Throughout the Second World War, there were many women who were affected by the conflict.
Thousands were forced out of their homes, and lots were deported to concentration camps.
As the Allies liberated different areas of France, they came across the Ugly Carnival
which was where French women who had slept with the German enemy were being paraded
in huge aspects of public humiliation. Many of the French women had their heads shaved,
and they were sometimes marked with swastikas and were forced to run the gauntlet.
Members of the French resistance saw this as the ultimate humiliation, sleeping with the enemy and
they encouraged the French people to hit and beat the women. Some women in Paris were even killed
by the public during the Ugly Carnival, however in Germany there was also a significant amount of
shame poured upon women who were considered the worst in German society, as the Nazis
deemed that they had slept with their enemies, and the people who Hitler would go on to persecute.
Join us today as we look at the horrific torture of the German women that slept
with their enemies, and remember to support our channel please make sure to subscribe.
Inside of Nazi Germany there was a concept known as Rassenschande, or Blutschande,
which was considered racial shame or blood disgrace. This was when Hitler believed that
Aryans were sleeping with non-aryans, and this was even enforced through policies and certificates.
These laws banned relations between ethic germans and non aryans, and those who would later be
persecuted such as the jews. During the war years, there were millions of accounts where the German
army or the SS violated the beliefs on who they should sleep with, and they assaulted a number
of women on the Eastern front for example. Before the Nazis came into Power, Hitler spoke at great
deal about the watering down of the aryan race through what he believed was aryan men and women
sleeping with non aryans, and he would attributed this to elements of German society, or events and
disasters such as Germany losing the First World War. Prominent Nazis also argued for the death
penalty for Jews who were found having relations with aryans, but when they came into power, there
were many efforts by the Nazis to define who was considered a Jew. Different Nazis had different
ideas on what defined a Jew, and how much of their heritage defined them in this category.
Inside of the third reich, local officials were asking couples that were getting married
to present proof of their aryan status and ancestry, and they would be able to marry if
both of them could prove their family history. Couples who were considered mixed race would
have their marriage applications delayed, and when the nuremberg laws were passed,
the SS went around arresting people who were accused of committing acts of ‘racial defilement.’
Many of those who were arrested were then paraded throughout the streets and German towns to shame
them. They had placards placed over their necks that told the crowds what they had done, One girl
was paraded throughout a town with a sign saying, ‘I have given myself to a jew,’ and this was aimed
to humiliate her, and then people would jeer and shout abuse at her, and also throw things.
The SA or stormtroopers also encouraged German people to treat mixed couples with
animosity, and there were acts of violence against people who were in relationships with those
considered non aryans. There was one incident in which a Jewish man had enticed a girl into an
evening swim at midnight, but the SS intervened and then a mob of thousands besieged this mans
house and the police had to then take him into protective custody for his own safety.
The nuremberg laws were passed to define that relations and marriages between Aryans and non
aryans were banned, and against the law. More people were being paraded throughout
the streets for their crimes, and many were convicted of having relations with the enemies
of the Nazis and for this they were sent to concentration camps for varying periods of time.
The laws did not at this time call for execution for those who were considered to have conducted
acts of racial defilement, as the Germans would in a sense be executing some of their master race.
The police struggled to keep up with the amount of crimes which were committed
with this sort of behaviour, and those Germans who had married Jews and other
non aryans before the Nuremberg Laws did not have their marriages dissolved,
they were instead pressurised by groups such as the SA, and were told to divorce their partners.
During the Second World War, there was large scale assault committed by the Wehrmacht in areas such
as the Eastern Front, where they encountered non aryan women. Many soldiers would assault
and then kill their victims to make sure they could not inform the Nazi authorities on them.
As the Second World War broke out, the Nazis banned any relations between Germans and
foreigners, and the Nazis discovered that there were accounts of Polish women sleeping with German
soldiers. Because of this they issued decrees in the press, and said that any German soldier who
slept with a polish woman was living dangerously, and they were compared in literature to Jews and
Gypsies to try and dissuade fraternisation. The Nazis would then state that whilst they were
occupying Poland, that any polish person that has relations with a German man or woman, or tries to
coerce them in this manner while be punished by execution and death. Himmler then also issued a
similar decree to this in December 1942 regarding activity on the Eastern Front, as he was concerned
about a ‘risk for the racial integrity of the German nation.’ The death penalty would be imposed
upon those women who were from countries that were enemies of the Germans, for example Britain.
But during the war, many German women were treated in a similar way to the Ugly carnival
in France after they were found to have slept with foreign workers. They were often marched through
the streets, and they also had their heads shaved and the signs again were placed around their necks
that told of the crimes they had committed. One Historian wrote of two cases that, ‘In
September 1940, Dora von Calbitz, who was found guilty of having sexual relations with a Pole,
had her head shaved and was placed in the pillory of her town of Oschatz near Leipzig,
with a placard that proclaimed: "I have been a dishonourable German woman in that I sought
and had relations with Poles. By doing that I excluded myself from the community of the people."
In March 1941, a married German woman who had an affair with a French prisoner of war had
her head shaved and was marched through the town of Bramberg in Lower Franconia carrying
a sign which said, "I have sullied the honour of the German woman." These were German women who
were being punished inside of their own lands for sleeping with the enemies of the Nazis.
There was some cases also where young women who were the victims of assault were punished
in the same manner, with their heads shaved and forced to parade through the streets.
But this particular exhibition did not go down well. Many polish men from 1940 who slept with
German women were also executed in public, and further efforts were made to enforce this.
Public executions were done to make the public think twice about their actions,
and propaganda was also distributed throughout Germany and also occupied lands.
The subject of racial defilement was even taught to children in school.
But thousands of people found themselves accused of the crime, for example there were over 1500
people in Hamburg alone who were accused. Often for men the punishment for violating the aryan
race was prison time or forced labour, and women were often tried for other crimes such as purgery,
and they could be sent to a concentration camp. Himmler at one point even came to Hitler with
the question, ‘what should the punishment for racial defilement be,’ and Hitler replied with,
‘having their hair shorn and being sent to a concentration camp.’
Further virulent Nazis called for a complete death penalty for this which was shocking.
However there were thousands of German women who had relations with people
that the Nazis would not approve of. The Nazis were so staunch and strong in their
beliefs about a master race that they were happy to punish their own people,
and they were happy to humiliate women in the same manner that the French also did.
It was shocking behaviour that aimed to keep their master race pure, and there were horrific
accounts of violence against women and men who maintained relationships that the Nazis disliked.
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