On August 20, 1947, in Lüneberg, Germany, the sentences were read in a trial that had lasted more than eight months. The defendants had either participated in a Nazi euthanasia program that killed mentally ill or physically disabled people deemed "unworthy of life," or had conducted painful and often deadly medical experiments on thousands of … Read more
On February 3, 1947, in Hamburg, Germany, the former staff of Ravensbrück listened as their sentences were read aloud. After nearly two months of gruesome testimony, the world finally learned the truth about the inhumane mistreatment and torture carried out by the camp's male and female personnel during its six-year existence. Of the 16 defendants, … Read more
An 11-minute meeting on 116th Street in Harlem set in motion a confrontation that would define the balance of power in the neighborhood for years. When a representative of Carlo Gambino’s organization presented a demand for consolidated oversight over Harlem’s numbers operation, Bumpy Johnson responded not with words, but by standing up and walking out. … Read more
The Battle of the Little Bighorn is remembered as one of the most significant defeats in American military history, but the popular story of what happened there in 1876 is far simpler than the reality. For decades, the narrative portrayed General George Armstrong Custer as either a heroic martyr or a reckless glory-seeker who led … Read more
Elsa Ehrich was born on March 8, 1914, in a part of the German Empire. Her parents were a skipper named Albert and his wife Anna. She was baptized as a Protestant on June 1, 1914. After finishing school, she worked in a slaughterhouse. The Nazi Party was founded in 1919 and led by Adolf … Read more
When German forces launched Operation Barbarossa on June 22, 1941, the invasion of the Soviet Union opened a new and devastating phase of the Second World War. Cities fell within days, and behind the advancing front lines came a system of terror aimed not only at defeating an enemy but at destroying entire populations. That … Read more
On July 3, 1863, roughly 15,000 Confederate soldiers under General George Pickett stepped out from the woods at Gettysburg and began a deliberate, shoulder-to-shoulder march across nearly a mile of open ground. Waiting for them on Cemetery Ridge were Union cannons and riflemen with clear sightlines. The men advanced at a steady walking pace, in … Read more
In October 1919, two fishermen in the Cumberland Gap region of Tennessee pulled something from the Clinch River that would haunt the isolated mountain community for generations. Murray Flint, 53, and his younger companion Zephaniah Goss had been fishing the cold waters near the ruins of an abandoned mill, about six miles downstream from the … Read more
In the spring of 1862, Ulysses S. Grant reportedly uttered a blunt assessment that would haunt the Union war effort: “He is too dangerous. ” The Confederate commander in question was Thomas Jonathan Jackson, the general whose relentless raids and tactical brilliance had thrown Union strategy into chaos across Virginia. At that point, Jackson was … Read more
On the night of July 22, 1944, soldiers of the Red Army reached Majdanek, the first major Nazi camp to be liberated. It stood in German-occupied Poland. The liberation became one of the most significant moments in the history of World War II and the Holocaust. Only after the camps were opened did the full … Read more