Luminous-Lint - for collectors and connoisseurs of fine photography
HOME  BACK>>> Subscriptions <<< | Testimonials | Login |

HomeContentsVisual indexes > Unidentified photographer

 
  
Standard
  
  
Unidentified photographer 
Eger, beim Einrücken deutscher Truppen [People of Cheb salute the German troops entering the town in the Anschluss of the Sudetenland in October 1938.] 
1938, October 
  
Gelatin silver print 
Deutsches Bundesarchiv (German Federal Archive) 
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H13160 / CC-BY-SA 
  
 
LL/43564 
  
Additional information (Wikipedia - Accessed April 2011):
 
This iconic picture of the Anschluss of the Sudetenland has been captioned and interpreted differently, depending on who published it. The Nazis, who first published it in autumn 1938 shortly after the Anschluss in their newspaper Völkischer Beobachter, claimed the woman cried tears of joy. See for instance this history of the Sudetenland, which seems to use such a caption:
 
A Sudeten woman, overcome with emotion, pays homage as the Wehrmacht enters the Sudeten border town of Cheb.
 
Also see the letter Lieutenant Earle A. Cleveland wrote to the Time Magazine (printed November 12, 1945). He wrote:
 
The Nazi explanation was that here were portrayed the intense emotions of joy which swept the Sudeten Germans as Hitler crossed the Czech border at Asch and drove through the streets of the nearby ancient city of Eger, 99% of whose inhabitants were ardently pro-Nazi Sudeten Germans at the time...
 
to which the Time editors commented
 
...sauce for the Nazi goose is sometimes sauce for Allied propaganda.
 
The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) provides this image (as #78) with the caption:
 
The tragedy of this Sudeten woman, unable to conceal her misery as she dutifully salutes the triumphant Hitler, is the tragedy of the silent millions who have been 'won over' to Hitlerism by the 'everlasting use' of ruthless force.
 
which is similar in spirit to the ADN/Zentralbild (a GDR news agency) German caption preserved by the German Federal Archive. Translation:
 
With her arm raised to the Hitler salute, this woman stood at the roadside when the troops of fascist Germany entered this town [Cheb] after the Munich Agreement (Sep. 29/30, 1938). The salute was not convincing; it was forced. She expresses it in her tears. Tears of misery, of deprivation, of human suffering. What has she gone through because of the fascists; what will she experience after this day? 
 

 
  
 
  
HOME  BACK>>> Subscriptions <<< | Testimonials | Login |
 Facebook LuminousLint 
 Twitter @LuminousLint