Nathan Gordon

April 15, 2015

Mrs.Wertz-O
English II
The final Phase of World War II: A Research Review
This research review covers some of the major inquires I did

researching Death Marches. Death Marches was the act of Nazi soldiers
marching Jews thousands of miles through the toughest of terrains to hide
their crimes on the incoming American troops. They knew that they were
committing serious war crimes by exterminating the majority of the Jews
throughout Europe, but that didnt stop them they were on a mission to make
their race the best. In Hitlers eyes no one could touch the perfect Arian
race. The Nazis provided little to no food for days on end just to keep their
worker bees working. In this paper, I will be discussing, The Death Marches:
The Final Phase of Nazi Genocide by Daniel Blatman, Chaya Galai and
Remembering the Auschwitz Death March by Thomas Buergenthal. Blatman
expressed the urge for Jews to escape near the end of the war and explained
how they knew the end was near and didnt want to be killed. The Germans
were ruthless and they stopped at no cost, but victory. On the other hand
Buergenthals Journal expresses a story about his own life. Years after the
Holocaust a story caught his attention and flashed him back to the ways he
felt and the things he saw through the eyes of a Jew in a concentration camp.

These were very vivid paintings he was drawing in his head about the way he
was treated by German soldiers.
Buergenthal expressed how his memory was so vivid on the days he
spent in the camps. Buergenthal said, The bread that was thrown into the
cars as the train passed under bridges in Czechoslovakia and the grownups
who stole from us (Buergenthal).This just shows how ruthless the
prisoners became. No grownups I have ever known would do such a thing.
The Author tells us how the frostbite he felt during war was one of the worst
things he has ever felt, which soon led to the amputation to his toes after the
war. Buregenthals evidence makes me truly feel for the Jews that lived in
these concentration camps. If you didnt manage to escape you were mostly
likely either taken to the firing squad or gassed which he evaded with two of
his friends. He states, The Polish winter, the terrible cold, the exhausting
three day march to Gliwice where we were stuffed into open railroad cars,
the roadside shootings of those who could no longer walk any more, my own
temptation to simply sit down and get it over with, how three children- two of
my friends and I- evaded being shot with the rest of the small group of
children who left Birkenau with us (Buergenthal). If this alone doesnt speak
for itself then I do not know what will.
Secondly, Blatman states how brutal the end of the war was, much like
Buergenthal. Blatman says, As the end of World War II approached, large
numbers of Nazi camp inmates, Jews and non-Jews alike, found themselves
subjected to one last existential challenge.(Blatman) The death marches

was more than a challenge to them, it was a life or death situation. Although
they didnt know for sure the war was coming to an end they knew that the
Nazis were going defensive and switching there strategy. The marches were
a last ditch effort to keep the Nazi party alive and keep Germany as a whole
out of a great deal of trouble. There move to the heart of Germany really
spoke volumes to the Jews knowing that they made it this far and they
couldnt quit now. At this time there German handlers emaciated 250,000
weakened prisoners in a span of a day to put their focus on something
greater than the camps. (2)
World War II shined many hardships on the public which lead to death
in many cases. This was the survival of the fittest, you either survived or
died. I still cant wrap my head around the fact that the Nazi party
slaughtered so many of their kind. I label them as this not because they
are from the same religion because they most certainly are not, but because
they lived in peace for so long as neighbors and friends. There was no reason
that this should have gone this far. The Jewish population did nothing wrong
to deserve this except the fact that they were not a German. German
soldiers treated Jews as if they were the scum of society feeding them
virtually nothing and watching them suffer. This truly disgusts me inside
because I believe that no person should be treated like this, it was as if they
were rats living in a sewer system. I am coming away with a lot more
knowledge about the end of World War II and have learned a great deal of
information dealing with the end of the war specifically about death marches.

Always remember treat people the way you would like to be treated! In this
case this was not true whatsoever.

Works Cited
The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 85, No. 3 (September 2013)
Thomas Buergenthal is Professor of Law at the George Washington University National Law Center
Talk delivered on 18 January 1995 at the US Holocaust Museum
Human Rights Quarterly 18 (1996) 874-876 1996 by The John Hopkins University Press