Nathan Stolzfus

Resistance of the Heart

Intermarriage and the Rosenstrasse Protest in Nazi Germany

Records in Berlin never before examined and interviews with survivors yield a history of the Nazi campaign against intermarriage-Jew and non-Jew-and a brave defense of family.

Berlin. February 1943. In a Final Roundup, the Gestapo swiftly arrested some 10,000 Jews remaining in the city. Most of them died within days in the ovens of Auschwitz. Approximately 2000, however, had non-Jewish relatives. These 2000 were locked into a temporary collection center on a street called Rosenstrasse, in the heart of Berlin. As news of the huge arrest pulsed through the city, hundreds of Gentile spouses hurried to the Rosenstrasse in protest. A chant broke out, "Give us back our husbands."

The protest lasted a week; again and again, Berlin police and uniformed SS scattered the women with threats to shoot them down. Again and again, the women regrouped and advanced in solidarity until they won, facing down Hitler's genocidal policy and securing the release of their loved ones.

Nathan Stoltzfus holds a Ph.D. from Harvard and teaches history at Florida State University.