Willi Seitz papers

Willi Seitz is a native of Karlsruhe, Germany, and a survivor of the Holocaust. He was expelled from a German school at age 13 or 14 for refusing to participate in patriotic school activities, give the Hitler salute, and salute the Nazi flag. A hearing before the juvenile court decided that he should be sent to the reform school in Flehingen for National Socialist indoctrination. To save Seitz from the reform school, his father, Franz Josef Seitz (1893-1952), transferred him to France and then Switzerland. Shortly after his son’s trial, Franz Josef Seitz, a Jehovah’s Witness, was arrested for distributing illegal publications and eventually imprisoned in Buchenwald concentration camp. Seitz was liberated in April 1945 and reunited with Willi soon after. The Willi Seitz papers consist of photocopies of court records, a personal narrative, printed materials, and poems. The court records document his persecution for not participating in patriotic school activities The personal narrative documents his father’s experiences as a Jehovah’s Witnesses and political prisoner and his years in the Buchenwald concentration camp. Printed materials document Jehovah’s Witnesses, Buchenwald, and Salamo Arouch. The poems document the Buchenwald concentration camp.