Bidspirit auction | “For all these atrocities, Nazism

“For all these atrocities, Nazism and its supporters bear responsibility – we must never forget.” - Rare postwar memorial poster. Paris, May 17, 1945 - “For all these atrocities, Nazism and its supporters bear responsibility – we must never forget.” An early memorial poster documenting Nazi crimes in the death camps – published by PATRIE – Journal des Combattants Français (The Homeland – Newspaper of the French Fighters), a French newspaper issued by the French Ministry of War (Ministère de la Guerre) after the Liberation, through the Direction des Services de Presse – the Press Services Division of the Ministry of War. Paris, May 17, 1945 – just one week after the end of World War II. Extremely rare. The poster is composed of a multitude of harsh photographs from the scenes of the Dachau and Belsen death camps. These are shocking photos taken by the Allied forces upon the camps’ liberation, depicting: piles of corpses, mass graves, surviving inmates in the aftermath of liberation, death train transports, and more. At the center of the poster appears the inscription in German with a French translation: “For all these atrocities, Nazism and its supporters bear responsibility – we must never forget.” On the lower left and right, set against a red background, the following declaration appears: “We think we have said everything about the German concentration camps, and yet each time we uncover a new penal colony, a new hell, we reveal more bodies, more horror, more terror. Human language is powerless to express what we have seen and what we feel before these scenes, which are nearly unimaginable—and yet, undeniably real. Photographic documents speak better. They possess a moving eloquence. They show to what extent Nazi barbarism reached in its refined sadism and bestial cruelty. Photos of Belsen. Photos of Dachau. Gathered here, they are terrible accusations from which the executed cannot escape. Corpses—always, and everywhere, corpses. The Nazi camps were nothing but factories for the scientific production of death. Women, men, and children were indiscriminately caught in this dreadful fate. Starvation, despair, disease, torture, the cruelty of the guards—so many instruments of daily extermination for these innocent masses.  Limbs amputated, skulls torn open, eyes gouged out! Never has monstrosity sunk so far, so low. For the martyrs whose blood cries out for justice, for a justice system that cannot remain indifferent to such crimes, for a future that must be freed from this nightmare—these crimes must be punished.”  Dated May 17, 1945 – only one week after the end of World War II.  Size: 62x47 cm. Fold marks. Good condition.