‘Was Grandad a Nazi?’

Researching one’s own family history sheds light on old ‘family legends’. These often stem from stories told by family members who have since passed away and whom we can no longer ask, or from old diaries and field post letters.

• Was my (great)grandfather a Nazi, and if so, how bad was it?
• What did Great-Aunt Erika and Great-Uncle Erwin get up to ‘back then’?
• Why did Uncle Karl never talk about the war?
• Was my ancestor persecuted by the Nazis, and why? – And is that even true?
• My ancestors lived in Germany, but emigrated before, during or after the war. Is there anything to be found here?

Recherche-Dienste can assist you with a professional and thorough family history investigation to determine whether your ancestors were perpetrators, victims or bystanders.

Personal records from the Nazi era

The German Reich section of the Federal Archives in Berlin-Lichterfelde stores, amongst other things, the collections of the former US Army Berlin Document Center (BDC). These include, for example, the two NSDAP membership card indexes (the ‘Gau’ and the ‘Zentral’ indexes). Around 85% of party members can be traced through these records.

Party correspondence, personnel records, files from the Supreme Party Court and membership applications have also been preserved. In addition, there are documents relating to the SA, the SS and the Waffen-SS, personnel files from the SS Race and Settlement Main Office (Rasse- und Siedlungshauptamt der SS; RuSHA), the police, the Central Immigration Office (Einwandererzentralstelle; EWZ), the Reich Chamber of Culture (Reichskulturkammer; RKK) and other Nazi organisations such as the National Social Teachers League (NS-Lehrerbund; NSLB) and the Reich Medical Chamber (Reichsärztekammer; RÄK).

Some sub-collections contain extensive files comprising detailed questionnaires, CVs, photographs, records of military and civilian careers, details of party activities, lists of ancestors, and medical questionnaires and examinations.

Other collections, such as the Nazi archives of the former East German Ministry for State Security (Ministerium für Staatssicherheit; Stasi), are gradually being incorporated into the Federal Archives’ personal records collections and made available for research.

Court and judicial records

Court records, such as those of the Reich Court or the People’s Court, as well as files from the Secret State Police (Geheime Staatspolizei; Gestapo), can be consulted when investigating injustices suffered at the hands of the Nazi state.
This applies in particular to files documenting the disenfranchisement and plundering of the Jewish population, such as the documents of the ‘Asset Realisation Office’ (Vermögensverwertungsstelle) at the Office of the Chief Finance Commissioner (Oberfinanzpräsident) for Berlin-Brandenburg.

Denazification files

The archive holdings of the denazification files are held by the respective state archives. Denazification tribunal proceedings were conducted in the three western occupation zones. All members of the NSDAP or other Nazi organisations were required to answer to the tribunals; however, due to numerous amnesties, only around 950,000 people were actually prosecuted.

Local archives and records held abroad

The numerous municipal and district archives, as well as registration offices, are often overlooked – and, in the course of research, unjustly so. The same applies to information held abroad. For example, when it comes to people born in areas that have not been part of German territory since 1945.

Military records

When conducting a personal history search for members of the Reich Labour Service (Reichsarbeitsdienst; RAD), the Wehrmacht or the Waffen-SS, the military records (see: Second World War) should be consulted, as the WASt’s Central Personnel Index and the records relating to captivity as a prisoner of war, in particular, may provide information on their involvement in Nazi organisations.