Research Paper Example: Women in the Holocaust

The topic I have chosen to research is women in the holocaust.  I want to know how they handled it compared to the men. And how they were treated differently from the men in concentration camps and in the beginning of the war.  I know they thought it was safer for women  walk to the streets at the beginning of the holocaust because the young men were being shipped out and not coming back. Where they were being shipped no one knows but they never came back. Women also had to start playing a bigger role in their families. For example, making new recipes from food scrapes to keep their families fed and finding ways to make money. Also when they were put into the concentration camps finding ways to survive to the best of their abilities.  

The book I read was called “All But My Life” by Gerda Weissmann Klein.  This book has shown me that a lot of people didn’t believe that the Germans were taking over.  Gerda’s family lived in Poland.  They thought they could keep living their lives. Oh, were they wrong? Even with all the warning signs from other countries and from relatives from other countries they decided to stay and see what happened. When her brother left Gerda was hearing rumors that all the boys who left were let go in the woods and were getting hunted like wild animals. “ One of the boys from a classmate of Arthur’s told us that after registering, many boys from other towns were taken to camp and killed” ( Klein 17). 

What I want  to find out about the women in the holocaust is how they survived. What did they have to do to keep their families fed at the beginning of the holocaust? What they had to do to keep their children happy and healthy. What they had to do to help their husband make money. How they stayed strong once they were put into the concentration camps. How they handled being separated from their families. What did they talk about to keep themselves distracted? These are just a few questions that I have questions about the holocaust. 

The first source that I read to learn more about women in the holocaust I called, “Women in the Holocaust”, Written by Dalia Ofer and Lenore J. Weitzman. Reading this article has shown me how different the holocaust was for men, women, and children. The first topic this article talked about was that men were Prioritized for leaving and were thought to be in more danger than women and children. “...with many assuming that only men were in “real danger,” men typically were prioritized for hiding and escape” (Ofer and Weitzman 1). This shows how things were in the times where men took care of the families and women took care of the house and the kids. Also if the women have children they had a choice to either leave their children or stay with them. If they left they would work in a factory. And if they choose to stay with their children it was a death sentence to the gas chamber. “Only two of about six hundred mothers of young children appeared for the selection; all the other decided to stay with their children to the end”(Ofer and Weitzman 18). 

Another huge topic this article brings up is how women cope with being in concentration camps. “... the sharing of recipes to cope with hunger and the formation of “camp-sister” relationships to support and sustain each other through the concentration camp ordeal” (Ofer and Weitzman 18). These are just some of the ways that the women in the concentration camps would cope with starvation and all the abuse they went through from the German officers. And with their “camp- sisters” they helped each other feel normal and help them keep each other sane.  

The second source that I read was,” How one writer uncovered the lost histories of 999 women and girls who were sent to Auschwitz” written by Suyin Haynes. This article talks about how 999 women were sent to Auschwitz in 1942. This article shows what happened to these women and how they want to spread the word about what happened to them. “... they were fed starvation rations and ordered to clean the barracks on their hands and knees” (Haynes 2). This shows how badly the women were treated and how their experience was different from the men in the concentration camps. When these women left the train station at 8:20 p.m. on march 25,1942 it was the first official transport by the nazis to a centration camp. 

The third source I found in an article titled, “Auschwitz: Women used different survival and sabotage strategies than men at Nazi death camp” by Judy Baumel-Schwartz. This article shows how women in the holocaust dealt with the nazis. This labor force was called the Canda Commando they made coats for the German soldiers they were called because Canada was seen as a symbol of wealth.  The men would purposely rip the lining of the coats so they would fall apart as the German’s were wearing them.  The women, “ … they decided together to insert handwritten notes into the coat’s pockets that read something along the lines of “German women, know that you are wearing a coat that belonged to a woman who has been gasses to death in Auschwitz” (Baumel-Schwartz 2). This was just one way the women in the holocaust found ways to mess with the Germans when they were in the concentration camps. 

The fourth source I found is called, “Women During the Holocaust” written by the United States Holocaust memorial museum. This article goes in-depth on what pregnant women had through giving birth or having an abortion. “Pregnant Jewish women often tried to conceal their pregnancies or were forced to submit to abortions” (Women during the Holocaust 5). And even the women were vulnerable to rape and beatings from the German soldiers. Some of the women were even forced to have sexual relations with the officers to just be able to get food, clothes, and shelter. “ Pregnancy sometimes resulted from Polish, soviet, or Yugoslav forced laborers from sexual relations with German men.” (Women during the Holocaust 5). This just shows how badly the women in the holocaust were treated by the officers and how pregnant women were treated and what the officers did to their babies. 

Writing this paper has shown me how much the women in the holocaust had to endure. From trying to save their children, to keep each other sane, and how having to keep their families fed to having to be the head of the household before the holocaust started. It amazes me how much of a difference the women in the holocaust had from the men. From how they handled it and how the mothers stayed with their children and choose death with them to make them feel safer right before they died. This information had helped me understand how much the women had to deal with and how they handled it. This shows me how much a mother would do for their children. Also how brave these women were to bale to stay alive not only for themselves but their camp sisters and children.