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Christa M.from Frankfurt am Main

1935–1943

Children and Youth as Victims of the Nazi Crimes

Seventy years ago, the National Socialists came to

power in Germany. During their rule, which lasted

until 1945, they persecuted and terrorized human

beings because of their origin, religion or physical

or mental handicap. The National Socialists attacked

many countries in Europe, occupied them and

murdered many millions, including six million Jews

from across Europe. On this web site, we wish to

remember five young people who became victims

of Nazi terror.

Christa M.

Christa M. Page 1 www.stiftung-denkmal.de

Christa M. was born on May 9, 1935 in Frankfurt am Main, afflicted

with a congenital disease, Down’s syndrome1. When Christa reached

the age of three, her mother passed away. Now her father was faced

with the problem of taking care of Christa and her sister all alone.

Probably that is why shortly after her mother’s death, she was placed

in a children’s home. At the age of five, Christa was transferred from

there to the Nursing Home and School for Special Education Scheuern2

outside of Nassau an der Lahn.

Christa sitting on a bench in a garden.

The photo was taken by her father,

when and precisely where is not known.

Source: Archive of the Hadamar Memorial

Christa M.


Christa’s father regularly inquired about his daughter, asking the sister

at the home. He would send her letters and packages with food and

toys. In 1942 her father passed away as well. He would have prefer-

red arranging for his daughter to stay with relatives. From then on,

Christa’s uncle Karl served as guardian and he kept up contact with her.

A few months after her father’s death, she was transferred to the home

in Hadamar3, where she was later murdered.

This is the letter Christa’s father wrote her on her fifth birthday. The sis-

ter at the nursing home read her the letter because she was unable to

read herself.

Fra[nkfurt] M., May 7, 1940

My dearest Christa!

For your birthday I’m sending you this card. I’m also enclosing a doll and a shovel and pail for playing in the sand.

I wish you all the best on your birthday and wish I could be together with you on this special day. I can’t send you

candy because I wasn’t able to get any. Love, your dad.

To the sister.

I’m enclosing a few things for the summer and think you can probably make good use of them. You can certainly

lengthen any clothes that are too short. Let me thank you here in advance. Please write me a few lines and tell

me how Christa is doing. The small photo is of my child.

Very sincerely yours

H. M.

Source: Archive of the Hadamar Memorial

Christa M.


On the basis of Christa’s medical file, it is possible to investigate

why she was murdered by the Nazis4. They condemned the

handicapped to death because they considered them to be »unworthy

of living«. The diagnosis of Down’s syndrome1 (in Christa’s file termed

mongoloid idiocy) proved fateful for her. The doctors erroneously

labeled individuals with Down’s syndrome »suffering from a hereditary

disease«. That stigma was used by the National Socialists as a basis

for persecuting individuals with a handicap. In 1939, the Nazis began

to register these persons in a special card catalog. This marked the

bureaucratic beginning of the mass murder of the handicapped.

Explanation on Christa’s medical file:

In the 1930s, doctors believed the underlying cause for Christa’s condition was her

father’s depressions and the alcohol problems of her grandfather. They mistakenly

claimed that Down’s syndrome was a hereditary illness (see the remark in her file

»registered as suffering from a hereditary disease«). Today science knows that neither

the social behavior of the parents nor that of grandparents plays any role in being

born with Down’s syndrome. Nor is the condition in any way hereditary.

Christa’s medical file from Scheuern,

1940–1943.Source: Archive of the Hadamar Memorial

Christa M.

Christa M. Page 3 Translation www.stiftung-denkmal.de

Nursing Home and School for Special Education Scheuern near Nassau/Lahn

Medical History

File no: 3905 Day of admission: 15 January 1940

Name: __ Christa

Born: 9 May 1934 5

Place of birth: Frankfurt a. M.

Hometown: Frankfurt a. M.

Last place of residence: "

Previous stay in institutions: Children’s home Häusergasse xxx Frankfurt a. M. from ?

to 15 Jan. 1940

Religion: Prot.

Marital status: single

Convictions: Registered with a hereditary disease: 20 Feb. 1940

Deprived of majority status: Sterilized on:

Form of sickness: Mongoloid idiocy

Congenital: Yes

Causes: a) Hereditary factors

b) Illness in the family:

Father slightly depressive. Maternal grandfather reportedly was an

alcoholic. Great uncle and great aunt had a child with idiocy. Brother

of paternal grandfather reportedly suffered from cramps. Mother

suffering from ‘symptomatic psychosis’. Mother + suffered from

anemia, weak circulation.

c) Other causes:

Physical deformations:

Released on 18 February 1943 Died on

cured, improved, not cured Cause of death:

To where? State Nursing Home Hadamar

Translation of Christa´s Medical File:

Christa M.

Christa M. Page 4a www.stiftung-denkmal.de

From 1941 on, patients were repeatedly transferred from Scheuern

to the extermination facility Hadamar, where they were murdered.

Christa was likewise transferred together with thirty other children

to Hadamar shortly before her eighth birthday. There the doctors

probably gave her a lethal dosage of drugs, leading to her death.

The precise circumstances of her death are not known. In order to

cover up the murder, the doctors indicated »enteritis« as the official

cause of death. During the war, 15,000 persons, most of them

handicapped, were murdered in Hadamar by poison gas, a lethal

overdose of drugs or forced starvation. The relatives of the victims

usually were subsequently sent a death notice, a bill for unpaid

costs of treatment, care and burial and the remaining personal

effects (clothing) of the deceased.



Christa M.

Christa M. Page 4b Translation www.stiftung-denkmal.de

22 March 1940 M. fell ill in February with bronchitis accompanied by high fever.

She was treated for this from Feb. 11-29. There were diffuse bronchitis sounds audible

in both lungs, the child was very weak, lying apathetically in her bed. On Trespulmin

injections and Expektoranelem, after 5 days fever gone. Then once again lively and happy.

The child has a friendly disposition and does not cause any difficulties in the ward. She is

quiet and amiable, adjusted quickly and well to life on the ward.

13 June 1940: From 31 May to 5 June, M. was treated once again for a diffuse bronchitis

and enteritis in the hospital of the home. She recovered very quickly and was returned

to the ward without any finding of illness. She is not very active on the ward, looks

occasionally at a picture book but then pushes it away. Apparently does not understand

at all what she sees. She knows the other children by name, but does not say their names,

and only points at them when you ask her about someone. She says ‘there she is.’

[section blocked out]

10 December 1940: M. can eat by herself, does so very nicely and with proper manners.

She does not eat too much, and is not choosy. She doesn’t soil her clothing excessively

when eating, keeps it quite clean, does not willfully tear anything. She is unable to get

dressed by herself yet, and doesn’t help much when others dress her.

4 Feb. 1941: M. likes best to be with the smaller children, does not want to be around

the bigger ones. She tries to play with the smaller children, tickles them on the neck,

sometimes pushes balls around the room together with them. But otherwise quite

inactive. She often sits for hours on her bed without doing anything.

10 May 1941: Always the same situation, no further mental development.

1943

18 Feb. Unchanged, transferred to the State Nursing Home in Hadamar.

[signed]

Hadamar

Translation of Christa´s Medical File:

Christa M.

Christa M. Page 4b www.stiftung-denkmal.de

Explanation of the handwritten comments:

In 1941, there was an end to typewritten comments. Once aerial bombardment of

Germany by the Allies began, nursing homes were used to house refugees and families

whose homes had been destroyed by bombing. This led to a deterioration in the care

provided for the persons in these homes. As is evident, the personnel no longer had the

time to keep medical files on the patients. The entry »no further mental development«

was a pretext for the Nazis to transfer Christa a short time later to Hadamar and have

her murdered there.

Hand-written comments:

10 May 1942: Same situation, no further mental development.

1943

18 Feb. Unchanged, transferred to the State Nursing Home in Hadamar.

Hadamar

22 Feb. 43: Arrived here in the evening.

Fell sick with enteritis.

Did not recover.

Today exitus due to Entero Colitis



Christa M. Background Text www.stiftung-denkmal.de

Murder by Euthanasia

The National Socialists had a world view which centered on the law

of the survival of the fittest. The weak, the sick, or persons considered

to be members of »inferior races« were treated as outcasts, excluded

from society. The Nazis termed individuals with physical and mental

handicaps »unnecessary mouths to feed«. In the letter here, you can

read that Hitler in 1939 issued an order to murder »the incurable«,

which also meant anyone with a handicap. To cover up the crime, Hitler

intentionally avoided using the word murder. Rather, he chose the

expression »mercy killing«, so that others might be led to believe that

this was morally justifiable, and something practiced only in a small

number of cases.

In fact, this letter initiated the mass murder of the handicapped.

Throughout the German Reich, gas chambers were built in six nursing

homes to murder the handicapped, including the facility in Hadamar.

Down to the end of the war, between 220,000 and 240,000 largely

handicapped persons were gassed, poisoned or murdered by forced

starvation. Christa was among those victims (Euthanasia Murders,

Operation T45).

Letter from Adolf Hitler to the head of the Reich Chancellery

Bouhler and his personal physician Dr. Brandt, in which he

authorized them to murder »the incurable«. As scholars later

determined, Hitler wrote the letter in October, but it was

backdated to September 1, 1939, the first day of the war.

Source: Federal Archive, Berlin-Lichterfelde, Reich Justice Ministry, R3001/R22 No. 4209.

Christa M.

Christa M. Background Text www.stif-

tung-denkmal.de

Adolf Hitler BERLIN, Sept. 1, 1939

Reich Leader B o u h l e r and

Dr. B r a n d t (MD)

have been authorized to extend the authority of doctors who will be

specifically determined so that patients deemed to be incurably ill can,

after the most exacting assessment of their condition,

be granted a merciful death.

[signed]

[passed on to me by Bouhler, Aug. 27, 1940

Dr. Geistner]

Translation of the letter:

Christa M. www.stiftung-denkmal.de

Glossary 1

1 Down’s Syndrome

(known earlier as mongolism) Individuals suffering from this syndrome have one

chromosome more than normal humans in each cell, namely 47 rather than 46.

Chromosome 21 is present in trisomy, three times rather than twice in each cell.

Due to this extra chromosome, individuals with D. suffer from a condition characterized

by various physical features, including altered size and weight, and abnormalities of

the shape of the head, and ears. In addition, they may have organic defects of the heart,

stomach or intestines, or changes in their bone structure. The ability of these children

to learn can be improved by special education.

2 Nursing Home and School for Special Education Scheuern

Established in 1850 as a nursing home with a school for special education and later a

department for children’s psychiatry, located outside of Nassau an der Lahn in the

province of Hesse. During National Socialism, this was an institution where children

were kept before being sent to Hadamar. A large number of the children murdered

in Hadamar came from Scheuern. They were sent to Hadamar and murdered there

under the pretext that they were »impossible to educate« and »incapable of any

concentrated activity«.

Nursing Home and School for Special Education Scheuern Source: Scheuern Homes

Glossary 2


3 State Nursing Home Hadamar

Established in 1906 as a state nursing facility for the handicapped near Limburg in the

province of Hesse. Down to August 1941, 10,072 persons were murdered there by poison

gas. Down to 1945, 5,000 more individuals were murdered by nursing personnel by a

lethal dosage of drugs. Among the victims were also Jewish and non-Jewish children from

children’s homes and Polish and Russian forced laborers who had contracted tuberculosis.

The black smoke visible in the photo is rising from the crematorium where the corpses of

the murdered were burned.

4 National Socialism

A political movement, founded in 1920 as the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP, the National Socialist German

Workers’ Party). From 1921 on led by Adolf Hitler. In 1933, it took over the reins of state power in the German Reich. In 1945, with

the end of the war, the party was dissolved. National Socialism propagated an open hatred of the Jews, fought against the democratic

state and persecuted those with opposing political convictions, such as Communists. The world view of the National Socialists was

characterized by the theory of a superior stronger (so-called Aryan) »race«, to which other weaker and inferior races were subordinate.

When the party took over power, this axiom became a guiding criterion for state policy. The concept of »race« is pseudo-scientific.

In fact, there are no human races, but only different nationalities, religious and linguistic affiliations.

5 Operation T4—Euthanasia Murders

A program organized by the government to murder the physically and mentally handicapped, psychiatric patients and concentration

camp inmates who were sick and no longer able to work. Named after the official address of the central office of the operation at

Tiergartenstraße 4 in Berlin. The operation was officially terminated in 1941. From 1942 on, the second phase of euthanasia murders

was initiated, working together with other institutions, continuing on down to 1945. The technique of killing by gas used for the

genocide of the Jews was developed initially for application in this operation and later employed in the extermination facilities and

death camps in occupied Poland.

State Nursing Home Hadamar Source: Municipal Archive Hadamar

Literature / Films / Links


Literature

m Berliner Institut für Lehrerfort- und -weiterbildung und Schulentwicklung (Hrsg.): » ... die vielen Morde ...«.

Dem Gedenken an die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus, Berlin 1999.

m Friedlander, Henry: The Origins of Nazi Genocide. From Euthanasia to the Final Solution, Chapel Hill 1995.

m Gabriel, Regine: Kinder als Besucherinnen und Besucher in der Gedenkstätte Hadamar, Hadamar 2002.

m Götz, Aly (Hrsg.): Aktion T4 1939–1945. Die »Euthanasie«-Zentrale in der Tiergartenstraße 4, Berlin 1989.

m Klee, Ernst: »Euthanasie« im NS-Staat. Die »Vernichtung lebensunwerten Lebens«, Frankfurt a. M. 2001.

m Landeswohlfahrtsverband Hessen (Hrsg.): »Verlegt nach Hadamar«. Die Geschichte einer »NS-Euthanasie« -Anstalt, Kassel 1991.

m Wölfel, Ursula: Ein Haus für alle, München 1998.

Films

G »Der schöne leichte Tod« (60 Min) Deutschland N3 / NDR 1994 (Regie: Michael Krull);

Ein Film über »Euthanasie«-Verbrechen in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

G »Wie man Morde verkauft« (45 Min) Dokumentation, Großbritannien / N3 1991 (Regie: Michael Burleigh)

Links

E http://www.lwv-hessen.de

E http://www.lernen-aus-der-geschichte.de

E http://www.erinnern-online.de

E http://www.step21.de

E http://www.hlz.hessen.de/gedenkstaetten/texte/gedenkstaetten/hadamar.html


Web Site CreditsResearch and text:

Annegret Ehmann, Stefanie Fischer

Editing:

Stefanie Fischer

Design:

sujet.design Claudia Winter, Oliver Temmler

Translator:

Bill Templer

Responsible for conception and layout:

Prof. Dr. Sibylle Quack

We are especially grateful to the following persons and institutions:

Richard Cossmann, Gymnasium Herborn, Germany

Laura Dostmann, Seifertshofen, Germany

Federal Archive Berlin-Lichterfelde, Germany

Hadamar Memorial, Germany

Sonja Haderer-Stippel, Austria

Gottfried Kößler, Fritz Bauer Institut, Frankfurt am Main, Germany

Bertil Langenohl, Max-Ernst-Gymnasium of the city of Brühl, Germany

Anna Matthias, Kaltenkirchen, Germany

Memorial, Concentration Camp Neuengamme, Germany

Lidice Memorial, Czech Republic

Municipality of Hadamar, Mayor’s Office, Mr. Lanio, Germany

Halina Piotrowska, Poland

Scheuern Homes, Nassau / Lahn, Germany

Prof. Christoph Schminck-Gustavus, Bremen, Germany

State Archive Bremen, Germany

Prof. Karl and Anna Stojka, Austria

© Stiftung Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas, 2003

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