User:JebEdwards/Hans Massaquoi

= Historical Context to Hans' Life = Nazism was a ideology that had many victims across the entirety of Germany and Europe, specifically those that did not fit within the image of the perfect racial identity, the Aryan. Groups who actively opposed this ideology or in passing were perceived as contrary to the Aryan image were treated as such. Throughout the entirety of Nazi legislation and power, these people who did not fit into the German nation and occupied countries were pushed to the fringes socially and physically. Those who predominantly suffered were primarily Jews, but many other groups such as the Afro-Germans, Roma and Sinti, people in the LGBTQ+ community, and disabled or mentally ill were targeted by Nazi legislation, and ultimately, many were killed throughout the course of the Holocaust and World War Two.

Eugenics and Germany
However, before this legislation and before Germany was run by Nazis, there were many practices of eugenics which mirrored the rest of the world. Germany was no stranger to the new wave of racial understanding through scientific practice. These feelings and beliefs were outlined best by one of the most infamous practitioners Eugen Fischer. His core beliefs were parallel to the ways that most colonialist nations had felt about the African people. Fischer thought that the African people were expendable but their labor should be taken advantage of first, overall, he felt, and many others did, that Africans and Black people as a whole were racially inferior. These historical attitudes in colonialism and practices of eugenics heavily influenced the Nazi party and their belief of a strong German racial identity, one that opposed all contamination by other races.

These studies of eugenics reflected the racial hierarchy that had been established within early Germany. These attitudes and beliefs were put into practice during the Namibian Genocide, where Namibians were physically separated from the rest of society into concentration camps that were similar to the camp system during the Holocaust. The entirety of the Herero people was almost destroyed throughout the Namibian Genocide, and their bodies were used in scientific experiments back in Berlin. Eugenics in practice had many victims, and in the case of Germany the Namibian people suffered tremendously for the advancement of a pseudo-science that had no base in reality.

Ordinary People
Scientists and medical professionals were not the only ones who had ill-intended curiosity, as normal German citizens also held on to curiosity and looked at Afro-Germans under a lens of observation. In the case of Bernhard Epassi, he was viewed through a physical criticism of his facial features and appearance. Despite his attributes socially and as a human being, because he was black and looked different, he faced more scrutiny for his appearance and his actions than others would. There was also the ways that different people around Berlin had perceived him and made racist remarks toward him openly. These feelings of racism and racial beliefs were not hidden, and normal everyday Germans had them just like eugenicists and medical professionals.

Namibian Genocide (1904-1908)
The Namibian Genocide, the mass extermination of the Herero and Namaqua in Namibia, occurred long before the establishment of Nazi Germany as these ideas of racial purity preceded any mention of Nazism. In 1904, German settlers began to pour into Namibia, but when Namibians refused to allow this to happen, they were killed mercilessly by the German military. The Herero and Nama people were specifically targeted and ethnically cleansed from their native lands. The Herero and Namaqua people suffered tremendously, and the tactics were fairly similar to the Holocaust which would come years later within Nazi Germany. The entirety of the Herero and Namaqua were starved, had different forms of identifications like tattoos and the physical badges, and were sectioned into concentration camps. The genocide itself was sponsored by the German government and there are many orders that show the intention was to destroy and exterminate these communities. Within the camps the Namibians were forced to assimilate to German religions and were forced to do work that ended with their deaths from exhaustion. This was fairly similar to the Holocaust itself, which saw the physical separation of Jews into ghettos and camps, and systematically killed through industrialized murder, starvation, and exhaustion from labor. The major difference between the two was the scale itself, as around 6,000,000 Jews were killed during the Holocaust, however, the lessons learned throughout the Namibian Genocide would be used on a larger scale by Nazi leadership decades later.

The racial policies in Namibia perpetrated by the colonial German government provided a frame for the Holocaust, with these practices of the Namibian genocide being continued years later. These attitudes of racial purity remained for decades, and never truly went away inside of Germany and on an international scale. This was not just the racial purity pertaining to Jews, but also those who were considered racially inferior, including African people and non-whites, who suffered similarly during the height of Nazism from 1933-1945.

The Rhineland Bastards
The Rhineland Bastards was the offensive term used for French black people by Germans within the Rhine. These same attitudes that had existed in Africa and in the colonial states continued within the European theater as well. The black people within the Rhineland, specifically the black French soldiers, were seen as colonists trying to derail German existence. This contrasted the reality of many of these situations, where Africans were colonized and many were brought back to Germany and France. Africans, specifically Black Africans, were used as tools for exploitation, whether it be for political gain or for cheap labor. Germans were not the only people to perpetuate the racism against Black people, however the context is important to understanding Hans Massaquoi's story and how Germans felt about Black people as a whole at the time of the Holocaust.

Propaganda Against the Rhineland Bastards
There were many different drawings of propaganda depicting the ways that the these Africans were perceived. In most of these drawings, the black people were portrayed as savages, specifically as monkeys attempting to rape or sexually assault a German woman. There was a distinct similarity between the ways that African people were perceived, both domestically and on an international scale by the German people. Domestically, these French Black men in the Rhineland were used as tools of propaganda to further German nationalism and pride. Outside of the Germans' use of Africans for political goals and aspirations, the German people saw Africans as subjects to observe, and many Germans felt Africans did not belong and were dirty. In Africa itself, the Namibian Genocide occurred through the German occupation and colonial power, which saw tens of thousands of Namibians being killed and treated as animals. Both in the domestic sphere and in the international sphere, Africans were perceived as less than human, and were portrayed as such, whether it be for political goals, or for racist and nationalist ideologies.

Nazis and Racial Purity
One of the most pressing parts of Nazi policies reflected attitudes that were seen through both the Namibian Genocide and the Rhineland Bastards, the fact that Germany was being infected by racially inferior people or deemed to be social outcasts. These attitudes heavily impacted the ways minorities in Germany and abroad were perceived by the German people, specifically by staunch Nazi supporters. Many who were deemed to be racially inferior were removed socially, and eventually they were removed physically .The initial policies brought on by the Nazis focused on destabilizing minorities and their communities, and attempted to oppress them to the point of movement away from Germany. The Nazis used legal process to come to power, and once they had it, they attempted to restore a strong Germany, one without minorities and with a racially pure Aryan people.

Sterilization Law
One of the most horrific acts done by the Nazis was the establishment of the Sterilization Law, which sought to eliminate the ability of racially inferior people to procreate and safeguard the so-called cleanliness of the Aryan race. The people who were targeted were in a large range, making the law itself incredibly subjective and applicable to anyone who the Nazis may not like. Some of these people were: alcoholics, people with mental illness, the mentally disabled, physically disabled, and the racially inferior. Many of those who were sterilized were perceived as social outcasts and were sterilized because they did not fit into the German image the Nazis were attempting to create.

Nuremberg Laws
The Nuremberg Laws were the manifestation of the feelings of racial superiority by the Nazis. In these laws, Jews and other races who were deemed to be racially inferior were no longer considered to be members of the German community. Their citizenship was taken away and they were no longer able to marry Aryan people. Not only were they socially excluded from society at this point, but in many cases they were no longer legally protected or respected as a citizen of Germany. Many of the people who were most affected by the Nuremberg Laws, namely Jews, attempted to leave Germany and escape the oppression that was growing consistently from 1933 and the beginning of Hitler's rule.

Black People During the Holocaust
The treatment of German Black people was very similar to that of the treatment African-Americans received inside of the United States, and both Germany and the United States were considered to be leaders in eugenics because of their experiments on minorities. Black people, which included African Americans and other prisoners of war (POWs), were sent to concentration camps and internment camps. In these camps the Black prisoners were treated far worse than their white POWs. In many cases the Black prisoners would have been worked to death in concentration camps or killed rather than going to a POW camp. They received much of the same treatment that many other minorities had experienced, mass killings and systematic discrimination that left them disadvantaged and struggling to maintain any form of normalcy inside of Nazi Germany. What is truly unfortunate about the Black people inside of the Holocaust is that their story has not been studied the same ways that many others have, and they have been left in the fringes of academia. To counteract that, many survivors, such as Hans Massaquoi, wrote about their experiences. This is one of the main ways that someone can learn about the Holocaust and Nazi period and the ways Black Germans were treated under Nazi control. = Hans Massaquoi = Hans-Jürgen Massaquoi (January 19, 1926 – January 19, 2013) was a German-American journalist and author. He was born in Hamburg, Germany, to a German mother and a Liberian father of Vai ethnicity, the grandson of Momulu Massaquoi, the consul general of Liberia in Germany at the time. Hans is most well known for his work Destined to Witness in which he discusses the trials and tribulations of being black in the third reich. His work serves as a primary source and one of insight into other victims (non-Jewish) of the Holocaust and the racial policies within Nazi Germany.

Youth and Life in the Nazi Period
Hans was born as a mixed race German-Liberian, his father from Liberia and his mother from Germany. Hans lived much of his early life inside of a mansion in Hamburg, as his family was incredibly wealthy thanks to the Liberian royalty he came from. As a child Hans believed Black people were the superior race, he grew up rich in Hamburg, in which many Germans were predominantly poor or middle class. He was constantly fussed over, and the Massaquoi family also had white servants that worked underneath them. As Momulu's time as a consulate came to a close, he suggested that Hans and his mother should come back to Liberia with him, but the mother rejected any possibility of that occurring. After rejecting the offer, Hans and his mother moved to Barmbek. Hans spent much of his childhood envying the German boys who easily fit into society while he was bullied and deemed to be an outcast because of the color of his skin. Hans even went as far as to ask his babysitter to sew on a swastika to his sweater so he could fit in. His mother rejected the Nazi party and refused to allow Hans to keep the swastika on his sweater, but Hans still did not give up his aspirations to become a normal Aryan boy and fit in with the other German children. Hans recalled when he and his classmates went to see Hitler in a parade, and the frenzy it had caused among the children and adults who vocalized support and admiration. Hans felt as though he belonged, though others did not feel the same way.

As the Nazi power in Germany became more cemented, Hans began to feel the effects. One particular instance that resonated with him was when he was grabbed and dragged to a podium by an SA member. He was being used as an example of racial impurity and was to be shamed, had a woman not stopped the SA man. It took the instance of the SA members grabbing Hans for him to start to come to terms with the reality within Nazi Germany. He was not accepted and the treatment of Africans would only get much worse. Another important and traumatizing instance was when Hans attempted to go to the local playground but was not allowed to swing because he was a non-Aryan. These new discriminatory laws and policies greatly limited Hans' freedom and possibilities, though he did not know it or fully understand it. Hans even attempted to join the Hitler Youth, but was turned away due to the ways his existence contradicted Nazi ideology. More than anything, Hans wanted to fit in and be a part of German society, but was unable to.

As Hans journeyed into his teenage years he still attempted to support the Nazi party, but was often turned away because he was African and did not fit into the national image Germany was trying to portray. As the war raged on, Hans and his mother had to go into hiding to attempt to stay safe from bombings that had occurred in Hamburg. They were able to hide thanks to the help of the Giordano family who helped find them a place to hide after their Hamburg neighborhood was destroyed.

Due to his family's political status and many encounters that saw him luckily get away due to his support of the Nazi party and Germany, Hans and his mother were able to survive World War II, just.

Hans After the Nazi Period
After the conclusion of World War II, racism in Germany continued. Unfortunately for Hans, racism and the Nazi period had not just evaporated and he experienced many different kinds of racial prejudices. Hans was asked by his father, who had abandoned him and his mother, to come to Liberia and meet him for the first time. Instead of staying in Liberia and inheriting the crown, he decided to emigrate to the United States and attend university. Massaquoi emigrated to the United States in 1950. He served two years in the army as a paratrooper in the U.S. 82nd Airborne Division and fought in the Korean War. He later became a naturalized U.S. citizen. His GI bill helped fund his journalism degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and he worked on his masters at Northwestern University until the impending birth of his first son catapulted into his career at Jet magazine and then Ebony magazine, where he became managing editor. His position allowed him to interview many historical figures of the arts, politics and civil rights movement in America and Africa. He was interviewed in turn by Studs Terkel for his oral history The Good War, and related his unique experiences in Germany under the Nazi government. Beginning in 1966, Massaquoi visited family and friends in Germany many times, always cognizant of Germany's complex history as the country of his childhood. Nevertheless, he considered Germany as his "homeland" and perfectly spoke German and Low German throughout his life.

= Bibliography =
 * “Black People — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.” n.d. Www.ushmm.org. https://www.ushmm.org/collections/bibliography/black-people.
 * Campt, Tina. Other Germans: Black Germans and the Politics of Race, Gender, and Memory in the Third Reich. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2005.


 * "Dialectical Anthropology". New York, NY: Springer, 2000.
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 * Kenneth L. Lewis Jr., "The Naimbian Holocaust: Genocide Ignored, History Repeated, Yet Reparations Denied," Florida Journal of International Law 29, no. 1 (April 2017): 133-iv
 * Lusane, Clarence. "Hitler's Black Victims the Historical Experiences of Afro-Germans, European Blacks, Africans, and African Americans in the Nazis Era". New York: Routledge, 2003.
 * Paula Karsten, “Kamerun in Berlin und deutsche Briefe von Kamerun,” Globus (7 August 1897), pp. 97-99, trans, by Robbie Aitken and Jeff Bowersox.
 * Marks, Sally. “Black Watch on the Rhine: A Study in Propaganda, Prejudice and Prurience.” European Studies Review 13, no. 3 (1983): 297–334. https://doi.org/10.1177/026569148301300302.
 * Massaquoi, Hans J. "Destined to Witness: My Odyssey". New York: W. Morrow, 1999.
 * Nelson, Keith L. “The ‘Black Horror on the Rhine’: Race as a Factor in Post-World War I Diplomacy.” The Journal of Modern History 42, no. 4 (1970): 606–27. https://doi.org/10.1086/244041.
 * Roos, J. “Nationalism, Racism and Propaganda in Early Weimar Germany: Contradictions in the Campaign against the 'Black Horror on the Rhine'.” German History 30, no. 1 (2012): 45–74. https://doi.org/10.1093/gerhis/ghr124.
 * Wigger, Iris. 2019. "BLACK HORROR on the RHINE: Intersections of Race, Nation, Gender and Class in 1920s Germany".