A new search engine that allows users to search Nazi Party records to find out whether their ancestors were cardholders has been accessed millions of times since it went live earlier this month.
The vast database was provided by the German newspaper Die Zeit with the aim of “putting an end to the silence born of misplaced shame,” according to the paper’s editorial. It operates in cooperation with archives in Germany and the United States.
Founded after World War I, Hitler’s party did not really become popular until the economic collapse of the Great Depression. Support for the party surged during the 1930 election, and three years later Hitler’s election abolished all other political parties and created a mass movement that controlled every aspect of German life.
According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, by the late 1930s, “the majority of Germans supported Hitler and the Nazi state.”
According to Die Zeit, 10.2 million Germans joined the party in the 20 years starting in 1925, and at its peak at the end of World War II, the party had about 9 million members.
At the end of the war, the Nazis tried to destroy the party’s vast collection of membership cards, but they were saved at the last minute and later passed into American hands. They were then stored at the Berlin Documentation Center, but later transferred to the German Federal Archives, and a copy was also kept at the U.S. National Archives, the newspaper reported.
A spokesperson for Die Zeit told CNN that the new site has been visited millions of times and shared thousands of times.
Christian Staas, head of Die Zeit’s history department, told CNN there had been an overwhelming response to the search engine. He explained that an average of 75,000 people contact the German Federal Archives each year seeking this information, and that when the U.S. National Archives put the records online, demand was so high that the website temporarily went down.
Die Zeit accessed these records and developed “convenient search options” with the help of AI, Staas said. “This level of interest seems relatively new. I believe the fact that most former NSDAP (Nazi Party) members, or those involved in Nazi crimes or war crimes, are no longer in this world makes it easier for many people to ask questions about their family history.”
“Polls show that only a minority of Germans say that their ancestors supported the Nazi regime, and a significant number believe that their family members opposed Hitler. That is clearly not true. Perhaps our search engine can help people arrive at a more realistic view of the past,” he added.
Some of those who searched the records shared with Die Zeit their reactions after learning their suspicions were confirmed.
“My feelings are beyond control right now,” wrote one person, Katha1927, who suspected the grandfather of two had attended the party. “I’m wondering which entry date you think is worse: 1931 – so early and they were already so sure? Or 1941, even though they already knew so much?”
“For more than 40 years, I had suspected that my great-grandfather was a member. He was a railroad engineer during the Nazi era and was always enraged when the topic of war came up. My question is now answered. Thank you, Mr. Zeit. It hurt me deeply,” he said.
One person identified as “Aunt Horst” said that investigations into the family had always focused on the Jewish branch, which was “wiped out by the Shoah.”
The defendant said he had discovered “the ‘Aryan’ husband of a Jewish great-aunt” who had joined the Nazis in 1933. “His wife, most likely divorced, was killed by truck exhaust at Kulmhof (extermination camp) in May 1942,” he wrote.
Christine Schmidt, co-director of the Vienna Holocaust Library in London, called the search engine “a boon to scholarship on the Nazi era.”
“At its peak, the Nazi Party had about 8 million members. People joined for a variety of reasons, including economic desperation, an attraction to nationalism and charismatic leadership, or their own anti-Semitism,” she said.
He said that the archive’s data being made accessible “represents an important step forward in the national and international appreciation of this period and its resulting horrors,” adding: “In an era of increasing misinformation about the history of the Holocaust, it also serves as a reminder of the power and evidentiary capacity of original documents in the face of denial and distortion of the facts of the time.”
