Metadata: Russian State Military Archive RGVA (CChIDK) Moscow “Looted Files" on Switzerland Microfilm holdings
Collection
- Country:
- Switzerland
- Holding institution:
- Archives of Contemporary History at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich
- Holding institution (official language):
- Archiv für Zeitgeschichte der ETH Zürich
- Postal address:
- Hirschengraben 62, CH-8092 Zurich
- Phone number:
- +41 44 632 40 03
- Web address:
- https://www.afz.ethz.ch/
- Email:
- afz@history.gess.ethz.ch
- Reference number:
- RGVA Schweiz
- Title:
- Russian State Military Archive RGVA (CChIDK) Moscow “Looted Files" on Switzerland Microfilm holdings
- Title (official language):
- Russisches Staatliches Militärarchiv RGVA (CChIDK) Moskau "Beuteakten" zur Schweiz Mikrofilmbestand
- Date(s):
- 1914/1945
- Language:
- German
- Extent:
- 41 microfilms
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
As regards the provenance of the "loot files" in the RGVA, there are files from the various Nazi ministries, the army, the SS, the Gestapo, the German occupation authorities in Austria, Belgium, Holland, France as well as in Southeastern and Eastern Europe. In addition, business files of numerous Jewish organisations the German occupying forces had appropriated also reached Moscow.
Reference is made here only to the files of the American Joint Distribution Committee and the United Jewish Emigration Committee "HICEM". These are the correspondence of the organisations, their annual reports, the documents on their religious and social activities and on their financial and organisational work in the field of refugee assistance.
The thematic focus of the AfZ's film project is on the above-mentioned activities of Jewish organisations throughout Europe as well as those of the various Nazi ministries, mainly in terms of legal and illegal political, economic and intelligence relations with Switzerland. A corresponding focus on filming is the file holdings of the Four-Year Plan Authority and the Reich Ministry of Economics. In addition to 40 microfilms, the collection also contains 1.6 shelf metres of paper copies.
Looted files of Jewish organisations and companies are for example files concerning the Zionist association "Jewish National Fund - Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael” (KKL). The collection contains correspondence with Jewish organisations in Geneva and Basel (1939-1940), for example, the Fédération internationale des Ligue contre le racisme et antisemitisme. It also contains conference documents on the international conference against anti-Semitism in Geneva, correspondence of the executive office with the SIG, the Zionist Society and other Jewish organisations (1934-1939). It also includes reports and correspondence on the situation of Jews in the occupied countries and on the activities of the Jewish refugee committees in the occupied countries, lists of transmigrants from the Netherlands, accounts of Swiss Jewish organisations, correspondence with Swiss Jewish organisations on financial issues (1931-1940). There is also correspondence with the branches in the occupied territories on the situation of the Jews, correspondence with the SIG and other Jewish organisations in Switzerland, reports on the situation of exiled Jews in South America, financial reports of the branches, activity report of the Committee (1933-1940). The collection also contains reports on the situation of Jewish refugees in Switzerland and on the situation of Jews in Germany and the occupied countries (1936-1939).
- Archival history:
- Since December 1998 there has been close cooperation between the AfZ (Archiv für Zeitgeschichte) and the RGVA (formerly "Special Archive") in Moscow. The subject of this cooperation is a complete film project on files relevant to Switzerland from the stock of the so-called "looted files". These files, which were previously in the possession of the National Socialist authorities in Germany, have been in Moscow since 1945, after having been removed from the German Reich by the victorious Soviet troops. The public only learned of the existence of this archive after the end of the Soviet system in 1991; since then it is open to international research. Since Russia, with the exception of two cases, has so far been unwilling to return these files to their original owners, filming projects such as this one represent the only way to secure the holdings of the RGVA for research outside Russia. To this day, the AfZ (Archiv für Zeitgeschichte) is the only archive in the German-speaking world that allows research to gain insight into these files from the Nazi era. It now has 41 microfilm reels with 2,500 pages each.
- Access points: locations:
- Basel
- Geneva
- Switzerland
- Finding aids:
- An online finding aid is available.
- Links to finding aids:
- http://onlinearchives.ethz.ch/
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Museum Hohenems
- Author of the description:
- Severin Holzknecht; Jewish Museum of Hohenems; 2020