Web design and content by the 8th-grade students of Bernard Zell
A student's guide to the novel inspired by hidden history.
Overview:
The physicians of the SS played a key roles in the killing of Jews, Roma, homosexuals, and other groups of victims during the Holocaust. The physicians conducted experiments on victims in camps, killed many through the T-4 program, and inflicted pain and suffering to many victims of the Holocaust. The selection process took place when victims arrived at the some of the Death Camps. Everyone was taken off of the trains and separated into male and female lines. The SS officers were in charge of the process and forming all of the groups. If the deportee were over fourteen and in good health he or she were sent to one side, all others including the elderly and women with children were sent to the other side. The elders and women with children were sent straight to the gas chambers and condemned to death. The other line were workers. In Auschwitz, a number was tattooed on their forearm , their heads shaved, and they were given striped pajamas. Another program during the Holocaust was the T-4 program or the Euthanasia Program, a killing program for the mentally and physically infirm. The program involved the systematic execution of the aged, insane, incurably ill, or deformed children by gas or lethal injections in nursing homes, hospitals and asylums. One of the most famous doctors, Joseph Mengele, also known as the Angel of Death, was a head doctor at Auschwitz II/Birkenau. He is known for serving as the physician at Auschwitz who, in a matter of seconds, made decisions about life or death. He also conducted medical experiments on patients who did not receive anesthetics and upon the completion of the experiments, he murdered them.
Connection to Train:
In Train, Victor died as a result of the T-4 program. Physicians sent a letter to his family saying that he died of typhus, but the physicians were the ones who killed him. Tsura was sterilized by the SS doctors, which was a common procedure that they would do so the Roma families so they could not continue to have offspring. ‘No one would know their stories.’
Vocabulary:
Euthanasia/T-4 Program- The Euthanasia Program, involved the systematic execution of the aged, insane, incurably ill, or deformed children by gas or lethal injections in nursing homes, hospitals and asylums.
Sterilization- The process of sterilization was Nazi doctors who sterilized “abnormal” people, during the Holocaust. This included Jews, the Roma, homosexuals, and the mentally and physically handicapped.
Selection Process- The selection process consisted of the Nazis separating non-Aryans into groups based on physical strength and age, those who were not healthy did not survive. In reality, even those chosen for work, were not meant to survive more than a few months.
Dr. Karl Brandt- Dr. Karl Brandt was Hitler’s personal German physician. He played a major role in formulating and executing the Euthanasia Program.
Joseph Mengele- Josef Mengele was a German Physician in Auschwitz who was in charge of conducting experiments on Roma and Jewish prisoners. He was particularly interested in experiments that involved twins.
Irmfried Eberl- Irmfried Eberl was an Austrian psychiatrist and medical director of the Euthanasia institutes in Brandenburg and Bernburg. He also served as the first commandant of the Treblinka extermination camp where he worked from 11 July 1942 until his dismissal on 26 August 1942. He was arrested after the end of the war in January 1948. Eberl hung himself the following month to avoid trial.
Death Camps--There were six death camps. The first four--Chelmno, Treblinka, Belzec, and Sobibor had no labor camps, while Auschwitz II (more commonly known as Birkenau), and Majdanek had a labor camp. Death camps differed from concentration camps.
