TIMEBASE 1938

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1938 January 4 Goering issues a decree classifying even firms with 25% Jewish ownership as subject to "Aryanization".

1938 January 6 U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull declares that America cannot intervene in Romania's internal affairs.

1938 January 9 Max Warburg dedicates a new Jewish Community Center in Hamburg.

1938 January 10 Professor Otto Warburg, scientist, communal leader and Zionist leader, dies.

1938 January 14 A Romanian decree forbids Jews from employing Christian female servants under the age of forty.

1938 January 14 Romanian police order all Jewish libraries and Jewish owned bookstores closed in Bessarabia. The same day, the Romanian press publishes instructions for dismissing all Jewish doctors from social insurance institutions.

1938 January 19 American and European Jewish organizations submit a protest petition to the League of Nations regarding the treatment of Jews in Romania.(Edelheit)

1938 January 21 Romania formally abrogates the minority rights of Jews, and revokes the citizenship of many Jews who have been resident there since the end of the war. (Atlas)

1938 January 24 German War Minister Blomberg is forced to resign and army Commander-in-Chief Fritsch is accused of homosexuality and then sent away on leave.

1938 January 25 The Gestapo is given the power to place prisoners in "protective custody" at its own discretion.

1938 January 28 President Roosevelt asks Congress for increased appropriations to build-up the U.S. armed forces.

1938 January Archbishop Groeber, a "promoting member" of the SS, known as the "brown bishop," is excluded from the SS, but refuses to voluntarily give up his promoting membership. (Lewy)

1938 February 4 Hitler announces he is personally taking over command of the German armed forces. Fritsch is forced to resign and Konstantin von Neurath is replaced by Joachim von Ribbentrop as Foreign Minister. Hitler assumes complete control of the Wehrmacht and announces a complete reorganization of the armed forces supreme command (OKW). Sixteen high-ranking generals are dismissed and 44 others are transferred to other posts. Hitler successfully eliminates the most important dissidents in the Wehrmacht and replaces them with men he feels he can either trust or manipulate. General Walter von Brauchitsch is appointed Commander-in-Chief of the army (OKH). General Wilhelm Keitel is appointed Commander-in-Chief of the OKW.

1938 February 4 Austrian Nazis vandalize numerous Jewish businesses in the suburbs of Vienna.

1938 February 6 Romanian Prime Minister Goga warns that he will not tolerate foreign interference in his domestic antisemitic policy.

1938 February 10 The Goga government in Romania is dissolved. The new government, headed by Dr. Miron Christea, nullifies some of Goga's anti-Jewish legislation.

1938 February 12 A meeting between Hitler and Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg at Obersalzberg leads to a greater Nazi role in Austrian government and public life.

1938 February 16 Chancellor Schuschnigg names Arthur Seyss-Inquart, a virulent Austrian Nazi, minister of the interior.

1938 February 16 Lithuania adopts a new constitution guaranteeing equal rights to all citizens regardless of race or creed. (Edelheit)

1938 February 18 Anthony Eden resigns as Foreign Secretary from the Chamberlain government in protest against Britain's continued appeasement of Italy. (Freedman)

1938 February 20 Lord Halifax (Edward F.L. Wood) replaces Anthony Eden as British Foreign Secretary.

1938 February 20 Bishop Ehrenfried of Wurzburg in a pastoral letter expresses the desire that "the totalitarianism of the State and the totalitarianism of the Church" should coexist "without conflicts and bitterness." (Lewy)

1938 February 20 Franz Josef Rarkowski is consecrated as bishop of the German army in a lavish ceremony conducted by Nuncio Orsenigo, assisted by Bishops Preysing and Galen. Rarkowski will hold this post until the end of World War II. (Lewy)

1938 February 23 Volksruf, a violently antisemitic newspaper, begins publication in Austria.

1938 February 24 Nazi-instigated disturbances erupt throughout Austria after Chancellor Schuschnigg calls for a plebiscite (referendum) on Austrian independence.

1938 February 28 The American Legion begins a nationwide campaign against the pro-Nazi German-American Bund.

1938 March 1 Thousands of Jews are deprived of their livelihood when the Polish government revokes Jewish tobacco dealers' licenses. (Edelheit)

1938 March 2 Long-time Bolshevik Nikolai Bukharin is publicly tried in a so-called "show trial" on trumped-up charges of conspiring to overthrow the Soviet state. He is quickly convicted and sentenced to death after making a forced confession.

1938 March 4 Hitler rejects British concessions in Africa.

1938 March 7 J. Dreyfus and Company, a large Jewish-owned investment bank in Germany, is "Aryanized."

1938 March 8 More than 2,000 Nazi demonstrators march through the center of Vienna shouting anti-Jewish slogans.

1938 March 11 Hitler issues an ultimatum demanding that Schuschnigg resign as Austrain chancellor. Arthur Seyss-Inquart becomes chancellor, paving the way for a complete Nazi take over.

1938 March 12 Operation Otto -- German troops enter Austria unopposed. Hitler tells a large crowd in Linz, his old home town, that "Providence had called him out of Linz and charged him with a mission to restore his homeland to the German Reich." (Operation Otto referred to the first name of the pretender to the Austrian throne: Archduke Otto von Habsburg.)

1938 March 13 The Reichstag "legalizes" Austrian Anschluss (union or annexation) by passing the Law Concerning the Reunion of Austria, declaring it a German province. Hitler, proclaiming the unity of the German people, realizes his dream of a union between Germany and his native Austria.

1938 March 13 Hitler with General Keitel at his side enters Vienna in a triumphant motorcade. Thousands of ecstatic Austrias greet him with unbridled enthusiam, waving Nazi flags and screaming his name.

1938 March 13 More than 138,000 Austrian Jews now come under Nazi rule. The activities of all Jewish organizations and congregations are quickly forbidden, and the Gestapo launces a campaign of terror, looting hundreds of Jewish shops and apartments. Many Jewish leaders are arrested, and more than 500 Jews, driven to despair, soon commit suicide.

1938 March 13 Leon Blum recovers the office of French premier and begins his second term. His Front Populaire government will last only to April 15, 1939.

1938 March 13 Nikolai Bukharin is executed by a Soviet firing squad.

1938 March 15 Austria enacts its first anti-Jewish laws since Anchluss. Hitler places Hermann Goering in charge of the Austrian economy.

1938 March 18 The Gestapo and SD are empowered to act in Austria outside those powers enacted by law. (Edelheit)

1938 March 20 The Polish Association of High School Teachers in Cracow (P) proposes a ban on all Jewish teachers.

1938 March 21 Lichtenburg concentration camp near Prettin (Torgau) reopens

1938 March 22 Britain announes a drive against Jewish "illegal" immigration to Palestine.

1938 March 23 Leon Blum's government in France announces a plan to permit legalized residence for Jewish refugees who agree to become farmers.

1938 March 24 Professor Kleist, a psychiatrist, ends his report on the German mental hospital in Herborn, where "uthanasia" by starvation is being practiced, with these sentences: "As long as there is no law for the destruction of lives unworthy to be lived, those who are beyond cure have the right to humane treatment which assures their continued existence. The expenditure on these unfortunates should not fall below an acceptable minimum level." (Science)

1938 March 24 The Romanian Ministry of Agriculture bans Jewish ritual slaughter (shechita).

1938 March 26 Jewish professors and instructors are dismissed from Austrian universities.

1938 March 28 Hitler gives General Keitel secret directives for Operation Green against Czechoslovakia.

1938 March 28 Berlin's Jewish community loses its incorporated status.

1938 March 29 The Spanish civil war comes to an end.

1938 March 31 The Polish Senate passes the Expatriots Law, canceling citizenship for Polish Jews living outside the country, unless their passports are checked and stamped by Polish consular officials by the end of October. (Edelheit)

1938 April 1 A number od Austrian Jews are sent to Dachau concentration camp.

1938 April 1 Jewish patients are barred from Danzig's public hospitals and welfare institutions. All Jewish doctors and nurses are dismissed.

1938 April 7 Codreanu is arrested in Romania and will later die in prison.

1938 April 8 Eduard Daladier forms a new French government.

1938 April 8 The Rothschild Bank in Austria is "Aryanized" and taken over by the Austrian Credit Institute.

1938 April 10 A plebiscite (referendum) is held in Austria to legalize Anchluss. Jews are excluded from voting.

1938 April 11 Bulgaria outlaws the Bulgarian Nazi Party (Ratnizi)

1938 April 13 The Roman Congregation of Seminaries and Universities attacks as erroneous eight theses taken from Nazi doctrine. Antisemitism is neither mentioned nor criticized. (Lewy)

1938 April 15 Starting in Dabrowa, hundreds of Jews are injured and much property destroyed during anti-Jewish attacks in Poland. (Atlas)

1938 April 16 Britain signs a pact of friendship with Italy without giving adequate notice to the United States. (Freedman)

1938 April 17 An attempted coup by Fascists and the Iron Guard is smashed by the Romanian government. Many of the instigators are arrested.

1938 April 19 All remaining Jewish banks in Austria are "Aryanized."

1938 April 22 Trouble breaks out in the Sudetenland signaling the beginning of the Czechoslovak Crisis.

1938 April 22 A German Law is published making it illegal for non-Jews to help conceal Jewish holdings.

1938 April 24 A Sudeten German Congress at Karlsbad demands full autonomy for Sudeten Germans.

1938 April 25 Nazis stage anti-Jewish riots in Theusing (G).

1938 April 26 The German government requires registration of all Jews with assets exceeding 5,000 Reichsmarks,, whether in Germany or abroad. Only British and American Jews living in Germany are exempted.

1938 April 27 The Woodhead Commission arrives in Palestine to study the Peel Commissions partition plan.

1938 May 2 The Gestapo orders the Jewish community offices in Vienna reopened.

1938 May 3 Flossenburg concentration camp opens in Germany.

1938 May 3 The DFG places 15,000 RM at the disposal of Dr. Ritter, "for the continuation of your research work on asocial individuals and on the biology of bastards (Gypsies, Jews)." (Science)

1938 May 3-9 Hitler makes a state visit to Mussolini in Rome, but chooses not to make the customary "courtesy call" on the pope. (Lewy)

1938 May 13 A major anti-partition demonstration is held in Beirut, Lebanon.

1938 May 17 The Czech government confiscates two Nazi-run newspapers, Die Rundschau and F.S., published by Sudeten German parties led by Konrad Henlein.

1938 May 19 Britain and France reject Hitler's demands concerning Czechoslovakia.

1938 May 20 Czechoslovakia orders a partial mobilization in response to Hitler's demands and unrest in the Sudetenland.

1938 May 24 The Nuremberg Laws are officially introduced in Austria. Books written by Jews and works not favoring Nazi ideology are removed from Vienna's libraries and bookstores.

1938 May 26 The U.S. House of Representatives establishes the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) to investigate activities of both the left and right.

1938 May 29 The Hungarian government passes its first law specifically restricting the number of Jews in the liberal professions, administration, commerce and industry to 20 percent. (Atlas)

1938 May 30 The Japanese government arrests 1,300 alleged Communists.

1938 May 30 Hitler signs a revised OKW plan for Operation Green (Fall Gruen) against Czechoslovakia.

1938 May 30 The Gestapo arrests almost 2,000 Jews in raids on cafes in Berlin and Vienna. Some 1,000 Austrian Jews are sent to Dachau.

1938 June 1 German political prisoners and all German Jews with previous criminal records are sent to Buchenwald. They are soon followed by 2,200 Austrian Jews.

1938 June 2 Italian Fascist leader Roberto Farinacci, a vocal antisemite, is appointed minister of State.

1938 June 7 Latvia and Estonia sign nonagression treaties with Germany.

1938 May 9 Munich's main synagogue is vandalized and destroyed.

1938 June 14 The German ministry of the interior requires registration of all Jewish-owned enterprises. Pressure is put on Jews to sell their business holdings to certain favored individuals or firms (I.G. Farben, the Flick Group, major banks etc.) at prices far below their actual market value. (Days)

1938 June 15 Operation June (Juni Aktion) sends some 1,500 German Jews to concentration camps.

1938 June 20 German Jews are forbidden to work in the stock and commodity exchanges.

1938 June 22 African-American boxer Joe Louis defeatss German boxer Max Schmeling at Madison Square Garden in New York City.

1938 June 26 Nazis in Austria order all "non-Aryans" dismissed from all Jewish owned firms and close the parks of Vienna to Jews. Jewish schoolchildren are completely segregated.

1938 June 28 Germany and Italy officially recognize Switzerland's neutrality.

1938 June 29 Nearly 40,000 Austrian Jews are dismissed from their jobs.

1938 July 2 Almost 40,000 Austrian Jews are taken into "protective custody."

1938 July 5 Trade unions in Vienna are dissolved and their funds and property are seized by the German Labor Front.

1938 July 5 President Roosevelt convenes an international conference on refugees in the French resort town of Evian on Lake Geneva. It soon becomes clear that more and more countries, including the U.S., want to restrict the number of Jewish refugees allowed to immigrate to their nations. The Australian delegation declares, "since we have no racial problem, we are not desirous of importing one." (Atlas)

1938 July 6 The Law for the Alteration of Regulations of Industrial Enterprises prohibits numerous Jewish business activities in Germany. Jews can no longer operate real estate, information, loan, private security, marriage, brokerage, or administrative offices. They are even prohibited from serving as tour guides and are ordered to declare their assets and "sell" their businesses.

1938 July 8 The main synagogue in Munich is demolished on Hitler's orders. (See June 9)

1938 July 8 Alfred Rosenbergg proposes a plan for establishing a reservation for 15 million Jews on the island of Madagascar.

1938 July 11 The French chamber passes a law authorizing the prime minister to govern by decree in the event of war.

1938 July 14 The third regulation of the Reich Citizenship Law is published. All Jewish-owned businesses are again advised they must register with the government.

1938 July 19 King George VI of Britain pays a state visit to France.

1938 July 20 All members of the Wehrmacht are forbidden to live in Jewish-owned homes or apartments.

1938 July 23 A new German law decrees that as of January 1, 1939, Jews will be required to carry special identification cards, which they must obtain from the local police. (Persecution)

1938 July 25 The fourth regulation of the Reich Citizenship Act bars all Jewish doctors from medical practice beginning September 30, 1938. After that date, Jewish physicians may treat only Jews and must call themselves Krankenbehandler (medial orderlies or literally "caretakers of the sick"). (Persecution; Edelheit)

1938 July 25 British Fascists and Nazi sympathizers paint antisemitic graffiti throughout the city of London.

1938 July 27 All Jewish street names in Germany are changed and given new names. (Persecution)

1938 July 30 Germany begins preparations for building new fortifications on its western border. A number of prohibited areas are established.

1938 July 31 In a period of 19 months prior to this date, William Dudley Pelley mails 3.5 tons of antisemitic propaganda from his headquarters in America.

1938 August 2 A major clash breaks out between Socialists and Nazis in Switzerland.

1938 August 3 New anti-Jewish legislation is introduced in Italy.

1938 August 5 New laws regulating the meat and cattle industry in Poland virtually eliminate Jews from participation.

1938 August 7 The Beirut synagogue is bombed by Arab terrorists.

1938 August 8 Mauthausen, the first concentration camp in Austria, goes into operation.

1938 August 10 The great synagogue and Jewish community center in Nuremberg is demolished on Nazi orders. (Edelheit)

1938 August 11 Poland withdraws its permanent delegate from the League of Nations.

1938 August 11 Hermann Goering tells an American diplomat that within ten years the United States will become the most antisemitic country in the world and that the combination of Jews and blacks raise grave questions about America's future. (Architect)

1938 August 13 The Wehrmacht stages large-scale military maneuvers.

1938 August 16 The German Ministry of Justice orders an increase in the Gestapo's power in Austria.

1938 August 17 A new decree orders that as of January 1, 1939, German Jews may have only Jewish first names. If they keep an "Aryan" first name (Michael etc.), they must add Jewish middle names such as "Israel" or "Sarah." (Persecution)

1938 August 17 Special passports for Jews are inroduced in Germany. (Eyes)

1938 August 17 Hitler issues a new decree indicating that the Waffen-SS is destined to be more than just a private police force. By authorizing motorization of the SS-Verfuegungstruppen (SS-VT or "field troops"), Hitler serves notice that it will fight in the coming war and enforce the Nazi-dominated peace that he is sure will follow. (The SS, Time-Life)

1938 August 19 Swiss officials take measures to block Jewish refugees trying to enter Switzerland.

1938 August 19-20 At a meeting of the German Committee for Public Care and Welfare Law, professors of medicine and law discuss with civil servants from the Ministry of the Interior the possibility of a "law on asocial individuals" that would allow people so defined to be sterilized or committed to concentration camps. According to later drafts of this law, which was never passed, two physicians and a police officer were to decide on the sterilization and further disposal of these individuals to concentration camps. (Science)

1938 August 26 The Central Office for Jewish Emigration is established in Vienna under the direction of Adolf Eichmann. Within eighteen months, 150,000 Austrian Jews will be induced to emigrate. (Days)

1938 August 27 General Ludwig Beck, one of the top Wehrmacht generals resigns in disagreement over Hitler's Czechoslovakian policy, which he believes will lead to war. (Edelheit)

1938 August Late in the month, Max Warburg, his wife, Alice, and their daughter, Gisela, depart Germany for New York. First they will make a stop-over in London. (See September 1938) (Warburgs)

1938 September The Soviet Union joins the League of Nations.

1938 September In London before leaving for America, Max Warburg meets with George Rublee, an American lawyer and head of the Inter-Governmental Committee on Refugees, and Lord Winterton at the British Foreign Office.

1938 September 1 Hitler demands the immediate cession of Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland to Germany.

1938 September 1 The Italian government orders all Jewish residents who settled in the country after 1919 to leave the country within six months or be deported.

1938 September 5 More riots and demonstrations are staged in the Sudetenland by Konrad Henlein and the Nazis.

1938 September 6 The U.S. Congress passes the Alien Registration Act.

1938 September 6-12 Hitler, speaking at the Nazi Party Rally in Nuremberg, verbally attacks Czechoslovakian President Benes, demanding the right of self-determination for the Sudeten Germans.

1938 September 7 All Jews naturalized in Italy after January 1, 1919, lose their citizenship.

1938 September 7 Pope Pius XI, during a reception for Catholic pilgrims from Belgium, is said to have condemned the participation of Catholics in antisemitic movements and to have added that Christians, the spiritual descendents of the Patriarch Abraham, were "spiritually Semites." This statement was omitted by all the Italian papers, including "L'Osservatore Romano". (La Croix, no. 17060; Lewy)

1938 September 7 France announces a partial mobilization in response to Hitler's demands on Czechoslovakia.

1938 September 8 The British Inner Cabinet meets to discuss the Czechoslovakian crisis (Munich crisis).

1938 September 12 Italy orders the expulsion of all foreign Jews.

1938 September 13 Czechoslovakian President Benes declares martial law in the Sudetenland..

1938 September 14 The Graf Zepplin II, the largest airship ever built, departs Germany on its maiden voyage.

1938 September 15 Hitler and Neville Chamberlain meet in person for the first time, at Obersalzberg (Berchtesgaden), to discuss the Czechoslovakian crisis.

1938 September 16 British Lord Runciman recommends that Czechoslovakia relinquish all border territories with a majority of ethnic Germans to Germany.

1938 September 18 British and French cabinet members, meeting in London, finalize an Anglo-French plan to "appease" Hitler in regard to Czechoslovakia.

1938 September 20-21 The Czech government is forced to accept the Anglo-French "appeasement plan" after being bluntly informed by representatives of Britain and France that they can expect no help if the Germans attack.

1938 September 22-23 Chamberlain meets with Hitler at Bad Godesburg to discuss events in Czechoslovakia and Hitler's continuing demands for the Sudetenland.

1938 September 22 Czech Premier Milan Hodza resigns, and a new Czechoslovakian government is formed by General Jan Sirovy.

1938 September 22 The International Brigades withdraw from Spain.

1938 September 23 Jewish synagogues at Cheb and Marienbad in Czechoslovakia are burned by German-speaking citizens of the Sudetenland. The new Czech government mobilizes its army.Atlas)

1938 September 23 Mussolini offers to mediate the Czechoslovakian crisis. A conference is called to settle the issue at Munich, setting the stage for an Anglo-French sellout of Czechoslovakia, whose representatives are not even invited to attend.

1938 September 24 Anti-Jewish riots break out in Strasbourg, France.

1938 September 25-26 The French government changes its position on the Anglo-French plan, committing itself to defend Czechoslovakia if the Germans attack.

1938 September 26 Hitler makes an angry speech at the Berlin Sportspalast, attacking Czechoslovakia's alleged mistreatment of its German-speaking citizens.

1938 September 27 Hitler warns that he will crush Czechoslovakia if his demands concerning the Sudetenland are not met.

1938 September 27 The fifth ordinance under the Reich Citizenship act closes the legal professions to Jewish lawyers in the German states.

1938 September 27 Police in Denmark adopt strict measures to prevent illegal Jewish immigrants from entering their country.

1938 September 27-28 The Britsh Home Fleet is mobilized in response to the Czechoslovakian crisis.

1938 September 29 The Munich Conference begins. Britain and France (Czechoslovakia's allies) quickly agree to turn over Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland to Hitler, who in return promises to make no further territorial demands in Europe. Czechoslovakia is excluded from participation in the conference as demanded by Hitler and Mussolini.

(Note: Unlike Austria, Czechoslovakia was a democratic state, and its president, Eduard Benes, was prepared to militarily resist Hitler's demands, but realized it was hopeless without British and French assistance.)

1938 September 30 The Munich Agreement is signed by Chamberlain, Hitler, Daladier and Mussolini. The Czechoslovakian Sudetenland is ceded to Germany. Czechoslovakia reluctantly bows to the circumstances and accepts the Munich Agreement. After returning to England, Chamberlain declares, "I believe it is peace for our time."

(Note: In the House of Commons the Munich Agreement is denounced by Winston Churchill as a total and unmitigated defeat.

1938 September 30 A new wave of anti-Jewish riots break out in Poland. (Edelheit)

1938 October Early in the month, the Polish government announces that all Jews who have lived outside Poland for more than five years will have their passports revoked. This law is to take effect of October 30. (Germany soon announces that there is no place in Germany for these "stateless" Jews.) (See October 26)

1938 October 1 German troops occupy the Czechoslovakian Sudetenland. Almost all of the 20,000 Jews in the Sudetenland soon flee to the still independent provinces of Bohemia and Moravia.

1938 October 2 Polish troops occupy Teschen in Czechoslovakia.

1938 October 4 On the advice of Swiss authorities, thhe letter "J" is printed on the front pages of German Jews' passports.

1938 October 5 German Jews have their passports revoked. (Edelheit)

1938 October 6 Dr. Eduard Benes, President of Czechoslovakia, resigns.

1938 October 6 Thousands of Jews with Polish passports who live in Germany and Austria have their passports recalled for "inspection and validation." (Edelheit)

1938 October 7 Slovakia and Transcarpathian Ruthenia are granted autonomy from what is left of Czechoslovakia. Father Josef Tiso, a Catholic priest, becomes leader of Slovakia.

1938 October 7 The Fascist Grand Council in Italy bans Jewish ritual slaughter (shechita).

1938 October 8 Hitler issues a decree establishing SS-Sicherheitpolizei Sonderkommandos (SS Security Police Special Units) for duty in the Sudetenland.

1938 October 13 The Italian government announces that no new business licenses of any kind will be issued to Jews.

1938 October 13 Chamberlain declares to the House of Commons that "The Munich Agreement does not permit us to diminish our efforts towards the realization of our military program."

1938 October 13 The Crown Jewels of the Holy Roman Empire and the Holy Lance (Reichskleinodien and Helige Lanz) are transported by train under heavy armed guard from Vienna to Nuremberg. (Spear)

1938 October 20 The Nazis begin harassing Communists, Jews and other anti-Nazis in Czechoslovakia.

1938 October 24 German Foreign Minister Ribbentrop and Polish Ambassador Lipski meet at Berchtesgaden. Ribbentrop invites Polish Foreign Minister Beck to visit Berlin and puts forward the following suggestions: (1) Danzig to be a German city. (2) Free port for Poland in Danzig with communications assured by extraterritorial railroad and highway through Danzig. (3) An Extraterritorial zone one kilometer wide for a railroad and highway across the Polish Corridor uniting the two portions of Germany carved out at Versailles. (4) Both nations to recognize and guarantee their frontiers. (5) An extension of the German-Polish treaty of Friendship. These proposals are standing and open until August 10, 1939, when Poland will reject them and declare "any intervention by the Reich Government (will be regarded as) an act of aggression."

1938 October 26 Himmler orders the police to collect all Polish Jews in Germany with valid passports and deport them before October 29th. (Architect)

1938 October 28-29 Some 15,000 "stateless" Jews are forced to leave their homes throughout Germany and to go, with only one suitcase, to the nearest railway station. They are then taken through the night to the German-Polish border and forced across at gun point. (See October 1938) (Atlas)

1938 October 30 The sixth ordinance of the Reich Citizenship Act bars all Jews from working as patent agents.

1938 October 31 Polish Foreign Minister Beck instructs Ambassador Lipski to negate Ribbentrop's proposals.

1938 November Karl Wolff visits Malvwine Wiligut (Wiligut/Weisthor's wife) at her home in Salzburg and learns of Weisthor's (Wiligut's) psychiatric history. Weisthor's stay in an Austrian asylum becomes an embarrassment for Himmler.

1938 November 2 Hungary occupies and annexes southern Slovakia.

1938 November 7 Ernst vom Rath, Third Secretary of the German Embassy in Paris, is shot by Herschel Grynszpan, a seventeen-year-old Jewish youth whose family had been expelled from Germany to Poland on October 28.

(Note: This was not the first assassination of a Nazi official by a Jew. Wilhelm Gustloff had previously been killed by a Jewish assassin in Switzerland and the SD was convinced both murders were part of a much broader Jewish conspiracy.) (Architect)

1938 November 8 Himmler addresses a select meeting of high-ranking SS leaders in Munich. He does not mention the vom Rath assassination, but tells them that within 10 years there will be unprecedented clashes -- not only a struggle among nations, but also an ideological struggle against the Jews, Freemasons, Marxists and Catholics worldwide. (Architect)

1938 November 9 Hitler authorizes Goering to deal with all Jewish political affairs. Hitler tells Goering that he is interested in sending German Jews to Madagascar and that he will make an initiative to the Western powers. (Architect)

1938 November 9-10 Enst vom Rath dies and a massive pogrom, known now as Kristallnacht (the night of glass) is launched against the Jews of Germany. 191 synagogues are set on fire and 76 others are completely destroyed, along with hundreds of Jewish shops and schools. 91 Jews are killed during the night of November 9th alone and 35,000 male Jews are arrested, herded into concentration camps and their property seized. (Atlas)

1938 November 10 Hitler, in a speech to hundreds of German journalists, discounts the prospects for peace and urges the press to help convince the German public to support his regime in the event of any future war. (Architect)

1938 November 10 The Gestapo closes the Central Organization of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith. (Edelheit)

1938 November 11 Hitler gives Goering a mandate to resolve the Jewish question "one way or another" and to coordinate the necessary steps by various agencies. (Architect)

1938 November 11 Reinhard Heydrich reports on Kristallnacht to Goering, stating that 36 Jews have been killed and 20,000 arrested.

1938 November 11 A new law decrees that German Jews may neither carry nor possess firearms. (Persecution)

1938 November 12 Goering summons a large number of officials from various agencies to the Air Ministry in Berlin to deal with the economic consequences of Kristallnacht and the ways to remove Jews from the German economy. (Architect)

1938 November 12 German Jewry is ordered to pay "Atonement Payments" of one billion Reichsmarks to the German government for the damages caused by German citizens during Kristallnacht, and insurance payments amounting to more than ten million Reichmarks are soon paid to the German government. (Days)

1938 November 12 Jews are prohibited from attending theaters, movies, concerts, and exhibits. Jews are no longer allowed to own stores and artisan businesses. (Persecution)

1938 November 12-14 Nazis in Danzig burn down two synagogues and badly damage two others.

1938 November 13 Nazi officials seriously consider the Madagascar Plan for the first time.

1938 November 14 In response to the Kristallnacht pogrom, President Roosevelt recalls American Ambassador Hugh Wilson from Berlin to Washington.

1938 November 15 All Jewish children are excluded from the German school system. (Goebbels)

1938 November 16 Neville Chamberlain suggests that Jewish refugees come to Britain as a temporary measure. (Edelheit)

1938 November 17 Socialist members of the French Chamber of Deputies criticizes the government for not officially protesting the persecution of German Jews.

1938 November 18 The U.S. State Department extends visitor's visas to some 15,000 mostly-Jewish refugees already in America, because of Kristallnacht.

1938 November 18 The Legislative Assembly of the American Virgin Islands adopts a resolution offering the islands as a haven for Jewish refugees. (Edelheit)

1938 November 18 Members of the Iron Guard (Legionaries) blows up the Ereschitza synagogue in Romania.

1938 November 19 Polish Ambassador Lipski meets with Ribbentrop in Berlin and informs him that, "any tendency to incorporate the Free City (Danzig) into the Reich will inevitably lead to conflict" between Poland and Germany.

1938 November 20 Father Charles Coughlin, head of the misnamed Union of Social Justice, makes a notorious antsemitic radio broadcast, prompting group pressure that will eventually force him off the air.

1938 November 21 German Jews with assets over 5,000 Reichsmarks are forced to pay a special 20 percent tax on their registered assets to the Reich treasury.

1938 November 23 All Jewish-owned plants and retail businesses in Germany are dissolved by a special administrative order. Jews are completely eliminated from German economic life. (Persecution; Edelheit)

1938 November 24 The Danzig Senate introduces legislation resembling the Nuremberg Laws for Jews still living in the Nazi-dominated "Free City."

1938 November 24 Das Schwarze Korps, an SS periodical, claims that it would welcome the founding of a Jewish state.The German people are not in the least inclined to tolerate in their country hundreds of thousands of criminals, who not only secure their existence through crime, but also want to exact revenge... In such a situation we would be faced with the hard necessity of exterminating the Jewish underworld... The result would be the actual and final end of Jewry in Germany, its absolute annihilation. (Architect)

1938 November 26 The Russian-Polish trade and nonagression pact is renewed.

1938 November 27 Soviet Jews in Moscow, Leningrad, Odessa and Kiev hold mass meetings protesting Kristallnacht.

1938 November 28 Nazi officials introduce residential restrictions on Jews. Movement of Jews from locality to locality is prohibited. The presidents of German regional councils are empowered to impose curfews on their Jewish populations and designate certain places as off-limits (Judenbann). (Persecution)

1938 November 29 Goering tells Hugo Rothenberg, a Danish Jew who had earned Goering's gratitude two decades earlier, that under all circumstances the Jews would have to leave Germany and recommended a foreign loan to finance their emigration. Goering warns him that Germany naturally had other ideas in case emigration did not work. He did not spell out their nature. (Architect)

1938 November 30 Father Charles Coughlin makes an antisemitic broadcast to an estimated 3.5 million American listeners on a nationwide radio network. Coughlin, with one of the largest antsemitic libraries in America, had been using antisemitic overtones in his propaganda before 1936, but it was only after the defeat of his third party in that year that he began to use antisemitism as a political weapon. (McWilliams)

1938 December The Nazi Party issue an edict affecting many sectarian groups in the Reich. (Roots)

1938 December Hjalmar Schacht meets in London with George Rublee, American lawyer and director of the inter-governmental commitee. Schacht presents a plan to allow 150,000 German Jews to leave Germany over a three year period. (Architect)

1938 December 1 Great Britain initiates a program of accelerated rearmament and military expansion.

1938 December 2 Jews in Danzig are ordered to contribute to the "atonement" fine of one billion Reichsmarks imposed on German Jews after Kristallnacht.

1938 December 3 A new decree orders that all Jewish enterprises and shops are now subject to compulsory "Aryanization," the forced disposal of all Jewish stores, businesses, and financial holdings. (Goebbels)

1938 December 3 German Jews are forced to give up their driver's licenses and vehicle registration papers. They are also forced to sell their securities and jewelry. (Persecution)

1938 December 4 Father Charles Coughlin verbally attacks the "Jewish international banking house" in an American radio address.

1938 December 5 The seventh ordinance of the Reich Citizenship Act orders a reduction in pensions for compulsorily retired Jewish officials.

1938 December 6 A new declaration of nonaggression and friendship is signed between Germany and France, providing a mutual guarantee of their common borders. Hitler disavows any interest in Alsace-Lorraine, and during the coming months, will cite this as proof of his peaceful intentions.

1938 December 8 All Jews are banned from conducting research at German universities. Jewish students can no longer attend German Universities. (Persecution)

1938 December 8 Himmler signs an order regarding the need to regulate the "Gypsy question" in Germany. (Edelheit)

1938 December 11 The Nazi Party wins in elections held in Memel. The Jewish situation becomes even more precarious.

1938 December 11 Twenty thousand Libyan Jews are deprived of their Italian citizenship.

1938 December 13 Neuengamme concentration camp is established as part of Sachsenhausen. It will eventually become independent with many sub-camps of its own.

1938 December 13 Jewish property is pillaged and synagogues burned in Slovakia during a renewed anti-Jewish campaign.

1938 December 14 Goering announces he has taken control of all Jewish affairs. All Jewish-owned businesses are placed under the contol of "Aryan" general managers.

1938 December 15 The New York Daily News reprints a scurrilously antisemitic pamphlet by William Dudley Pelley.

1938 December 16 A remarkable editorial in The New York Daily News says that the Bill of Rights means only "that our government shall not officially discriminate against any religion. It does not mean that Americans are forbidden to dislike other Americans or religions or any other group. Plenty of people just now are exercising their right to dislike the Jews."

1938 December 22 All Jews are forced to retire from Italain military service.

1938 December 23 The Hungarian parliament introduces new racially-defined antisemitic laws.

1938 December 24 Twenty-one American republics sign the Declaration of Lima pledging themselves to oppose foreign intervention and to protect themselves by collective action against aggression.

1938 December 28 Jews are forbidden to use sleeping compartments or dining cars on German railways.

1938 December 31 An internal SS report states that 22.7 % of the SS membership still belongs to the Catholic faith (despite all pressures to leave the Church). (Lewy)

1938 Outraged at Hitler's treatment of the Jews and fearing that Hitler will outlaw Christianity, Protestant pastor, Martin Niemoller, organizes the Pastor's Emergency League to oppose Hitler's policies.

1938 Pastor Martin Niemoller is arrested by the Gestapo and thrown into a concentration camp until liberated in 1945.

1938 Edward R. Stettinius, Jr., becomes chairman of the board of U.S. Steel.

1938 Otto Hahn discovers the principles of nuclear fission.

1938 Sigmund Freud flees to England to escape Nazi persecution in Vienna.

1938 The SS Training Office orders a specially revised and expanded, one-volume edition of Michael Prawdin's two books on Genghis Khan (See 1934, 1935). This book was frequently given as a Christmas present by Himmler and every SS leader received a copy. Hitler is said to have derived his ideas concerning Blutkitt (blood cement) from this source. (Architect)

1938 The U.S. and Britain send aid to the Chinese in their war against Japan.

Copyright © 1997 R.H. Perez de Cruet
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