Holiday on Sylt

Access this item (login required):

Description: East German documentary about Heinz Reinfarth, a former SS officer, now the major of the North Sea holiday island of Sylt. Part of 'The Archives Testify' series.
Duration: 17 mins 13 secs
Director: Annelie and Andrew Thorndike.
Credits: Directed by Annelie and Andrew Thorndike. Music by Paul Dessau. Script by Guenter Ruecker. Contributors: Klaus Alde, Walter Fuchs, Jochen Lange and Karl Raddatz. A film of the VEB DA FA Newsreel and Documentary Studios.
Year: 1957
Subjects: Poland, Human rights violations, Germany FR, Resistance to oppression, Nazism, Concentration camps, Genocide, Administration of justice
Segment 1: Film cans in an archive vault, clips from Nazi newsreel soundtracks. Credits. West Germans travel to the island of Sylt for relaxation and recreation. History of Reinefarth's role in the SS. Includes his decoration by Hitler and his role in Czechoslovakia and Poland where he headed an SS police department. Shots of interrogations in Poland by the SS in summer 1944. Promotion by Hitler to SS Gruppen Fuehrer, Nazis in Warsaw. Poles rounded up in Warsaw wait in transit areas. Preparation for the Warsaw uprising. Poles evacuated, taken to the 'mills of death.' Armaments factory in Germany. Shots of Poles being exterminated by the SS. Footage said to be taken hours before the Warsaw uprising. 'Die Deutsche Wochenshau' Nazi war newsreel shows the Polish uprising and the Nazi retaliation using large calibre guns, tanks and blanket bombing of areas of the city. Nazi SS troops storm Warsaw. Documentation showing Reinefarth's involvement. Archive footage of fighting in Warsaw.
Segment 2: Shots of Polish civilians taken prisoner and murdered. Discussion of reports surrounding SS action in Warsaw. Statements by prisoners of war against Reinefarth. Shots of original documents. Testimony of German POW describes atrocities committed against Polish civilians by the SS at the orders of Reinefarth. Statement describes the death of 5000 civilians in one part of Warsaw alone. In 1950, the Allies order Reinefarth's extradition from Germany. He changes his identity and escapes. The SS is reborn in isolated areas of Germany in 1957. SS rally in 1957, intercut with archive footage. Film closes with a warning against the re-emergence of Nazism and those who have escaped justice.
Persistent URL: http://edina.ac.uk/purl/isan/0002-0000-0027-0000-0-0000-0000-0
Written and compiled by the British Universities Film & Video Council © BUFVC 2005
Subject classification by University of Edinburgh Library © 2006