It's a bit strange question but I can't find anything in this topic. So currently I'm working on a book that is set in the 1940's in Germany, and one of the characters in it was born to a British father and a German mother. Since he was born in the early 1910's, it means that he spent his young adulthood in the Nazi era. So my question is that: what was the protocol with people like him? How would the German racial laws affect his life?
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1Note that Germany was at war against the United Kingdom. So, if your character has British citizenship, your character might be considered an enemy or potential threat by Germany.– StefJan 15 at 15:18
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1See for instance (external links): British internees in Germany; Britons rounded up in occupied France; How would a British person have been treated in Nazi Germany?– StefJan 15 at 15:19
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1 Answer
How German racial laws affected people who weren't Jewish but one of their parent's wasn't German?
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born to a British father and a German mother
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So my question is that what was the protocol with people like him? How would the German racial laws affect his life?
It wouldn't, since:
- a) he would be a British Subject
- only in cases of illegitimate birth was citizenship derived from the mother
- b) he would be considered to be of Aryan descent
Aryan certificate - Wikipedia: 3rd Paragraph on Page 41:
Arischer Abstammung (deutschblütig) ist demnach derjenige Mensch, der frei von einem, vom deutschen Volke aus gesehen, fremdrassigen Blutseinschlage ist. Als fremd gilt hier vor allem das Blut der auch im europäischen Siedlungsraume lebenden Juden und Zigeuner, das der asiatischen und afrikanischen Rassen und der Ureinwohner Australiens und Amerikas (Indianer), während z.B. ein Engländer oder Schwede, ein Franzose oder Tscheche, ein Pole oder Italiener, wenn er selbst frei von solchen, auch ihm fremden Blutseinschlägen ist, als verwandt, also als arisch gelten muß, mag er nun in seiner Heimat oder in Ostasien oder in Amerika wohnen oder mag er Bürger der U.S.A. oder eines südamerikanischen Freistaates sein.
Aryan descent (of German blood) is therefore a person who, from the point of view of the German people, is free of a foreign blood strain. The blood of the Jews and Gypsies who also live in the European settlement area, that of the Asian and African races and the natives of Australia and America (Indians), is considered foreign here, while e.g. an Englishman or Swede, a Frenchman or Czech, a Pole or Italian, if he himself is free from such blood stains, which are also foreign to him, must be regarded as related, i.e. as Aryan, whether he lives in his homeland or in East Asia or in America or whether he is a citizen of the USA or a South American free state.
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6The character might run into the issue of "proving" the "purity" of the English ancestors. German churches got used to research in parish records, an Anglican parson might provide wrong or incomplete answers.– o.m.Jan 14 at 14:37
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Interesting that according to that document, Poles and Czechs could be considered Aryan — I thought that generally the Nazis considered Slavs as Untermenschen? Jan 15 at 14:23
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@PeterLeFanuLumsdaine Just as in medicine, just because they look similar doesn't mean that they are the same. You now know the official meaning of Aryan, now all you need to learn is what what was unerstood as to be a Untermenschen (as understood by the National Socialists, which does not incluve Slavs - despite the the claim in the English version of Untermenschen that it does). Jan 15 at 17:43
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@PeterLeFanuLumsdaine Since the Aryan certificate was the document that was considered to be the ultiment proof of what the National Socialists believed to be an Aryan, assume that other claims are false. Jan 15 at 17:43