Editorial Preface

This document collection on the persecution and murder of the European Jews should be cited using the abbreviation PMJ. This citation style is also used in the work itself where there are cross references between the individual volumes. The documents are consecutively numbered, beginning anew with each volume. Accordingly, ‘PMJ 1/200’ refers to document number 200 in the first volume of this series. The individual documents are presented as follows: title (in bold type), header, document, footnotes.

The titles have been formulated by the editor(s) of the respective volume and provide information on the document’s date of origin, its core message, author, and recipient(s). The header underneath the title is part of the document itself. It specifies the type of source (letter, draft law, minutes, and so on), the author’s name, the source’s origin, the file reference (where applicable), remarks indicating confidential or classified status, and other special features of the document. The location of ministries or other central agencies in Berlin at the time, for instance the Reich Security Main Office or the Chancellery of the Führer, is not cited. The header also contains details about the addressee and, where applicable, the date of the receipt stamp, and it concludes with the date of origin and a reference to the source’s stage of processing, for instance ‘draft’, ‘carbon copy’, or ‘copy’.

The header is followed by the document text. Salutations and valedictions are in­cluded, though signatures are only indicated in the header. Instances of emphasis by the author in the original document are retained. Irrespective of the type of emphasis used in the original source (for example, underlined, spaced, bold, capitalized, or italicized), they always appear in italics in the printed version. Where necessary, additional particulars on the document are to be found in the footnotes. To enhance readability, words missing in the original due to obvious mistakes have been added in square brackets. Additional contextual information that has no direct equivalent in the original but is required to understand the text has also been added in square brackets.

Abbreviations are explained in the List of Abbreviations. Uncommon abbreviations, primarily from private correspondence, are explained in a footnote upon first mention in a given document.

Handwritten additions in typewritten originals have been adopted by the editors without further indication insofar as they are formal corrections and most probably inserted by the author. If the additions significantly alter the content – either by mitigating or radicalizing it – this is mentioned in the footnotes, and, if known, the author of the addition(s) is given.

As a rule, the documents are reproduced here in full. Documents are only abridged in exceptional cases where the original source was overly long, or where, in the case of the written records of meetings, Nazi policies relating to the persecution of Jews were only addressed within a single part of the proceedings. Any such abridgements are indicated by an ellipsis in square brackets; the contents of the omitted text are outlined in a footnote.

Documents are presented in strict chronological order according to the date they were produced. There are a few exceptions: descriptive texts written soon after the period covered, but nonetheless retrospectively, are sometimes classified according to the date of the events portrayed rather than the date of writing. These include a Jewish eyewitness account written in Palestine in 1940 describing the first weeks and months of the German occupation in Poland (Doc. 13). Other instances are reports written in late 1940 and early 1941 for the underground archive of the Warsaw ghetto (Ringelblum archive, Oyneg Shabes) which describe developments in late 1939 (e.g. Doc. 47 and Doc. 48). The precise dating of documents is particularly difficult in the case of the reports collected for the underground archive. Where there is any uncertainty regarding the date the documents were written or whether they constitute originals or copies, reference is made in the footnotes.

The first footnote for each document, which is linked to the title, contains the location of the source and, insofar as it denotes an archive, the reference number, as well as the folio number(s) if available. Reference to copies of archival documents in research institutions and in the German Federal Archives in Berlin is always made if the original held at the location first mentioned was not consulted there. In the case of printed ­sources, for instance newspaper articles or legislative texts, this footnote contains standard bibliographical information. The documents in this series have been translated from the original sources. If the source has already been published in a document collection on National Socialism or on the persecution of the Jews, reference is made to its first publication, alongside the original location of the source. Where English-language versions of these sources are available, references to these are given and in some cases the published English version is reproduced, with acknowledgements. If a document has already been published in English translation but has been newly translated for this volume, this is indicated in a footnote.

The next footnote places the document into context and, where appropriate, mentions related discussions, the specific role of authors and recipients, and activities accompanying or immediately following its genesis. Subsequent footnotes provide additional information related to the document’s subject matter and the persons relevant to the content. They refer to other – published or unpublished – sources that can place the document in its historical context.

The footnotes also point out individual features of the documents, for instance handwritten notes in the margin, underlining, or deletions, whether by the author or the recipient(s). Annotations and instructions for submission are referred to in the footnotes where the editors consider them to contain significant information. Where possible, the locations of the treaties, laws, and decrees cited in the source text are provided in the footnotes, while other documents are given with their archival reference number. If these details could not be ascertained, this is also noted.

Where biographical information is available on the senders and recipients of the docu­ments, this is provided in the footnotes. The same applies to persons mentioned in the text if they play an active role in the events described. As a general rule, this information is given in the footnote inserted after the first mention of the name in question in the volume. Biographical information on a particular person can thus be retrieved easily via the index.

The short biographies draw on data found in reference works, scholarly literature, or the Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names established and run by Yad Vashem. In many cases additional information was retrieved by consulting personnel files and indexes, municipal and company archives, registry offices, restitution and denazification files, or specialists in the field. Indexes and files on persons from the Nazi era held in archives were also used, primarily those of the former Berlin Document Center and the Central Office of the Judicial Authorities of the Federal States for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes (Zentrale Stelle der Landesjustizverwaltungen zur Aufklärung nationalsozialistischer Verbrechen) in Ludwigsburg, the latter now stored in the German Federal Archives. National archives and special archives on the Second World War and the persecution of the Jews in the respective countries were also consulted. Despite every effort, it has not always been possible to obtain complete biographical information. In such cases, the footnote in question contains only verified facts such as the year of birth. In some cases a year of death has been assumed, as indicated by a question mark immediately after it. Where a person could not be identified, there is no footnote reference.

As a rule, in the titles, footnotes, and introduction inverted commas are not placed around terms that were commonplace in Nazi Germany, such as Führer, Jewish Council, or Aryanization, but German-language terms expressing ideological concepts of race, such as Mischling, are placed in italics. The terms ‘Jew’ and ‘Jewish’ also require some comment. The personal identification of victims as Jews was not the defining factor in someone’s persecution. Rather, the terms ‘Jew’ and ‘Jewish’ which were used as the basis for persecution were defined by the perpetrators on the basis of racial legislation. References in the documents to the ‘Gestapo’, an acronym of the German GEheime STAats­POlizei, and to the ‘State Police’ denote one and the same institution: the Secret State Police.

The glossary contains concise descriptions of key terms and concepts that are repeated on multiple occasions or are related to the events and developments described in the volume. All primary and secondary sources consulted are listed in the footnotes and bibliography.

Note on the translation

British English is used in all translations into English. Where a document was originally written in British or American English, the spelling, style, and punctuation of the original have been retained, with silent corrections of minor spelling or grammatical errors and...