Kristallnacht
Photographs, 9 - 11 November 1938

During a single night - between 9 and 10 November 1938 - an officially-approved and organised pogrom throughout Germany, including the occupied Czech border area and Austria, resulted in most synagogues being burned down, the windows of Jewish shops being broken and Jewish houses and flats looted. The pretext for the pogrom, which is generally known as Kristallnacht, was the assassination by a Jewish youth of a German diplomat working at the embassy in Paris.

View of the burning synagogue in Ober-Ramstadt, morning of 10 November 1938. (Foto: Trudy Isenberg, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives)

Extinguishing the burning synagogue in Ober-Ramstadt. (Foto: Trudy Isenberg, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives)

View of the destroyed synagogue in Aachen. (Foto: Stadtarchiv Aachen, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives)

View of the destroyed interior of the synagogue in Hechingen. (Foto: Dr. Adolf Vees, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives)

The burning synagogue in Opava. (Foto: Leo Goldberger, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives)

People walking past the broken window of a Jewish shop, Berlín. (Foto: National Archives, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives)