Schindler Jews

In 2000, the list of Jewish employees drawn up by Oscar Schindler to save the Schindlerjuden ( Schindler Jews ) from Nazi death camps was discovered in a suitcase full of papers left to a German couple, the German newspaper Stuttgarter Zeitung reported. Stuttgarter Zeitung said it planned to give the suitcase to Yad Vashem.

The Stuttgart couple, relatives of close friends of Oscar Schindler, found the list of 1,200 Schindler Jews among the papers, which deal mainly with his life after World War II. The papers were donated to the newspaper, the Stuttgarter Zeitung. They include a speech Schindler gave on May 8, 1945, as the war ended. In it, he urged the SchindlerJews who worked for him not to pursue revenge attacks.

Schindler Jews History

The list of Schindler Jews obtained by the newspaper is on letterhead for Schindler's enamelware factory in Krakow, southern Poland. Schindler wrote the names and jobs of 1,200 Jews at the Plaszow concentration camp and gave the list to the Nazi SS, said Mordechai Paldiel, director of the department at Israel's Holocaust memorial Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Paldiel said no one at the memorial has ever seen the original list, and that presumably it would have been saved in the SS archives. It is also possible Schindler kept a copy, he said.

A second list, the one that appears in Steven Spielberg's 1993 film "Schindler's List" was created a month before the war ended. Schindler made up that list with fictitious jobs for each worker to convince the SS that they were vital to the war effort. Schindler went on to be recognized as a righteous gentile for his efforts to save his Schindlerjuden ( Schindler Jews ).

The suitcase with the names of Schindler Jews inside was found by the Stuttgart couple at a relative's house in Hildesheim, Lower Saxony. A former neighbor of Schindler's in Frankfurt, Dieter Trautwein, confirmed that Oscar Schindler spent the last months of his life in Hildersheim with friends after becoming ill.

Learn more About Schindler Jews

Learn more about Schindler Jews at the Official Schindler's List DVD web site. You can also preorder and buy your Schindler's List DVD at the Universal Home Video & DVD store.