How did Nazis murder Anne Frank? Life of Anne Frank in the Secret Annex and her painful death – WW2


The 10th of May, 1940, World War 2, the  Netherlands.

Nazi Germany invades Holland   and the German Air Forces – the Luftwaffe – use  paratroopers in the capture of tactical points and   to assist in the advance of ground troops across  the country.

The invasion is accompanied by heavy   aerial bombardment of Rotterdam and culminates on  the 14th of May with the destruction of its entire   historic center.

Because the Germans threaten  to bomb the city of Utrecht in the same way,   the Dutch forces surrender one day later.

Soon  after the Nazis start to occupy the whole country   and pass new anti-Jewish laws which are  designed to exclude Jewish people from society   and restrict their livelihood.

15,000 Jews who fled from Nazi   Germany to the Netherlands between 1933 and  1939 are once again under Nazi domination.

One of them is a Jewish teenager who would become  the world’s most famous diarist Anne Frank.

Annelies Marie Frank was born on the 12th  of June 1929 in Frankfurt, Germany to Otto   and Edith Frank.

Anne had also a sister, Margot,  who was three years her senior.

The sisters had a   happy childhood playing almost every day in the  garden with the children of their neighborhood  The Franks were liberal Jews and  lived in an assimilated community   of Jewish and non-Jewish citizens of various  religions on the outskirts of Frankfurt.

Their life changed dramatically when on the 30th  of January 1933, Adolf Hitler, the leader of the   Nazi Party, was appointed chancellor of Germany  by the German President Paul von Hindenburg.

The Nazi regime quickly began to restrict the  civil and human rights of the Jewish people   and established first the concentration  camps, imprisoning its political opponents,   homosexuals, Jehovah’s witnesses,  and others classified as “dangerous”.

Because of business problems  and growing antisemitism,   Otto Frank decided to leave Germany  and move to the Netherlands.

In September 1933, he founded a franchise for the  Amsterdam branch of Opekta company that traded in   pectin, a gelling agent for making jam.

The rest  of the family moved to Amsterdam soon after.

The Franks were among 300,000 Jews who fled  from Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1939.

After the experiences in the Third Reich,  the family felt soon at home in Amsterdam   and the girls enrolled in Dutch schools.

They  made new friends and despite initial problems   with the Dutch language, they became  excellent students, especially Margot.

While the girls seemed to be happy about  their new life in their country, for their   parents the situation was more challenging.

Otto had to work hard to get his company going   and build a new life for his family.

However, the  financial situation of the family improved in 1938   when Otto started a new company called Pectacon,  which was a wholesaler of herbs and spices.

Seeing the development in Nazi Germany and  its aggressive expansion, he even wanted to   set up a new business in Great Britain and  move there but this plan did not work out.

The Second World War started on the  1st of September 1939.

Anne Frank   was 10 years old when Germany invaded  the Netherlands on the 10th of May 1940.

The life of the Franks, who were once again  under Nazi domination, changed completely.

The criminal Nazi regime from which they ran  away in 1933 finally caught up with them in the   country which became their new home and had  made them feel free to live their own life.

The Netherlands became an occupied territory,  and it did not take long for the Nazis to   begin introducing new anti-Semitic laws and  regulations restricting the lives of Jews.

Jewish civil servants were fired  and Jewish businesses as well as   the Jews themselves had to be registered.

They could no longer visit parks, cinemas,   or non-Jewish shops.

Many places thus became  off-limits to Anne who could no longer go to   the same school as all Jewish children  had to go to separate Jewish schools.

According to new laws, Jews were no  longer allowed to run their own businesses   and the Nazis forced Otto Frank to give up his  companies.

However, Otto had managed to transfer   control of his businesses to his employees soon  enough to keep his companies out of Nazi hands.

The situation got worse in 1941 when Jewish men  were arrested during raids and then deported to   the Mauthausen concentration camp.

Among them  were friends and acquaintances of the Franks   and reports of their deaths would soon to follow.

Otto understood that the situation was  critical and tried to emigrate to the   Unites States and Cuba.

However, he never  managed to obtain the necessary documents.

It was in the spring of 1942 when Otto Frank,  anticipating deportation of his own family,   decided to set up a hiding place in an empty part  of his business premises at Prinsengracht 263.

Regulations which forced Jews to wear a yellow  badge in the form of a Star of David as a means   of identification were announced in the  Netherlands on the 29th of April 1942.

Those caught without the badge after the  5th of May, when they came into effect,   was arrested and detained for six-week period.

The systematic deportation of Dutch Jews to the   death camps started in the summer of 1942.

Transports regularly left the transit camps   of Westerbork and Vught.

Out of 140,000 Jews who  lived in the Netherlands by the beginning of the   Second World War, 107,000 including little  children were deported mostly for Auschwitz   and Sobibor by September, 1944.

Out of the  107,000, only 5,000 returned after the war.

Before going into hiding, the 12th of June 1942  was probably the last happy moment for the Frank   family.

It was the day when Anne celebrated  her 13th birthday and received her diary.

A diary which would one day make her  famous and in which she would write   about her feelings and thoughts during  the difficult times that were to come.

Less than one month later, on the 5th  of July 1942, Margot, Anne’s sister,   received a call-up to report for a so-called  ‘labor camp’ in Nazi Germany.

Knowing the faith of   their friends and acquaintances who had been sent  to such camps and never returned, the Franks did   not hesitate for a moment.

The next morning, they  went into hiding in order to escape persecution.

In the secret annex the family  would spend long 761 days.

After 7 days, the Franks were joined by the  Van Pels family made up of Hermann, Auguste,   and 16-year-old Peter from whom Anne would  receive her first kiss in the secret annex.

In November, they were joined by Fritz  Pfeffer, a dentist and family friend.

It is Anne’s diary thanks to which we  know how the Frank family and 4 others   lived for more than 2 years in a three-story  space entered through a revolving bookcase.

The people in hiding were completely dependent  on six helpers.

They were employees and friends   of Anne’s father who provided food, clothing,  and everything necessary to the 8 people in   the Secret Annex between 1942 and 1944.

Writing helped Anne pass the time and it   is thanks to her diary that we can get a glimpse  into the everyday life of the people in hiding.

It was important to be silent especially  from 8:30 AM when the men in the warehouse,   which was located below the secret annex, started  their work day.

Any sound could cause suspicion.

The morning was devoted to reading, studying,  and preparing for their lunch break.

At 12:30 PM, when the warehouse workers went home  for lunch, a few of the helpers came up to the   Secret Annex to have lunch with those in hiding.

Miep Gies usually stayed in the office to keep an   eye on things.

The people in hiding could  see other faces and listen to the “Radio   Oranje” which was a programme broadcasted  by the BBC where Dutch Queen Wilhelmina,   who on the 13th of May 1940 had escaped from the  invading German troops and travelled to England,   spoke 34 times during the course of the war.

While in the afternoon some people in hiding
took a nap , Anne used to write or study.

Then  they had a coffee, prepared dinner and at 5:30 PM,   when the warehouse workers went home, the  people in hiding could leave the Secret   Annex and spread out through the building.

They would cook dinner and took turns using   the bathroom as they did in the morning before  the warehouse workers started their working day.

The situation became more  dangerous after September 1942,   when special units were formed, made up of Dutch  collaborators that began hunting for hiding Jews.

An estimated 25,000 Jews went  into hiding in the Netherlands.

Two thirds of them survived and one  third were betrayed and discovered.

The 8 people in the Secret Annex belonged to  the later group.

To this day, we do not know the   reason for the police raid, but the hiding period  came to an abrupt end on the 4th of August 1944.

Dutch police officers headed by SS officer Karl  Silberbauer went to investigate a tip-off that   Jews were hiding in the upstairs rooms at  Prinsengracht 263.

The hiding place had been   discovered and Otto and the others were arrested.

While Silberbauer confiscated their valuables and   money, he scattered out the papers and notebooks.

After people from the Secret Annex were then taken   to Gestapo headquarters in Amsterdam, two  other helpers took the documents before the   Secret Annex was emptied by order of the Nazis.

Anne’s diary and her other manuscripts survived.

From a prison in Amsterdam, they were  sent to the Westerbork transit camp.

They ended up in the prison barracks,  and the men and women were separated.

Otto had to work during the day but in the  evening he could be with Edith, Margot, and Anne.

After a few weeks, they were sent to the  Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

Their train was the last one to leave  Westerbork for this extermination camp   located in Nazi-occupied Poland.

The train journey took three horrible days, during  which Anne and over a thousand others were packed   closely together in cattle wagons.

There was  little food and water and only a barrel for a   toilet.

Upon arrival at Auschwitz, Nazi doctors  checked to see who would and who would not be   able to do heavy forced labor.

Around 350  people from Anne’s transport were immediately   taken to the gas chambers and murdered.

While Otto ended up in a camp for men, Anne,   Margot and their mother Edith were  sent to the labor camp for women.

After the war, survivors described them as an  inseparable trio.

Otto would never see them again.

When in early November 1944, Anne and Margot were  deported to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp,   their parents stayed behind at Auschwitz.

Edith  died of weakness and disease on the 6th of January   1945, three weeks before the  Red Army liberated the camp.

At Bergen-Belsen, Anne reunited with her friend  – Nanette Blitz – who survived the Holocaust   and described Anne “ as bald, emaciated, and  shivering”.

She added that Anne did not wish   to live any longer as she believed  her parents were both dead.

However,   Anne also did tell her that she hoped to one day  write a book based on her diary when the war ends.

Sanitary conditions were terrible  and there was no water for washing   and hardly enough for drinking and  cooking.

Between January and March   1945 when the prisoners were sent on death  marches from the other concentration camps,   about one-third of the prisoners who arrived  in the transports were already dead, and almost   80 percent of the rest had to be fetched by  truck from the station as they were too week
and sick to walk.

On one occasion out of a  transport of 1,900 inmates over 500 arrived dead.

The prisoners got almost no food during these  death marches and there was no food when they   arrived at the camp either.

The camp was  so overcrowded that during winter months   when it was freezing cold, the prisoners had  to sleep in a sitting position on the floor   and somehow try to share only 200 blankets  in a camp of tens of thousands of prisoners.

Due to starvation, thirst and  the outbreak of typhus epidemics,   the average daily mortality rate of  prisoners was between 250 and 300.

In these terrible conditions, Anne  and Margot contracted typhus as well.

After the war, Gena Turgel, a survivor of  Bergen Belsen who worked in the camp hospital   and knew Anne remembered seeing her and in in  her own words said that Anne was “ delirious,   terrible and burning up.

” She also brought Anne  water with which to wash.

But unfortunately,   Anne and her sister did not survive After Margot fell from her bunk in   her weakened state and was killed by  the shock, Anne died one day later.

They both died in February 1945  owing to the effects of typhus,   Margot first, Anne shortly afterwards.

It was initially believed that the sisters died a  few weeks before the camp’s liberation on the 15th   of April 1945.

However, it was later revealed  that they may have died as early as February.

Anne and Margot are among the millions of  victims who were senteced to death by starvation,   thirst, illnesses, ill treatment  or extermination with Zyklon B gas.

However, there was one person from the Secret  Annex who survived.

It was Otto, Anne’s father.

He was liberated on the 27th of January  1945 when the Soviets entered Auschwitz.

On the way back to the Netherlands he  found out that his wife Edith had died   but he hoped that Anne and Margot had somehow  survived.

He returned to the liberated Netherlands   on the 3rd of June 1945 – 9 days before  what would have been Anne’s 16th birthday.

All hope was lost one month later when he  learned about the death of his daughters.

Miep Gies, one of the helpers of the  Secret Annex, passed him Anne’s diary.

After he found enough courage to read  it, he was astonished by her writing.

He also read about Anne’s dreams to become  a writer and journalist and her intention to   publish her stories about their life in the  Secret Annex after the war would be over.

In the end, Anne’s dreams would come true.

First 3,000 copies of her book – “Secret   Annex” – were published in 1947.

Since then, the  book has been translated into over 70 languages.

People all over the world were introduced to  Anne’s story and in 1960, the hiding place   which for 2 years became the home to 8 people  who tried to survive the atrocities of the   criminal Nazi regime, became a museum: the  Anne Frank House.

Today, you can even visit   her room that has walls brightened with picture  postcards and movie stars which Anne collected   and see her original diary and other  manuscripts which she wrote until her arrest.

Anne Frank, a teenage girl who perished  in the death camp and whose only “sin” was   that she was a Jew, has become a symbol  which will live forever and will always   remind us of the dangers of discrimination  and racism, and hatred towards each other.

thanks for watching the world history channel and  don’t miss our next videos click the subscribe   button now for more interesting clips give us  a like and see you in the following episode

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(1848, Macon) Light-Skinned Woman Disguised as White Master: 1,000-Mile Escape in Plain Sight

The hand holding the scissors trembled slightly as Ellen Craft stared at her reflection in the small cracked mirror.

In 72 hours, she would be sitting in a first class train car next to a man who had known her since childhood.

A man who could have her dragged back in chains with a single word.

And he wouldn’t recognize her.

He couldn’t because the woman looking back at her from that mirror no longer existed.

It was December 18th, 1848 in Mon, Georgia, and Ellen was about to attempt something that had never been done before.

A thousand-mile escape through the heart of the slaveolding south, traveling openly in broad daylight in first class.

But there was a problem that made the plan seem utterly impossible.

Ellen was a woman.

William was a man.

A light-skinned woman and a dark-skinned man traveling together would draw immediate suspicion, questions, searches.

The patrols would stop them before they reached the city limits.

So, Ellen had conceived a plan so audacious that even William had initially refused to believe it could work.

She would become a white man.

Not just any white man, a wealthy, sickly southern gentleman traveling north for medical treatment, accompanied by his faithful manservant.

The ultimate disguise, hiding in the most visible place possible, protected by the very system designed to keep her enslaved.

Ellen set down the scissors and picked up the components of her transformation.

Each item acquired carefully over the past week.

A pair of dark glasses to hide her eyes.

a top hat that would shadow her face, trousers, a coat, and a high collared shirt that would conceal her feminine shape, and most crucially, a sling for her right arm.

The sling served a purpose that went beyond mere costume.

Ellen had been deliberately kept from learning to read or write, a common practice designed to keep enslaved people dependent and controllable.

Every hotel would require a signature.

Every checkpoint might demand written documentation.

The sling would excuse her from putting pen to paper.

One small piece of cloth standing between her and exposure.

William watched from the corner of the small cabin they shared, his carpenter’s hands clenched into fists.

He had built furniture for some of the wealthiest families in Mon, his skill bringing profit to the man who claimed to own him.

Now those same hands would have to play a role he had spent his life resisting.

The subservient servant bowing and scraping to someone pretending to be his master.

“Say it again,” Ellen whispered, not turning from the mirror.

“What do I need to remember?” William’s voice was steady, though his eyes betrayed his fear.

Walk slowly like moving hurts.

Keep the glasses on, even indoors.

Don’t make eye contact with other white passengers.

Gentlemen, don’t stare.

If someone asks a question you can’t answer, pretend the illness has made you hard of hearing.

And never, ever let anyone see you right.

Ellen nodded slowly, watching her reflection.

Practice the movements.

Slower, stiffer, the careful, pained gate of a man whose body was failing him.

She had studied the white men of Mon for months, observing how they moved, how they held themselves, how they commanded space without asking permission.

What if someone recognizes me? The question hung in the air between them.

William moved closer, his reflection appearing beside hers in the mirror.

They won’t see you, Ellen.

They never really saw you before.

Just another piece of property.

Now they’ll see exactly what you show them.

A white man who looks like he belongs in first class.

The audacity of it was breathtaking.

Ellen’s light skin, the result of her enslavers assault on her mother, had been a mark of shame her entire life.

Now it would become her shield.

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