September 19th 39. 00 nazi germany invaded poland and for more than 5 years brought terror to much of europe with its ideology of a master race. A central figure in that campaign was right sphere s. S. Heinrich himmler. The leading nazi was obsessed with racial purity and came up with a plan to bolster the socalled arion race between 19411945 children were kidnapped from all over Eastern Europe and forcibly germanized. Historians estimate that 20000 of those children came from poland alone. In nazi run Childrens Homes they learned to speak german their identities were falsified. The core trust for people i was named l. O. Dia vitesse check from that moment on i was a leaf said that. Those children are now over 80 years old and many of them still know nothing about their roots. Do you know would you buy me a bizarre nissan i felt this kind of back and forth also affected my relationships few people here. Much of what happened to them is still a mystery. Use if so of our travels as often as he can to the place where his parents are buried. It lies outside chance to hava in southern poland. He was just 9 years old when they die. For you im back i feel im missing the warmth of being raised by a father and mother. We want to grow brought up by strangers who were Something Like a family but all my life ive been missing that warmth of that embrace. His father usurped was 41. His mother french scieszka 36. When they were murdered by the nazis on this spot. Their son user is now 86 years old. But he has never forgotten his childhood home. Power. Followed all of your skin over there was a Village House with 2 rounds it was made of wood and bricks book i wish i made the job you let me show you where the stables were and found his workshop and i could. During world war 2 use of his family he would use and partisans in the bunker 7 people lived underground here for 2 years is out then one couldnt bear out all of the above this bunker was a pipe or the air came in or not and the jews and the polish protestants got their air through this pipe of course my parents also gave them food water should be a condominium found out shows there are just arent going to learn yet. And the whole tragedy and torture took place here. And show you how the holiday germans came into cars by soldiers in the literal times. Of ali knock on the door. And ask if theyre so frustrated here called mommy thats an invalid its what they started smashing the windows with their rifles. All the planes were broken just my mother was crying and took us children out to the you know 3. Children ran behind our mom and papa we were all practically naked under shorts it was 5 oclock in the morning it was september so it was chilly and said and the german said where the jews were the participants were also i only went into the barn and they had a pointy metal stick and they stuck it in the straw to see if they would hit a person i would scream and yell more but there was nothing. Yes that. The germans hit them with anything they could get their hands on. With a whole bunch of pitchforks. My mother was stabbed in the stomach 3 times with the pitchfork children while she was pregnant flesh to show their mission under 6 their 7th month. Well bhatia mama didnt make any more sense she was reading just another woman my father had. He been hit with a rifle the whole court yard was full of blood they dragged my mother here my father there are kids there. And they still found nothing but i sure this is not leisure not. Once not just between the workshop and the stables and. Im not sure im going to like that maybe 4 or 600 names for all in the middle of the courtyard and at that moment the 1st jewish women came out of. There and. Then they said the other side of the house on fire. After that the soldiers shot uses parents dead and threw their bodies into a pit at the spot where their graves is now. The children survived after witnessing the events then they were taken to germany like thousands of other children from 1941 onwards who were deemed to be worthy of being terminal. Use of sr yanina still lives in germany. On as shes german german ice. All eyes just that she corresponds to the period nordic race want blonde hair and light colored that was what the germans wanted to show our sister was lost to us forever. As a cool little sister the best one of us as in germany lined up such as. It was comes god. If you get him anything give me a good good game of you got a good back or should we do. Your job we come to. Be kinda funny and to be funny. Just dont get what i was little baby did you. Wish hed. Come on luther king has lived in by dear im in southwestern germany since he retired. Where he originally came from he doesnt know whose you know uses she can even do everyone feels nice curiosity to know what their parents looked like if you have read a breeder i dont know if i had others saw systems on the see saw so i just dont know seems to have tried everything. I did 20 archives i found nothing new nothing at all to have an issue for a guy thinks. This for decades herrmann has been trying to find out who his parents were and where he was born. He always has the support of his partner. And you even as a child he felt that there was some mystery. He was 6 years old when he was placed with maria and her man luther king but he sensed that they were keeping something from him that. This stuff out of the way spot was hidden in my foster fathers concert. Various 13 or 14 year old i looked to see what was in it. Yes i was always curious. And when i saw this i realized more or less what it was a part. Of this. This is my life i already knew that i wanted my real parents but i didnt know how it all hung together. And then i read this document that said. Mother dead. Birth certificate issued by nazi officials and there are dashes where the names of his father and mother should. Be. His place of birth is listed as broker invertigo the site of one of the nazi run orphanages where the identities of the abducted children were covered up. When the book. Was the 1st place i went looking and i spoke to the cant take it he was still alive i asked him if anybody else took place here like youd sent him a document and he said no no but never took place here. This found since then harriman has discovered that he was probably called roman russia top ski before he was placed with his foster parents was he really born on january 20th 1036 he has his doubts. I might be a year older or younger maybe im just 36 years old. Theyre just staying with documents from ward was january the 21st for the notes i had swung to say out of. The central polish city of wood was probably the 1st station in his life. Come on still doesnt know who gave him up to this orphanage. But he does know that the nazis took him from here to germany. To be that youve been in the water going but you for being on an. Optimist by. Boredom i am. But being no one. He really was because i met him you know what you know i wouldnt want anybody. But grandma. To me when i did not have it on. Critical mind is. That going to be a bold but i am kind of old of. The. Story also has ties to wards. She was 5 years old when she was brought to the youth Detention Camp in leeds munched as woods was called during the nazi occupation. Today shes meeting up with her friend bob. The 2 women have a lot in common. And their paths in life have been very similar. Theyve come to a school located on the site of the camp. The School Director is showing them a room that commemorates the thousands of children who were interned here. Like who was brought here in 1943. All you have a great map. Well shall we need to find they really have plotted street its over here we should turn the map around like this what i thought that means my house must have been here. Of the house where you remember everything of course have you ever heard of the children from duck to tash x. Group i am a. Father was a resistance fighter executed by the nazis her mother was deported to auschwitz for her husbands actions and ended up in the machinery of the german occupiers oppression people and how long were you in the camp last spring. I was probably here for around 8 weeks. Before that in the race office in poznan and they had determined that i corresponded to the so called area. Jets and the germans wanted to german eyes children of the area and race are said to one yourself write. 3 people. 3 life stories. With fierce in common. All 3 are victims of heinrich humors racist mania. The right spirit s. S. Visited occupied poland in 1941 and traveled through the vatican our district. In 1939 poland had been carved up between the soviets and the germans. Sections of the western part of the country including the socalled racecar to land were incorporated into the german reich. Other regions were placed under german civil administration. Himmlers vision was to make sure many of the mightiest nation in the world by bolstering the population with new progeny from abroad mainly. From Eastern Europe. In the bundesliga sheaves in berlin are hundreds of documents that show the gradual development of humor strategy for the organized abduction of children. After his trip through vertigo himmler wrote to the go lighter touch of christ or. I believe it is right that small children of especially good raise from polish families because lectern brought up by us and special not to large childrens nurseries and orphanages. I would advise starting with 2 or 3 such institutions so as to gather experience. Isabel hina mine is a professor of contemporary history at the university of minister. She has studied the subject of the stolen children for a number of years. She set up a europe Wide Research project and with colleagues has analyzed 17000 files of foreign children found by the allies in germany after the war look you pointed out you know and historians want to reconstruct the roots taken by the stolen children and with them. But the fact that the nazis deliberately conceal their identities makes that a formidable task when it. Is rude enough to but with the calculations like down based on the reports of how many children were transported and how many were found after the war i would estimate the number to be around 20000. 00 polish children behind each one of those numbers is an individual story of a life thrown into turmoil and set on a completely different course and none fall off the norm. There are many myths about the forced german ization of foreign children one account is that they were ethnic germans that is children of german ancestry who lived outside the german reich and that only very few children were brought to germany at all. But him or his plan did have a system as the rights commissioner for the consolidation of german nationhood he helps to issue directives 671. Its stated. First all children informally polish orphanages are to be taken and placed in accommodations after that operation is concluded children living with polish foster parents will be examined. The directive was signed by all risk rife and himmlers direct subordinate. Later at the nuremberg trials he claimed that there had never been a concrete plan. Directive 6071. 00 went to only high ranking leaders of the s. S. And the police and the corresponding s. S. Leaders concerned with race and settlement policy so that the s. S. Operators would be aware of how it worked it was a part of a supposedly rational occupation and gemini ization policy that was imposed mainly on occupied poland but also one other occupied and next to each and. All possible. Today experts believe that our own 50000 children were abducted from across europe. Cases are known from todays ukraine the Czech Republic and slovenia. But the Largest Group was from poland because the machinery of the abduction started in the bar to go district. First orphanages were searched then Child Welfare officials summoned all children living with foster parents for inspection. There were precise guidelines on how a racially suitable child was supposed to look. 21 characteristics were examined including growth patterns the back of the head the bridge of the nose and body hair the officials were looking for socalled arion types classified as pure nordic purif alien or nordic family and what the nazis couldnt use were unbalanced hybrid types. And finally children were also taken away from their biological parents like. She was taken for racial examination after her mother was deported then in the autumn of 1943 she was brought to the youth Detention Camp in litzmannstadt to be germanized. This memorial recalls the thousands of children who lived here and were forced to do hard labor. I knew it. Was a book the memories come flooding back when all over your stands here. She was brought to the camp together with her little sister daria. Nirvana bought some Michael Portillo straight away we werent allowed to speak polish. Wed whisper to each other in polish but of course we couldnt make it obvious that we were speaking. At all smiles our pop our school knew we were punished for every infraction. Each couple had a club and they shouted at us very loudly. We were scared of the yelling and of course the severe beating. Body out of the pedal. At 6 am they woke us for roll call that counters off in germany which was hard for us we didnt know the numbers. Thats why the roll call used to take a very long time wash with some of our time and a lot of. Other illness that they are but it had to keep going until our supervisor had counted the entire group of children off. To the show. And often when they went through the barracks where they slept. They would find children in the beds. So. No. Then called was the 1st place where all of you were sent more followed. Brooke ill. Bide protein. Thousands of children were funneled through these nazi run homes. Each station represented a further step to conceal the childs real identity. Dates of birth were changed names were made more german sounding. Became elite civic. Her friend barbara became bearable. They were forced to forget their origins finally both were placed in german families where paradoxically they experienced the happiest years of their childhood. The use of sofa lives in the center of chance to hold. Even know he cant accept that his sister yanina loves the nation that caused his family so much suffering american as for these other letters from germany from our sister. Ship she did not want to appear in person in this film or engage with the familys history thats apparent in her letters. It was a line vendor by your society so when you come to see us please please dont talk about politics or about the war. Wars you love and kisses. Yes. All her letters are signed with her polish and her german name on a stock. And so germanized that she even writes in her letters that i shouldnt talk about politics or our history show you because shes embarrassed. You can still get the rope she doesnt want to know anything about poland or the memory of her family. Or when you know she lives her life there in germany she is 4 years richer. After the murder of their parents the 5 silver children were brought to costco you know grown cold. You know nino was taken from there by a woman from hanover who adopted her her name was changed to anita no official records about this were preserved which is why you know it was not found after the war but her siblings never stopped looking it was 20 years before use of saw her again since then theyve met up regularly. How theyre all out oh good and dark my good day my dear sister. Are you would home or out for a walk. 2 heres a thought i had lunch and youre probably tired just last year im looking forward so much to seeing you soon as the were from the church. You were taught about a living a chance to hope for tomorrow or 12 at nohant. Check or by my dear sister. Boys your boys. Those decided by stories so now youve heard her voice. Use of sr was carried off to germany shortly before the end of the war she didnt undergo a racial examination the longer the war went on the less attention the german officials paid to rules and guidelines. His abduction was an act of pure despotism. In the southwestern german city of fribourg hermeneutic king is paying a visit to crystal this is the. Charts as a teacher but for years he has been helping him on the to want the German Government to recognise the kidnapped children as victims of the nazi regime so that they can receive compensation. She wants founded an association representing the childrens interests and he and herrmann have filed lawsuits together so far with no success. As a last resort theyve approached germanys highest court the Constitutional Court. This is this is nice is the letter i received and this. Is processing it. And now i have to wait for a day. You know how mom is right for just a minute suggest that we write another letter to the Constitutional Court saying they should speed things up a little in consideration of your. Own zone of us who are not. Those finish of toil i think its great that his age he still is prepared to fight for justice because even though its only about the symbolic sums of 2500 euros for not really its a joke its. According to germanys act regulating compensation for National Socialist injustice that is the sum to which non jewish victims are entitled. Kemah new ticking considers himself a part of that group. Is good for me its not about the money but about the recognition that this was a crime its made me thats what gets me mad he used that strategy used to wait until nature takes care of it or by then its over. The German Government argues that the kidnappings can be seen as general Collateral Damage of war and that therefore there can be no claim to compensation. And its often argued that the kidnapped children were well treated in contrast to other victims. That was true in herremans case his german foster parents were wealthy his mother was a teacher and head of the Regional Association of german girls. The father was a high ranking teacher both were nazi party members. Came on graduated from school studied at university and became a mechanical engineer. But the parents never spoke to him about his background. Back in chains to hoffa. Use of silva is on duty. For the past 30 years hes been working for an organization for the victims of nazi persecution he campaigns for them to receive compensation stuff poland has a number of funds from which the germanized children or the children of mothers who are forced laborers receive small payments. Like this woman from now on shell get 50 euros a month. For her by me not all her dearly on this is actually. This letter says you will get at least 212 swatches the l