patriotes (National Federation of Deported and Imprisoned Resistance Fighters and Patriots) is an organization founded by Marcel Paul and Henri Manhès in October 1945, five months after the defeat of Nazi Germany at the end of World War II.

Freedom Radio

It is set in Nazi Germany during the Second World War and concerns an underground German resistance group who run a radio station broadcasting against the totalitarian Third Reich.

Gare de Montérolier-Buchy

A plaque placed on the station forecourt commemorates the existence there from April to June 1945 of a reception station for deportees, prisoners and returning French obligatory workers being repatriated from Nazi Germany.

Gertrude Hiscox

Gertrude Blount Hiscox (1910 Hendon, Middlesex - 1966 Ipswich) was a British collaborator with Nazi Germany in World War II.

Maltatal

After the Austrian Anschluss to Nazi Germany, beginning in 1941 the Malta Valley was the site of a labour camp where deported prisoners of war originating from the Soviet Union were forced to work in a granite quarry supplying a Reichsautobahn construction site in nearby Spittal an der Drau (the present-day Tauern Autobahn).

Max Fechner

Fechner participated in the social-democratic resistance group led by Franz Künstler, and was jailed in 1933–1934 and 1944–1945 by the Nazi regime.

Olszowa, Greater Poland Voivodeship

Following the invasion of Poland and the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, Olszowa was occupied by the Wehrmacht and annexed by Nazi Germany.

Płośnica

At the beginning of World War II in 1939 it became part of Nazi Germany again until 1945, when it was overrun by the Soviet Red Army and given to Poland again.

Protective custody

In Nazi Germany, the German equivalent term, 'Schutzhaft', was used as a euphemism for the extra- or para-legal rounding-up of political opponents and especially Jews, sometimes officially defended as being necessary to protect them from the 'righteous' wrath of the German population.

Przebrno

During the Second World War it was the location for the German concentration camp Pröbernau, a subcamp of the concentration camp Stutthof.

Réseau Morhange

The group was constituted of 82 agents officially engaged in the conflict against Nazi Germany.

Slovakia during World War II

Although Slovakia had signed a "Protection Treaty" with Nazi Germany, in direct violation of that treaty, Germany refused to help Slovakia.

Sondra Bianca

Due to its ban in Nazi Germany it was unpopular in that country for many years.

The Balloon Goes Up

The title refers to the 'balloon going up', a popular euphemism for an anticipated German invasion of Britain during the Second World War.

We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah

It urges Catholics to repent "of past errors and infidelities" and "renew the awareness of the Hebrew roots of their faith" while distinguishing between the Church's "anti-Judaism" as religious teaching and the murderous antisemitism of Nazi Germany which it described as having "roots outside Christianity."

Yisrael Galili

During the Second World War, he was involved in preparations to counter an anticipated German invasion of Palestine.

Zakrzewo, Złotów County

In 1935 the Nazi government changed the village's name to Buschdorf as part of a drive to Germanize Slavic-sounding placenames.


1939 in Germany

28 September — Warsaw surrenders to Germany; Modlin surrenders a day later; the last Polish large operational unit surrenders near Kock 8 days later.

7571 Weisse Rose

The name was chosen in memory of the non-violent resistance group White Rose in Nazi Germany.

92d Air Refueling Wing

It was the first VIII Bomber Command B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bombardment group to carry out strategic bombardment operations against targets in Occupied Europe and Nazi Germany from RAF Bovingdon, England in September 1942.

Action Française

In foreign policy, Maurras and Bainville supported Pierre Laval's double alliance with Benito Mussolini's Fascist Italy and with the United Kingdom in the Stresa Front (1935) on one side, and with the Soviet Union on the other side, against the common enemy Nazi Germany.

Ahmadiyya Jabrayilov

In May 1942 he was severely wounded, taken prisoner by the Nazis and sent to a concentration camp in Montauban.

Ambrosini SAI.403

The single prototype (MM.518) was seized by the Germans and evaluated by the Luftwaffe at Vergiate.

Anthony Ashley-Cooper, Lord Ashley

During the Second World War Major Lord Ashley served as a British Intelligence Officer with the Auxiliary Units, which were highly covert Resistance groups trained to engage and counteract the expected invasion of the United Kingdom by Nazi Germany.

Atentát

The World War II story depicts events before and after the assassination of top German leader Reinhard Heydrich in Prague (Operation Anthropoid).

Battle of the Cigno Convoy

Their aim was to isolate and defeat the bulk of the German Afrika Corps and the Regio Esercito (Italian Royal Army) in Tunis by strangling their supply lines.

Buck passing

The most notable example of this was the refusal of the United Kingdom, USA, France, or the Soviet Union to effectively confront Nazi Germany during the 1930s.

Chinese Righteous Among the Nations

He was appointed First Secretary at the Chinese legation in Vienna in 1937, and when Austria was annexed by Nazi Germany in 1938 and the legation was turned into a consulate, Ho was assigned the post as Consul-General.

David Strangeways

After the Allies' victory over Nazi Germany, Strangeways was given the role of political adviser to the Allied Commissioners for Westphalia and the Rhine.

Enemy at the Door

The series was shown between 1978 and 1980 and dealt with the German occupation of Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands, during the Second World War.

Ernst vom Rath

Ernst Eduard vom Rath (3 June 1909 – 9 November 1938) was a German diplomat, remembered for his assassination in Paris in 1938 by a Jewish young man, Herschel Grynszpan, which touched off Kristallnacht, The Night of Broken Glass.

Gatchina

During the German occupation, which lasted from 13 September 1941 to 26 January 1944, the city had the name Lindemannstadt after the Wehrmacht general Georg Lindemann.

Gau Bayreuth

Gau Bayreuth (until 1942, Gau Bayerische Ostmark (English: Bavarian Eastern March)) was an administrative division of Nazi Germany in Lower Bavaria, Upper Palatinate and Upper Franconia, Bavaria, from 1933 to 1945.

Gau Westfalen-Nord

The Gau Westphalia-North (German: Gau Westfalen-Nord) was an administrative division of Nazi Germany encompassing the Free State of Lippe, Free State of Schaumburg-Lippe and the northern half of the Prussian province of Westphalia between 1933 and 1945.

Giulio Cogni

In 1941 Giulio Cogni went to Weimar in Nazi Germany where he met collaborating European writers and joined the "Europäische Schriftstellervereinigung" (i.e. European Writers' League) which was founded by Joseph Goebbels.

Gremmendorf

After the Second World War, the barracks originally intended for German soldiers were taken over and utilized by British occupational forces (Following the defeat of Nazi Germany, the country was divided into 4 separate sectors: American, French, British, and Soviet, which would eventually be known as East Germany ), who ended up constructing even more barracks.

Guy Môquet

After the occupation of Paris by the Germans and the installation of the Vichy government, he was denounced on 13 October 1940 and arrested at the Gare de l'Est metro station by three police officers of the French Anti-Communist Special Brigade.

Hans and Sophie Scholl

Hans and Sophie Scholl, often referred to in German as die Geschwister Scholl (literally: the Scholl siblings), were a brother and sister who were members of the White Rose, a student group in Munich that was active in the non-violent resistance movement in Nazi Germany, especially in distributing flyers against the war and the dictatorship of Adolf Hitler.

Haviva Reik

Haviva Reik (alternately Haviva Reick, Havivah Reich, or Chaviva Reich) (1914–1944) was one of 32 or 33 Palestinian Jewish parachutists sent by the Jewish Agency and Britain's Special Operations Executive (SOE) on military missions in Nazi-occupied Europe.

Hay Internment and POW camps

Three high-security camps were constructed in 1940.  The first arrivals were over two thousand refugees from Nazi Germany and Austria, many of them Jewish; they had been interned in Britain when fears of invasion were at their peak and transported to Australia aboard the HMT Dunera.

Invasion of Iceland

Requisitioning local means of transportation, the troops moved to Hvalfjörður, Kaldaðarnes, Sandskeið and Akranes to secure landing areas against the possibility of a German counterattack.

Jonathan Steinberg

Steinberg's teaching covers modern Europe since 1789 with specialization in the German and Austrian Empires, Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and modern Jewish history.

King's Park F.C.

The fortunes of the club were hit further in 1941 when a Luftwaffe Heinkel III dropped a single Hermann bomb on Forthbank - one of only German two bombs that hit the town during the war, and was believed to be merely one that had been finally successfully dislodged by the crew after becoming "stuck" in its bomb cradle when its payload had been dropped elsewhere (a not uncommon problem for bomber crews during the war).

Krøkebærsletta

It was primarily a transit camp for prisoners on their way to Falstad, Grini or camps in Germany.

Military history of the Soviet Union

Soviet participation in the Spanish Civil War was greatly influenced by the growing tension between Stalin and Adolf Hitler, the leader of Nazi Germany and an avid supporter of the fascist forces of Francisco Franco.

Neckerchief

In Nazi Germany, the Hitler Jugend, Deutsches Jungvolk and Bund Deutscher Mädel all wore a black neckerchief as part of their uniform, usually folded under the shirt collar.

Northern Epirus Liberation Front

In September 1943 Italy surrendered to the Allies and her place in Albania was taken by German troops.

Operation Totalize

The intention was to break through the German defences south of Caen on the eastern flank of the Allied positions in Normandy and exploit success by driving south to capture the high ground north of the city of Falaise.

Operation Wunderland

The Germans knew that many ships of the Soviet Navy had sought refuge in the Kara Sea because of the protection that its ice pack provided during 10 months of the year.

Otl Aicher

Aicher was a classmate and friend of Werner Scholl, and through him met Werner's family, including his siblings Hans and Sophie Scholl, both of whom would be executed in 1943 for their membership in the White Rose resistance movement in Nazi Germany.

Ruin value

The idea was supported by Adolf Hitler, who planned for such ruins to be a symbol of the greatness of the Third Reich, just as Ancient Greek and Roman ruins were symbolic of those civilisations.

Šentvid pri Zavodnju

On 22 February 1944 the Slovene poet and Yugoslav people's hero Karel Destovnik (a.k.a. Kajuh) was killed in fighting with German troops in the hamlet of Žlebnik south of the main settlement.

Settela Steinbach

Anna Maria (Settela) Steinbach (December 23, 1934, Buchten – July 31, 1944) was a Dutch girl who was gassed in Nazi Germany's Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp.

Sprachregelung

Also, euphemisms of Nazi Germany, like "final solution" for what is today known as the Holocaust, have been regarded as a case of Sprachregelung as recounted in Hannah Arendt's coverage of the trial of Eichmann in Jerusalem.

Tommy cooker

The term also came to be applied by the German tank crews as a derogatory nickname for the Sherman tank whose earlier models acquired a reputation for bursting up in flames when hit.

Ursula von Rydingsvard

Ursula von Rydingsvard born in Deensen, Lower Saxony, then Nazi Germany, is a sculptor who has been working in Brooklyn, New York for the past 30 years.

Wilfrid B. Israel

On 26 March 1943 Israel left London for Lisbon, Portugal and spent the next two months distributing certificates of entry to British ruled Palestine, and investigating the situation of Jews on the peninsula; during World War II the fascist regimes in Spain and Portugal sympathized with Nazi Germany but refused to hand over Jews to the Germans.

Wolf pack Seewolf

Coincidentally, Allied Intelligence formed the view that the Germans were planning to mount a missile attack on the United States, using V-1 or V-2 missiles adapted for launch at sea by submarines.

Women for Israel's Tomorrow

Nadia Matar, the group's co-chair, caused controversy across the Israeli political spectrum in September 2004 when she compared the government's intention to remove Israeli settlers from Gaza to the involvement of the Judenrat ("Jewish Council") in Berlin in 1942, which under orders from the German government organized the expulsion of the Jewish community from that city.