Primary Source Databases & Archives
Below is a list of some of main primary source databases for Holocaust Studies. For databases covering historical news, see Find News.
- Eichmann Trial RecordingsVideo recordings from the 1961 trial of Adolf Eichmann, which took place in Jerusalem. Videos on this YouTube channel include simultaneous audio translation into English.
- Klemperer Online: Tagebcher 19181959Complete and unabridged diaries of German Holocaust survivor Victor Klemperer from 1918 to 1959 which provide historical account of daily life during Germanys Weimar Republic, Third Reich, Holocaust/Shoah, post-war years.
- Leo Baeck Institute CollectionsThe LBI collects, archives and digitizes sources on the history of German-speaking Jews. Related to Holocaust history are private collections of survivors and of refugees, as well as media publications and administrative records from Nazi Germany. Vast amounts of their holdings are available for viewing online.
- Visual History ArchiveA fully streaming video collection of more than 55,000 primary source testimonies from the USC Shoah Foundation of survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust and other genocides, including the Armenian Genocide, the Cambodian Genocide, the Central African Republic Conflict, contemporary antisemitism, the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsi in Rwanda, the Guatemalan Genocide, and the Nanjing Massacre. Note: only available remotely to UMN users. See Visual History Archive Online (version for non-UMN users).
- Testaments to the Holocaust. Documents and Rare Printed Materials from the Wiener Library, London This link opens in a new windowSearch the archives of the Wiener Library, London, the first archive to collect evidence of the Holocaust and the anti-semitic activities of the German Nazi Party contains eyewitness accounts, photographs, books and more. 75% is in German.
- Nuremberg Trials ProjectThe Harvard Law School Library's Nuremberg Trials Project is an open-access initiative to create and present digitized images or full-text versions of the Library's Nuremberg documents, descriptions of each document, and general information about the trials.
- UMN Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies' Digital CollectionsCollections related to the Armenian Genocide, Holocaust, and other genocides. In particular: Portraying Memories - Portraits & Conversations Survivors of the Shoah.
- Yad Vashem's Digital CollectionsDigital archive of documents, photos related to the Holocaust/Shoah. Also includes links to databases about victims, deportation, the Righteous, and more.
- EuroDocs Shoah (Holocaust)Links to primary historical documents covering the Holocaust/Shoah and Anti-Semitism. The sources are transcribed, reproduced in facsimile, or translated. Video, sound files, maps, photographs and other imagery, databases, and other documentation are also available.
- United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's CollectionsPortal to search through USHMM collections of artifacts, documents, photos, films, books, personal stories, and more covering the Holocaust. Note: some materials are only available on site at the museum.
UMN Archives and Special Collections on the Holocaust
Americans for Human Rights in Ukraine records. Verbatim, unedited transcripts of the trial proceedings for the State of Israel vs. John (Ivan) Demjanjuk in the Jerusalem District Court, 1987-1988. Demjanjuk, a suspected Nazi war criminal, stood trial for operating a gas chamber at the Treblinka camp in Poland.
Amos S. Deinard papers. (Partially digitized) Series 3 of the collection is comprised of pamphlets and publications related to topics that interested Deinard, namely anti-Semitism and Zionism. Some of the titles are from the 1930s-40s and discuss the rising persecution of Jews in Germany under the Nazis.
Association for Voluntary Sterilization records.(Partially digitized) Clippings on sterilization in Nazi Germany and discussion of the impact on Nazi sterilization programs and its effects on sterilization movement in the US.
Esther Winthrop papers. Reminisces on her Greek family, many of whom were lost during the Holocaust. Esther survived the war in Greece hidden and for a time in an orphanage.
David and Genia Levi papers, 1946-1979. This collection consists of the papers of David and Genia Levi, Holocaust survivors who immigrated to the United States in 1950, eventually settling in St. Paul, Minnesota. These papers mostly deal with the Levi's efforts for reparations from the German government.
Flori Loew papers. Contains correspondence (in German) and personal papers during her flight from Germany under Nazi persecution, traveling to Italy and England before settling in Minneapolis.
Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum records. (Partially digitized) A number of exhibitions touch upon the Holocaust.
Fred K Hoehler papers. (Partially digitized) Director, Division of Displaced Persons, United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) 1944-1945. UNRRA related files dating from 1943-1953 document services for and repatriation of displaced persons, including displaced Jewish survivors of the war, as well as genocide prevention, displaced persons camps, and conditions of the Jewish community in Germany.
German Propaganda Collection. The collection includes propaganda leaflets, newspapers, booklets, pamphlets, stickers and postcards distributed by various political parties in Germany, including the Nazi period.
Gisela Konopka papers. Includes a talk given at the University of Minnesota: “Resisting the Holocaust: a personal account,” focusing on Konopka’s formative experience with the Nazi resistance inside Germany, including time spent in a German concentration camp.
Harold C. Deutsch papers. A professor of History who worked as an interrogator of German war criminals at Nuremberg, this collection includes transcripts from Nazi interrogations.
Herman Stein papers. A leader in social work education, he worked with the American Joint Distribution Committee in Europe and North Africa in 1947 to assist survivors of the Holocaust and other displaced persons.
International Social Service, American Branch records. Of interest is materials on the United States Committee for the Care of European Children, Inc., 1945-1956 documenting rescue, transportation and foster care or adoption of children fleeing the war or post-war conditions in Europe. Access Restrictions.
Jewish Community Relations Council records. Records documenting their efforts in providing Holocaust education via Tolerance Minnesota and in leading local Yom HaShoah commemorations.
Jewish Community Relations Council / Anti-Defamation League Holocaust Oral History project records. This collection consists of taped oral histories and transcripts from Minnesota Holocaust survivors and liberators, a project funded by the Jewish Community Relations Council/Anti-Defamation League, which resulted in the publication Witnesses to the Holocaust: an oral history by Rhoda G. Lewin.
Mary Markreich Schwarz papers. Includes passports and documents allowing her to leave Germany in 1938 for Trinidad and Tobago, from where she eventually immigrated to St. Paul.
Max Lowenthal Papers. Includes files reflecting Lowenthal’s sponsorships of numerous European Jews who applied for travel visas during the Nazi rule in Germany and occupation of Poland and Hungary.
Michael Engel oral history. Engel was a Holocaust survivor; was interviewed by Rabbi Jonathan Perlman as part of his own Yom HaShoah project.
Mount Zion Temple Oral History records. (Partially digitized) Includes eight oral histories from Holocaust survivors.
National Conference of Christians and Jews records. (Partially digitized) Records document the efforts to reconcile Christian actions during the Holocaust and to commemorate the events of the Holocaust. The records also contain information on genocide treaties, including the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in 1948.
National Italian American Foundation records. Series nine is comprised of materials documenting the organization’s initiative to highlight the efforts of Italian officers to free or protect Jews living in areas occupied by the Italian Army during World War II. Some materials in Italian.
Ollie Randall papers. (Partially digitized) Includes records for the Newark House of New Jersey Fellowship Fund for the Aged, a house that provided shelter and services for elderly survivors of the Holocaust.
Robert O. Meyer papers. Details his emigration to the United States to join the Obstetrics and Gynecology department at the University of Minnesota after his position at the University of Berlin was eliminated in 1935 because of his Jewish ancestry.
Robert Winston Ross papers. Includes papers regarding his 1980 publication So It Was True: The American Protestant Press and the Nazi Persecution of the Jews which explores the theory that American Protestant churches were cognizant of the events surrounding World War II and the Holocaust.
United Way of Minneapolis records. (Partially digitized) Of particular interest is the United States Committee on Care of European Children 1940-1942.
World War Poster Collection. (Fully digitized) Includes German Election posters from 1932 including Nazi posters.
Finding Primary Sources in the Library Catalog
Additional primary source materials can be found by searching the University of Minnesota Libraries' Catalog. Enter one of the terms below and keywords of the event as subject keywords.
- "personal narratives" (Example: "holocaust" and "personal narratives")
- "sources"
- "documentary film"
- "interviews"
- "correspondence"
- The Third Reich Sourcebook byCall Number: eBookISBN: 9780520955141Publication Date: 2013With The Third Reich Sourcebook, editors Anson Rabinbach and Sander L. Gilman present a comprehensive collection of newly translated documents drawn from wide-ranging primary sources, documenting both the official and unofficial cultures of National Socialist Germany from its inception to its defeat and collapse in 1945. Framed with introductions and annotations by the editors, the documents presented here include official government and party pronouncements, texts produced within Nazi structures, such as the official Jewish Cultural League, as well as documents detailing the impact of the horrors of National Socialism on those who fell prey to the regime, especially Jews and the handicapped. With thirty chapters on ideology, politics, law, society, cultural policy, the fine arts, high and popular culture, science and medicine, sexuality, education, and other topics.
- Modern Genocide : a Documentary and Reference Guide byISBN: 9781440862335Publication Date: 2019This primary source collection closely examines and analyzes primary documents related to genocides, focusing on genocidal events from the beginning of the 20th century to the present.
- The Holocaust byISBN: 9780780809352Publication Date: 2006Provides coverage of all aspects of the Holocaust, from roots of anti-Semitism to Nazi "Final Solution" actions and policies. Features include narrative overviews of key events and trends, 100+ primary source documents, chronology, glossary, bibliography, and subject index
- A Holocaust Reader: from Ideology to Annihilation byISBN: 9780138422387Publication Date: 1998This unique book presents selections of original material related to the Holocaust, including documents, memoirs, and other primary sources that allows readers an unfiltered, firsthand means of evaluating the causes, events, and results of the Holocaust.
- Never again? : Genocide since the Holocaust byPublication Date: 2004DVD-R. This documentary film looks at Mao's purges in China, Cambodia under Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge, the Arab/Israeli conflict, border wars in Pakistan and Bangladesh, and killing in Central America.