Figure 1.--This photograph reportedly shows the Edelweiss Pirates in Cologne about 1943. Edelweiss badges can been seen on the collar of the boy on the left and on the hat of the girl in the middle.

The subject of youth in the NAZI Third Reich is a fascinating topic. No German leader before or after has placed a greater emphasis on youth than Adolf Hitler. And young Germans organized in the Hitler Youth played an important role in the rise of the NAZIs. As far as we can tell, Hitler and the NAZIs very effectively coopted German youth. The Hitler Youth has to be seen as one of the most effective youth group's in history. By effective we do not mean a youth group which serve to benefit young people, but rather a group which effectively served it purpose of molding the minds of young Germans. In this case the cause was evil, but that of course does not detract from the effectivness of the organization. The Hitler while dominating the loyalties of most Herman children, was not totally effective. There were exceptions. One of the most notable youth Ressistance effort was the White Rose. Others were the Swing Kids and the Edelweiss Pirates.

Hitler Youth

The subject of youth in the NAZI Third Reich is a fascinating topic. No German leader before or after has placed a greater emphasis on youth than Adolf Hitler. And young Germans organized in the Hitler Youth played an important role in the rise of the NAZIs. As far as we can tell, Hitler and the NAZIs very effectively coopted German youth. The Hitler Youth has to be seen as one of the most effective youth group's in history. By effective we do not mean a youth group which serve to benefit young people, but rather a group which effectively served it purpose of molding the minds of young Germans. In this case the cause was evil, but that of course does not detract from the effectivness of the organization.

Effectiveness of the Hitler Youth

We believe that German Youth bought into the NAZI message even more fully than the adult population. One of the purposes of the Hitler Youth was to pry young people away from parents and the Church, any influences that were not totally inder NAZI control. Even the schools which were increasingly taffed with teachers firmly committed to the NAZIS, were not fully trusted. At first membership in the Hitler Youth was voluntary, although parents were expected to send the children. Eventually membership was made compulsory at age 10. The children were thus subjected to relentless propaganda at school and in the Hitler Youth. Here parents were often unwilling to challenge NAXZI idelogy. A young child might repeat things he heard at home which might be reported to the Gestapo. Older children might be alienated by their parent's objections to the New Order. A British reader writes, "I think HBC is correct that the HJ swept up most of the young population in one way or another. There were, however, some exceptional groups that prove the rule. I remember seeing a documentary where a German was recalling as a boy him being asked at school why he wasn't in the Hitler Youth and his dad telling him to say they couldn't afford the uniform.The next day a package with the a uniform was delivered to their home with the address and date of the next meeting. He did then say that he went along and went off to camps and found it very exciting as he came from a poor family who had never done that sort of thing. I think it was part of a Granada TV series called 'The World at War' - this episode dealing specifically with the Hitler Youth. I also remember it showing footage of a visit of Hitler Youth to an English scout troop on the South coast of England in the 1930s - before war broke out obviously. They seemed to be saying that at that time they! were trying to promote the Hitler Youth abroad as merely a new or German form of the Boy Scouts.

Sippenhaft

There were numerous political arrests by the NAZIs. Many of the initial arrests were Communists (1933). After that the arrests were more varied. As far as we know the arrests were mostly men and not women in a family. There were some mother-father and even wider family arrests leaving the children unattended, but not very many. This wa known as Sippenhaft or Sippenhaftung (klan or kin guilt). This was the idea of families sharing the responsibility for a crime committed by one of its members. A relative of the perpetrator could thus be punished in place of or in addition to the perpetrator, depending on the circumstances. This was used as a threat as well as actually employed. As a legal principle, it is revived from medieval Germanic law. Historically it usually meant fines and compensations. The NAZIs seemed to hve recived the idea during the War, primarily to threaten or punish military officers. It is believd it is why Rommel, for example, agreed to commot suiside. In the few cases we know of, younger children were turned over to politically relible NAZIS rther than being taken into care by the state. This is not a topic we know much about and would bee interested in any information readers may know about. This did occur after the Bomb Plot (July 1944). After the War, the Communists East German regime would take children from families deemed unreliable. As far as we know, this was not a common practice by the NAZIs. Children of individuals arrested for political crimes, however, might suffer in school or at the hands of other children.

Reformatories

Germany as in any other country was face with the problem of juvenile delinquency. We know little about how this problem was dealt with in Germany diring the Imperial Era, Weimar, and the Third Reich. We do not know how youth offenders were dealt with differently than adult offenders nor we know what changes were made in approaches toward youth offenders during the Third Reich. Also we do not know to what extent the system for dealing with juvenile delinquents was used by the NAZIs to deal with teenagers that expressed objections to NAZI ideology.

Rebeliousness

One author writes, "Although many youngsters opposed Nazism in the early days of the regime; youth opposition grew as the war progressed. While Joseph Goebbels and other party members repeatedly claimed victory on the Russian Front; evidence provided by returning soldiers and BBC broadcasts presented another story. However, due to Hitler's early liquidation of political opposition groups, there was little in the way of a public forum for dissent. Yet opposition did reveal itself outside of the public forum; it found an outlet in the rebellious expressions of youth." [Holmes] I'm not sure how this can be measured uin a police state, but it seems to HBC that this was a small minority of German youth. There were definitely some boys who became disenchanted, but as far as I can tell those that made an issue of their disenchantment with the regime, but they appear to have been dealt with by the Gestapo--if not their school fellows. As far as we can tell the HJ very effectively managed the attitudes of German youth. Hitler Youth boys fought in Normandy at Caen and much of the resistance in Berlin was HJ boys--often fighting when the sutuation was hopeless. There were instances when units composed of Hitler Youth boys jeered Wehrmacht soldiers preparing to surrender.

Youth Resistance Movements

The Hitler Youth while dominating the loyalties of most German children, was not totally effective. There were exceptions. The early Hitler Youth has seized open the rebeliousness of youth, but once the NAZIs were firmly entrenched in power, such rebeliouness was discouraged. Young people were expected to conform to NAZI values and expectations. This was a factor in groups that appeared during World War II. They can not be precisely called resistance groups, but they did reflect varying levels of opposition to the NAZI regime and NAZI ideology. One of the most notable youth opposition efforts was the White Rose which might be called a resistance movement. Others were the Swing Kids and the Edelweiss Pirates. In each case, they soon attracted the notice of the Gestapo and were relentlessly persecuted. As much of the oppsition occurred during the War, opposition to the War was an important factor. With the White Rose, German attrocities in the East appears to have been a major concern.

Reader Comment

A HBC reader writes, "I haven't really looked at the uniformed group pages - as I said I was never in the scouts or anything - but it interests me that there seems to be the idea that the German people "as a race" would "naturally" be given to the idea of "order" embodied in the Hitler Youth and like the idea of uniforms. I think this is false. I think when I was there in the late 60s there was a consious attempt by both the state and parents ( like I said no toy guns) to get away from this idea. I believe there were no school uniforms - I was there in the school holidays - and as far as I know scout uniforms were not very formal. On the other hand in England at that time most schools had uniforms and scouts were pretty strict about uniforms and "parades" - my elder brother was in the cubs and the scouts and I remember him spending ages getting his uniform "just right" - especially on Sunday when they had "church parade" and he had the "honour" of carrying the troop flag. Added to this that my primary school was organised into 'teams' (as I've told you) and you could argue that it was the British who were more into 'order' at that time." This is a provocative comment. We note, however, that the observations of the Germans are based on a visit around 1967 after World war II. Our British reader might think differently if he had visited Germany in the 1930s. His point about the British, however, is certainly accurate. The British Scouts have certainly fiven much more attention to uniform than many other countries such as the American Scouts. Within Germany there have been different trends. The German Wandervogel was, for example, much less focused on uniforms than the more militarized Boy Scouts. The fact that Kaiser Wilhelm II and the Prussian Junkers who supported him as well as Hitler and the NAZIs were consumed with the military and uniforms has had a considerable impact on German values and fashions.

Individuals

We do not yet have much information on individual youths involved in the anti-NAZI resistance movement. we suspect that this was very difficult, given the enthusiasm with which many young people supported Hitler. There of course was a high degree of stahe management in public events. Given the enthusism we see in the photographic record as well as various written accounts, we thinknit is fairly safe to say that large numbers of young people ardently supported the Führer. And we see this even before the NAZIs seized power through to the very end. Hitler Youth boys were found to be fighting in the final months of the NAZI regime when older soldiers wanted nothing more than to surrender to the americbs and British rather thn being taken cptive by the Russians. But there were young people who resisted. Helmuth Günther Guddat Hübener (1925–42) came from a Mormon family. The Mormons were a smal church, but included very few NAZIs. He was a advid Boy Scout until the group was banned and he was forced to join the Hitler Youth. As a boy he was deeply troubled by Kristalnacht. He was arrested for involvement withbanti-Nazi pamflets. He was one of the youngest opponents of the NAZI regimes to be tried by the Volksgerichtshof (People's Courts). These were special tribunfals ordered by Hitler because the German courts had not yet been NAZIfied (1934). He was found guilty and setenced to death. After the sentence was read, Helmuth turned and faced the judges, and said, "Now I must die, even though I have committed no crime. So now it's my turn, but your turn will come." He was only 17 years old. Two confederates receuved prison terms. Another youtful resister was Sophie Scholl (1921-43). She was the daughter of the liberal politician Robert Scholl, an vehement NAZI critic. She was arrested for distributing anti-Nazi pamphlets at the University of Munich. This was one of the few ways young oeople could resist and very dangerous. She was tried and sentenced to death. Prison officials after the War in describing the scene, emphasized the courage with which she walked to her execution. Her last words were: "How can we expect righteousness to prevail when there is hardly anyone willing to offer themselves up individually for a righteous cause? Such a fine, sunny day, and I have to go." (1943). It is interesting that the young people were dealt with within the judicial system and not simply committed to concentration camps. We are not sure why that was.

Sources

R. Blair, Holmes and Alan F. Keele, eds. When Truth Was Treason: German Youth against Hitler (Chicago, 1995).

Created: February 18, 2004
Last updated: 9:08 AM 7/28/2015