Goeschel - Suicide in Nazi Germany

SUICIDE IN NAZI GERMANY

CHRISTIAN GOESCHEL

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Christian Goeschel 2009

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First published 2009

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ISBN 9780199532568
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It is a great pleasure to thank all those who have supported my work for this book. I should like to thank the Arts and Humanities Research Board, the Allen, Meak and Read Scholarship, and the Cambridge European Trust for funding my research at Cambridge. I am also grateful to the Sir John Plumb Charitable Trust and the German History Society for financing various research trips to the archives. The Cambridge University Prince Consort Studentship, the Kurt Hahn Trust, the Institute of Historical Researchs Scouloudi Fellowship, the Charles H Revson Fellowship at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and, above all, my parents provided crucial extra support.

I should like to thank the many librarians and archivists in Britain, Germany, and the United States who have supplied me with material for this book. Without their expert advice, I could not have written it. My work has benefited in many ways from discussions with other scholars. I was fortunate enough to be a member of the Cambridge Modern European History Workshop and Richard J Evanss Cambridge Workshop on Modern German History where some of the ideas presented here first took shape. At an early stage of my research, Hans Medick and Andreas Bhr invited me to give a paper at a very stimulating conference at Erfurt University, where I received invaluable advice. Hartmut Kaelble and Wolfgang Hardtwig kindly invited me to their colloquia at Berlins Humboldt University which provided lots of useful feedback. In Berlin, I also had many productive conversations with Monica Black and Molly Loberg who both read early versions of some of the material presented here. Monica organized a very useful panel discussion at the German Studies Association, where I benefited from Frank Biesss commentary. Jeffrey Herf invited me to his research seminar at the University of Maryland which provided lots of food for thought. In Washington, DC, I had very fruitful exchanges with my colleagues at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies. In California, I enjoyed discussing my work at Claremont McKenna College and the Lessons and Legacies Conference. In England, I received very constructive feedback at the Oxford Modern German History Seminar, the Modern German History Seminar at the Institute of Historical Research and the Holocaust Workshop at Royal Holloway.

Earlier versions of Chapters 3 and 5 have appeared as articles, and I thank the editors and readers for their stimulating feedback: Suicides of German Jews in the Third Reich, in German History, 25 (2007), 2245; Suicide at the End of the Third Reich, in Journal of Contemporary History, 41 (2006), 15373.

Without the generous support of many other scholars, I could not have written this book. I should like to thank Richard Bessel for all his help and support at an early stage of my research. I also owe special thanks to Moritz Fllmer for many fruitful discussions over the years. I have benefited enormously from stimulating conversations with Darcy Buerkle, Zo Waxman, Hubertus Jahn, Dan Magilow, and Jonathan Petropoulos. Dan kindly helped me translate some of the quotations and Jonathan assisted me in approaching this publisher.

Other friends and colleagues too have read earlier versions of some or all of this material. I am extremely grateful to Geoffrey Giles, Emanuel Heisenberg, Maximilian Horster, Susan Morrissey, Mark Offord, and Nick Stargardt. Chris Clark and Sir Ian Kershaw gave me the most generous and helpful feedback on an earlier draft of this work, and I am deeply grateful to them.

Over the last few years, I have greatly enjoyed the privilege of working with Nikolaus Wachsmann in the stimulating and supportive atmosphere of Birkbeck Colleges School of History, Classics and Archaeology. My colleagues Sean Brady, Lucy Riall, and Nikolaus Wachsmann all read my manuscript and did much to improve it. Catharine Edwards made some excellent suggestions on the introduction. I also owe particular thanks to my students at Birkbeck College who have helped me shape my ideas about the history of the Third Reich. I am deeply indebted to my brother Joachim for his expert help with the statistics at the end of this book. Christopher Wheeler and his team at Oxford University Press have been enthusiastic supporters of this project, and Jeremy Langworthy has been an exemplary copyeditor.

Most of all, I have to thank Richard J Evans for all his help and support. His comments on various drafts were always to the point and his advice could not have been more generous.

CG
London

Under German law governing personal data and records, individuals identities are to be protected during their lifetime and for a certain period after their deaths. Relatives of individual suicides must also be protected, of course. This regulation creates some problems for any historian. I have therefore decided to abbreviate the last names of individual suicides, unless their cases have been published before.

Important suicide statistics are presented in a statistical appendix.