In January 1942, a group of German government officials from various ministries and offices, met at a house on the Wannsee, a lake on the outskirts of Berlin. There they laid the plans for the mass murder of the Jewish population of Europe.
The letter above is from Reinhard Heydrich to Foreign Office undersecretary Martin Luther, informing him that the meeting, originally scheduled for December 1941, would be held on 20 January 1942. The letter is dated 8 January and was sent from Prague, where Heydrich had been installed in his new job as Deputy Protector of Bohemia and Moravia.
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Playlist:
Fanfare
Opening War Theme
Symphony No. 5 in C Minor
Composed in 1808 by Ludwig van Beethoven. Public domain.
Performed by the Davis High School Symphony Orchestra. Public domain recording. Source.
String Quartet No. 2
Composed in 1908 by Arnold Schoenberg. Public domain.
Performed by the Carmel String Quartet, and used pursuant to a Creative Commons CC BY 3.0 Deed. Source.
Closing War Theme
Except when otherwise indicated, the contents of this podcast are © and ℗ 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024 by Mark Painter, all rights reserved. Some music and sound effects used by arrangement with Pond 5.
Tough subject. Good job in not pulling any punches.