Gypsy In The Holocaust

“Next morning, that big train came and was already wagon full. And that's what they picked up, what was in there. And my mother knew then already. My mother said "Hold Hands." "Stay Together." "All us stick together, so we don't get lost” (Lentini). That’s where humanity comes into play in the Holocaust, where people still retain their kindness and smartness. Throughout the Holocaust, the Gypsies endured persecution by being forcibly imprisoned, subjected to anti-gypsy laws and policies, and forced to live in inhumane conditions at the hands of the Nazis who believed them to be racially inferior.

The Nazis persecuted the Gypsies for many reasons. At first, the Nazis had research done on the Gypsies to link heredity to criminality. Ritter took

At first, when the SS men came into their house they told them to pack their things and get out of the house. All the Gypsies in her town were sent to a big hall where they were housed for a couple of days. The family was on the train for 3 days. When she got there, she had to strip down to being naked, and her mom covered herself with her hands because of the embarrassment. Her hair was then sprayed on and all cut off. After that, she started to learn how to cook for the Nazis. She witnessed the Nazis harassing people, and sometimes just killing them by shooting them right where they were standing. She had to have a number tattoo put on her arm to identify her by that number. When Julia got herself sick, she was put into the sick block. There when she woke up, women were treating her. They were putting tea over her face and gave her some bread to eat. Her teeth were sore when she woke up. She had typhoid, and she survived through it with the help of the women who were treating her. Many people died from typhoid every day in the camp. The Nazis gassed many people in the camps. and the Gypsies were not immune to this. Hundreds of Gypsies died every day from gassing, but for the Jews, it was way worse. She had to work under terrible weather conditions, in little clothes, and very hard labor. Every night, she would wash her clothes in the sand that was near her bed.

They were both treated inhumanely, had been subjected to the Nuremberg Laws, were both under deportation orders from the Nazis and were both racially inferior to the Germans. The differences were that the Gypsies didn't have to go through the selection process when they got to the concentration and death camps while the Jews did have to go through that. Another difference is that the Jews were killed twice as much as the Gypsies were because there was way more of the Jews than the Gypsies. The Primary difference between the Gypsies and the Jews is that the Gypsies were thought as more of a stereotype while the Jews were thought of as more a religion. The Primary parallel between the Gypsies and the Jews was that they were both mass murdered in gas chambers, shot at, and lived in very inhuman conditions compared to other groups persecuted by the Nazis. “The uniqueness of the Jewish experience can best be documented by comparing it with the Nazi treatment of other persecuted populations. Only by understanding the fate of other groups, detailing where it paralleled Jewish treatment and more important where it differed, can the distinctive nature of Jewish fate be historically demonstrated.” It is saying that only by knowing what had happened to other groups during the holocaust, can we truly know what had happened to Jews. Knowing what happened to the Gypsies, for example, is that there are many parallels and