Keeping the British Liberal Party flag flying high

[pipisme]

Originally Posted by Turquoise Blue

So... You kept the Liberals a major party, and effectively put Labour/Soc. Labour in the spot Liberal/Lib Dem is in OTL? That is clever of you.

That's right. But in OTL the number of Liberal MPs fell to only five in 1957. In this TL the number of Socialist Labour MPs will not fall into single figures.

Back to events in Germany. The deportees/refugees from the Nazi controlled part of Germany, who were in the "privileged" category were allowed to take 20 marks for each married couple, after they had bought third class rail tickets to destinations in free Germany. If they didn't have any enough money for the tickets, they could go with the "unprivileged" deportees, or make their own way to freedom. All their personal transport - cars, motor bikes, bikes - were taken by the Nazis. I have not been able to find information about train fares on German railways in 1939 in OTL.

The majority of deportees were from Breslau. The nearest city in free Germany was Dresden. Now the train journey from Wroclaw [the name for Breslau since 1945] to Dresden takes around 3 hours and twenty minutes. [1] I don't know how long it would have taken in 1939. As four to five thousand "privileged" deportees from Breslau had purchased tickets they had the right to travel in the trains, but so as not to inconvenience the other passengers only a limited number were allowed on each train. Here is the wikipedia article for Wroclaw Main Station [formerly Breslau Hauptbanhof]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wroc%C5...ailway_station. So the deportees had to wait on the platforms or in the third class waiting rooms.

As for the "non-privileged" deportees when they arrived at the border towns in free Germany [see Post # 954 on this page] in the afternoon of 24 and 25 April 1939, the German authorities gave them food and drink, medical treatment if necessary, and anything else they needed. I have estimated that there were in the region of 2,600 to 4,000 people. They also gave them money to buy second class railway tickets to Berlin, with free bus or coach travel to the nearest railway station. In order to avoid overcrowding the authorities put on more trains.

Because of the fighting in the east of Berlin trains from the border towns had to make a detour to the north-west or south-west of the city, which lengthened the journey time, which I guess would have been around an hour and a half to two hours. Here is a photograph which gives an idea of the deportees/refugees at Charlottenberg railway station in Berlin: http://svetlanakarlin.wordpress.com/...n-1945-Germany.

[1] See http://www.raildude.com/en/city-to-c...any-poland/612.

[pipisme]

By the 26 April 1939 there were about 12,000 refugees from the Nazi controlled area of Germany in free Germany. A couple of hundred or so would go and live with friends and relatives, but accomodation would need to be found for the rest.

The German government appealed in radio broadcasts, newspaper advertisements and posters for people to take the refugees into their homes. The drawing by the artist, Kathe Kollwitz [1], of a harassed looking, but attractive woman, with a boy, a girl, and carrying a baby, and with the words "please give us a home", was reproduced widely in advertisements and posters.

In Berlin there were the buildings which had been used by the Nazi Party and the SS, and which were now vacant. So what had been the SS Operational Headquarters; the office of the Senior SS Commander, Berlin; the SS Central Department; the SS Leaders School; the office of the Reich Youth Leader, were all adapted to house the refugees. Also this mansion - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wa...cture_4589.jpg -in the western suburb of Wannsee.

[1] Here is a biography of Kollwitz: http://rogallery.com/Kollwitz/Kollwitz-bio.htm.

[stevep]

Originally Posted by pipisme

In Berlin there were the buildings which had been used by the Nazi Party and the SS, and which were now vacant. So what had been the SS Operational Headquarters; the office of the Senior SS Commander, Berlin; the SS Central Department; the SS Leaders School; the office of the Reich Youth Leader, were all adapted to house the refugees. Also this mansion - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wa...cture_4589.jpg -in the western suburb of Wannsee.

[1] Here is a biography of Kollwitz: http://rogallery.com/Kollwitz/Kollwitz-bio.htm.

pipisme

I like it. Logical and appropriate.

Steve

[pipisme]

Also the houses and apartments of the Nazis who had fled to Konigsberg were used for housing the refugees. In February 1937 Reinhard and Lina Heydrich purchased a 700 square metre family home in Augustastrasse, not far from the shores of Schlachtensee, in the south-west of Berlin. [1] It had nine rooms on three floors, and a garden with a hen house. This was in OTL and this TL. The Heydrich's house was used to house two refugee families.

I would expect that Goering, Hess, Bormann and Rosenberg had apartments or houses in Berlin.

[1] Schlachtensee: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlachtensee.

[pipisme]

Former Nazi Party and SS buildings in cities, as well as Berlin, in free Germany were also used to house refugees from the Nazi controlled part of Germany. Also there was a very generous response to the appeal by the free German government for people to take refugees into their homes. In Frankfurt-on-Main, Otto and Edith Frank found room for a single Jewish woman in her late twenties in their house, to share with their daughters Anne and Margot.

In the Neukolln district of Berlin, the Wilhelm and Kathe Fischer took in a nineteen-year-old Jewish girl from Breslau, called Miriam Lewy, to share their apartment with their children Sophie and Karl. [1] Philipp, their elder son, was in the medical corps in the free German army. He wanted to train to be a doctor. Miriam's two brothers and divorced father had been murdered by the Nazis.

[1] For the Fischers see post #870 and subsequent posts on page 44.

[Archangel]

Keep it up, pip!

[pipisme]

On 2 April 1939 Kathe Fischer started work as a costume designer with the prestigious Deutsches Nationaltheater am Schiffbauerdamm in Berlin. [1]

Here is a list of members of Hitler's cabinet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitler_Cabinet. The following members were captured in the revolution on 15 March 1939:
Joachim von Ribbentrop
Wilhelm Frick
Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk
Franz Gurtner
Wilhelm Keitel
Walther Funk
Richard Walther Darre
Franz Seldte
Wilhelm Ohnesorge
Julius Dorpmuller
Joseph Goebbels
Bernard Rust
Hanns Kerrl
Hans Frank
Otto Meisner
Hans Lammers.

Hjalmar Schacht, who had been a Minister Without Portfolio, was not arrested because he was secretly a member of the Resistance.

Helmuth James Graf von Motlke, the Minister of Justice in the free German government, had to decide who would be tried and on what charges, and who would be released. He decided not to press charges against Ohnesorge, Dorpmuller and Kerrl [the Ministers of Postal Affairs, Transport, and Church Affairs respectively] as they were of only minor importance in Hitler's cabinet. The others were remanded in custody until their trials started at various dates in April 1939.

The trial of Frick, Gurtner and Goebbels began in a Berlin court on 11 April 1939, on the charge of the murder of Kurt von Schleicher and 84 other persons during the Night of the Long Knives, 30 June to 2 July 1934. [2] The charge carried the death penalty. There had not been jury trials in Germany since 1924. Instead there were three professional judges and six lay judges.

All three defendants pleaded not guilty, but as Goebbels attracted by far the most publicity as is the one with the highest name recognition, I will concentrate on him.

Goebbels conducted his own defence. As the prosecution had incontrovertible evidence from the relevant documents that he had authorised the murders, he did not deny it. Instead he claimed that Scheicher and the others were traitors to the German Reich who had to be executed. His repeated attempts to make speeches praising the Hitler regime as restoring honour and greatness to Germany, were cut short by the judges. He was told to concentrate on answering the charges he was accused of.

There was no doubt of the verdict and on 18 April all three defendants were found guilty and condemned to death by guillotine. The executions took place on 28 April 1939. The evening before his execution Goebbels met Magda, his wife, and his stepson and five children for the last time. According to Magda he told them that he was dying as a martyr for Germany and National Socialism.

[1] See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theater_am_Schiffbauerdamm.

[2] See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Long_Knives.

[pipisme]

At their trial Goebbels, Frick [Minister of the Interior] and Gurtner [Minister of Justice], were also prosecuted for their responsibility for the establishment of concentration camps, and for the murder of Jews and destruction of Jewish property during Kristallnacht [9-10 November 1938].

In reply to questioning about the establishment of concentration camps, Goebbels' defence was that they were a necessity against enemies of the German people. Such camps were originally established by the British to hold Boer women and children in South Africa during the Boer War. Also he claimed that conditions in the concentration camps in Germany were no worse than in prisons in the southern states of the United States with their chain gangs.

Regarding the events on Kristallnacht, prosecuting counsel read out the secret report of the Supreme Court of the National Socialist German Workers on the anti-semitic riots:

On the evening of 9 November 1938, Reich Propaganda Director and Party Member Dr. Goebbels told the Party leaders assembled at a social evening in the old town hall in Munich that in the districts of Kurhessen and Magdeburg-Anhalt there had been anti-Jewish demonstrations during which Jewish shops were demolished and synagogues were set on fire. The Fuhrer at Goebbels's suggestion had decided that such demonstrations were not to be prepared or organized by the Party, but neither were they to be discouraged if they originated spontaneously....

The oral instructions of the Reich Propaganda Director were probably understood by all the Party leaders present to mean that the Party should not appear outwardly as the originator of the demonstrations but that in reality it should organize them and carry them out. [....] The first known case of the killing of a Jew, i.e a Polish citizen, was reported to [...] Dr. Goebbels on 10 November 1938 at about 2 o'clock and that in this connexion the opinion was expressed that something would have to be done to prevent the whole action from taking a dangerous turn. According to the statement by the deputy Gauleiter of Munich-Upper Bavaria, Party Member Dr. Goebbels replied that the informant should not get excited about one dead Jew, and that in the next few days thousands of Jews would see the point. [...]

This report estimated the number of Jewish dead at 91. Over 20,000 Jewish men were arrested and taken to concentration camps.

Quotation taken from the book Documents on Nazism, 1919-1945, Introduced and Edited by Jeremy Noakes and Geoffrey Pridham, New York: The Viking Press, 1975.

Goebbels vehemently denied that he was responsible for the deaths of any Jews during Kristallnacht. However he was convicted of material responsibility for the deaths of 91 Jews, and of authorising, or at least not preventing, the destruction of Jewish property.

Because of lack of evidence Frick and Gurtner were not convicted of responsibility for any crimes committed during Kristallnacht.

In this TL German government and Nazi Party documents which in OTL were captured by the Allies during World War II, were captured in the Democratic Revolution on 15 March 1939. In the course of time they were made available to historians.

[pipisme]

This timeline now has over 100,000 views. For this milestone I would like to thank all the readers of this TL.

At his trial Ribbentrop was closely questioned by prosecuting counsel about his behaviour during the night of 9-10 November 1938 [Kristallnacht]

Counsel: "Herr Ribbentrop, where were you on the night of 9th November last year?"
Ribbentrop: "I was at home in Berlin."
Counsel: "Did you go to the Foreign Office in the Wilhelmstrasse
the following morning?" [Ribbentrop was Foreign Minister in Hitler's cabinet].
Ribbentrop: "I did."
Counsel: "On your way there did you see any damage to buildings?"
Ribbentrop: "I did."
Counsel: "What did you think was the cause?"
Ribbentrop. "I assumed there had been riots."

To be continued in my next post.

[pipisme]

Continuation of questioning of Ribbentrop by prosecuting counsel:

Counsel: "Herr Ribbentrop, were you aware that Jewish property had been damaged?"
Ribbentrop: "Whether it was Aryan or Jewish did not occur to me."
Counsel: "Did you read the accounts in foreign newspapers of events during the night of 9 November last year?"
Ribbentrop: "I did."
Counsel then read in German translation a description of Kristallnacht in the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph dated November 11, 1938.
Counsel: What was reaction to these accounts? I would remind you that you are under oath.
Ribbentrop: "I was appalled and disgusted by these crimes, as all decent people must have been."
Counsel: "So Herr Ribbentrop, you were so appalled and disgusted that you stayed in the government as foreign minister. Did you reveal your opinions to any your colleagues, to your wife, to any of your friends? I will ask you one more time, and as you no doubt know, perjury is a very serious offence."
Ribbentrop: "I was pleased that the Jews were getting all they deserved."
Counsel: Thank you Herr Ribbentrop. That is all for now."

Ribbentrop's defending counsel: "Herr Ribbentrop: Have you ever expressed in word or writing any desire that any Jew should be killed or his property damaged or destroyed?"
Ribbentrop: "No".

[Archangel]

Keep it up, pip!

[pipisme]

In his trial Ribbentrop was also questioned by the prosecution about his role in the German invasion of Czechoslovakia in the early morning of 15 April 1939. He admitted that he agreed to the invasion but it was not contrary to German law. His defence counsel likened the invasion to American annexation of Spanish colonies in the Spanish-American War in 1898.

Ribbentrop was acquitted by the judges of all the charges against him. This acquittal was spun the German government as showing the independence of the judiciary in the new free Germany.

[idumea]

Pretty much to be expected, really - internment for one is hardly a huge crime pre "extermination camps" and all the Allied powers are interning foreign citizens not long after in OTL, I can't see the sentiment vanishing simply because the Liberals are still in the ascendent. For the rest I guess the judiciary can still be seen to have strong Nazi elements within, since membership was tacitly a requirement for a new justice after 1933 (expressed as "don't be a Jew, a socialist, a liberal etc).
The free German government simply does not have the state apparatus or even the political capital to disbar fascist judges at this point.

[pipisme]

Originally Posted by idumea

Pretty much to be expected, really - internment for one is hardly a huge crime pre "extermination camps" and all the Allied powers are interning foreign citizens not long after in OTL, I can't see the sentiment vanishing simply because the Liberals are still in the ascendent. For the rest I guess the judiciary can still be seen to have strong Nazi elements within, since membership was tacitly a requirement for a new justice after 1933 (expressed as "don't be a Jew, a socialist, a liberal etc).
The free German government simply does not have the state apparatus or even the political capital to disbar fascist judges at this point.

Thank you for that link. The free German government banned anyone who had been a member of the National Socialist Party from serving as a judge. Although the judges in the trials of the former Nazi cabinet ministers were mostly right-wing, they prided themselves on their high standards of professional integrity, and did not allow their political opinions to influence their verdicts.

Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, Hitler's Finance Minister, was prosecuted for the collective fine of 1 billion Reichsmarks imposed on German Jews by a decreee dated 12 November 1938. The prosecution claimed that it was state sponsored robbery of a group of Germans. Krosigk's defence counsel argued that as the decree was issued by Goering, their client was not responsible for it. However Krosigk was convicted on the ground that he was responsible for its enforcement, and was sentenced to three years in prison.

[pipisme]

Walter Funk, the Minister of Economics in Hitler's cabinet, was convicted for being responsible for the implementation of Goering's decree, dated 12 November 1938, eliminating Jews from German economic life. The provisions of Article 1 of this decree were as follows:

1. From 1 January 1939 the running of retail shops, mail order houses and the practice of independent trades are forbidden to Jews.

2. Moreover, Jews are forbidden from the same date to offer goods or services in markets of all kinds, fairs or exhibitions or to advertise them or accept orders for them.

3. Jewish shops which operate in violation of this order will be closed by the police.

This quotation is taken from the book Documents on Nazism, 1919-1945, Introduced and Edited by Jeremy Noakes and Geoffrey Pridham, New York: The Viking Press, 1974.

Funk was convicted on the grounds that these decrees violated the economic rights of German Jews. The mostly conservative judges feared that they could be used by a Communist government. He was sentenced to three years in prison.

These decrees were repealed by the free German government when it seized power on 15 March 1939.

[pipisme]

General Wilhelm Keitel, the former chief of the high command of the armed forces and de facto minister of war under Hitler, was prosecuted for his role in the invasion of Czechoslovakia during the night of 15 March 1939, which was illegal under international law under the provisions of the Kellogg Briand Pact 1928 which had been signed by representatives of Germany and Czechoslovakia, among other countries. [1]

However the important question to be decided by the court was whether or not Keitlel was guilty of any crime under German law, and if he was not whether he should be convicted for a crime under international law. The prosecution argued that because Germany was a signatory of the Kellogg Briand Pact, Keitel was guilty of a crime under German law.

Keitel's defence was that he was only a soldier who was simply obeying the orders of Hitler. He did not know that the invasion of Czechoslovakia was illegal under the Kellogg Briand Pact. He said that he had never been a member of the National Socialist Party. He made a solemn oath as an officer and a gentleman that he would always be loyal to the democratic government of Germany. He condemned the Heydrich regime as a gang of murderers.

The prosecution argued that even if Keitel did not know about the illegality of the invasion under Kellogg Briand, he should be convicted for his major responsibility in the invasion of Czechoslovakia, which was contrary to the moral law. However he was found not guilty.

[1] Here is the text of the Kellogg Briand Pact: http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/kbpact.htm.

[pipisme]

At their trials those members of Hitler's cabinet whose fate has not been been described above were all acquitted. However Robert Ley, the former head of the German Labour Front [Deutsche Arbeitsfront -DAF] was prosecuted for being responsible for the takeover of the free trade unions and the confiscation ol their property in May 1933, and for his embezzlement of funds of the DAF for his own use. [1]

He was convicted on both counts and sentenced to three years imprisonment on the first count and five years on the second count, the terms to run consecutively.

So by the end of April 1939 Hitler, Himmler, Goering and Goebbels, who had been the four most important men in the Third Reich, were all dead.

[1] Here is wikipedia's entry for Ley: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Ley.

[pipisme]

The German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact was signed on 26 January 1934. It was vaild for a term of ten years. [1] In OTL it was unilaterally abrogated by Hitler on 28 April 1939. However in this TL with two German governments there was need for clarification as to whether they still honoured the Pact. On 26 March 1939 the free German government renewed it for a further ten years.

In OTL and in this TL in the autumn of 1938 and in the winter of 1938/39, Hitler had tried to secure German-Polish co-operation against the Soviet Union. In return for Danzig, and perhaps the Polish Corridor, he offered to support Polish claims in the Ukraine. However the Poles rejected this offer.

Anyone who looked at a map could see that in order for free German troops to liberate East Prussia from the Nazis they would need to go through Polish territory. Heydrich didn't want a Polish alliance with free Germany, so on 18 April 1939 he renewed the German-Polish Pact for a further ten years.

[1] Here is the text of the Pact: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/wwii/blbk01.asp.

[stevep]

Originally Posted by pipisme

The German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact was signed on 26 January 1934. It was vaild for a term of ten years. [1] In OTL it was unilaterally abrogated by Hitler on 28 April 1939. However in this TL with two German governments there was need for clarification as to whether they still honoured the Pact. On 26 March 1939 the free German government renewed it for a further ten years.

In OTL and in this TL in the autumn of 1938 and in the winter of 1938/39, Hitler had tried to secure German-Polish co-operation against the Soviet Union. In return for Danzig, and perhaps the Polish Corridor, he offered to support Polish claims in the Ukraine. However the Poles rejected this offer.

Anyone who looked at a map could see that in order for free German troops to liberate East Prussia from the Nazis they would need to go through Polish territory. Heydrich didn't want a Polish alliance with free Germany, so on 18 April 1939 he renewed the German-Polish Pact for a further ten years.

[1] Here is the text of the Pact: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/wwii/blbk01.asp.

pipisme

Or go by sea. Not sure how the navy split up but could see that this would be somewhere where the British government might be willing to supply some RN backing.

Steve

[pipisme]

Originally Posted by stevep

pipisme

Or go by sea. Not sure how the navy split up but could see that this would be somewhere where the British government might be willing to supply some RN backing.

Steve

Steve

So far the majority of the German navy in the Baltic is under Nazi control. But under the right conditions there could be a landing from the sea on the coast of East Prussia, but that would be very much second best to a land invasion. Also it would have to be when weather conditions are right, which rules out October to April/May. The British government would be willing to give RN support if requested by the free German government.

Contingency plans for an invasion of East Prussia from the sea were drawn up by the free German high command. But so were defensive plans by the Nazi high command.

pipisme