Germany Cancels Auction of Holocaust Artifacts After Backlash; 87th Kristallnacht Anniv. Nov. 9, 1938

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3. Continued, DW News Article...

Auction of Holocaust items canceled after outrage, DW, 11/16/2025.

Cont.. Welcoming the cancellation, German State Minister for Culture Wolfram Weimer told dpa he expected steps to be taken to prevent such auctions in the future. "Documents or expert reports by Nazi perpetrators that were offered at the auction are not for private collections," he said. "These historical documents of suffering and crime belong in memorials, museums and research institutions."

What was to be auctioned? In a listing that has been removed from its website, Felzmann had described a trove of documents in its auction titled "System of Terror Vol II," with items dating from 1933 to 1945.

Among the various items were Nazi documents on a forced sterilization carried out at the Dachau concentration camp. The auction would have included records of companies forcefully sold to Nazis, as well as identification documents and passports of Jews who managed to flee persecution to Chile and Argentina. It featured "life saving documents" like a release form for a prisoner who was able to leave the Mauthausen concentration camp.

In one of the most personal items, the auction house was preparing for bidding on three journal notebooks of an anonymous Polish Jew who survived the war in Poland. Controversially, the auction also nearly included worn Stars of David from the Buchenwald concentration camp and also a Star of David armband. --