June 30, 1934: The Night of the Long Knives

Left to right: Adolf Hitler, Gregor Strasser,

Ernst Röhm and Hermann Göring, 1932.

June 30, 1934: Adolf Hitler, Chancellor of Germany and Führer (Leader) of the Nazi Party, as paranoid as ever, consolidates his power with a "purge" that becomes known as "The Night of the Long Knives."

Ernst Röhm was the co-founder and leader of the Sturmabteilung (SA, meaning "Storm Division," or "Storm Troopers," also known as the "Brownshirts"), the Nazi Party's original paramilitary wing, which played a significant role in Hitler's rise to power. He and Hitler were close friends.

But Hitler began to see the independence of the SA, and the penchant of its members for street violence ,as a direct threat to his newly gained political power. He also wanted to appease leaders of the Reichswehr, the German military, who feared and despised the SA as a potential rival, in particular because of Röhm's ambition to merge the army and the SA under his own leadership.

Additionally, Hitler was uncomfortable with Röhm's outspoken support for a "second revolution" to redistribute wealth. In Röhm's view, President Paul von Hindenburg's appointment of Hitler as chancellor on January 30, 1933 had brought the Nazi Party to power, but had left unfulfilled the party's larger goals.

So, urged on by Hermann Göring, the President of the Reichstag (the national legislature), and Heinrich Himmler, the Reichsführer of the Schutzstaffel (SS, "Protection Squadron"), Hitler ordered a series of political extrajudicial executions.

The primary instruments of Hitler's action, which carried out most of the killings, were the  SS and its Sicherheitsdienst (SD, "Security Service"); and the Geheime Staatspolizei (shortened to "Gestapo," meaning "Secret State Police"), under the command of Reinhard Heydrich.

Leading members of the Strasserist faction of the Nazi Party, including its leader, Gregor Strasser, were also killed. So were establishment conservatives and anti-Nazis, such as former Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher and Bavarian politician Gustav Ritter von Kahr, who had helped suppress Hitler's Beer Hall Putsch in Munich in 1923. In Godfather terms, Hitler was settling all business.

Röhm was arrested in Munich, but not killed right away. On the afternoon of July 1, in his cell, he was approached by SS-Brigadeführer Theodor Eicke and SS-Obersturmbannführer Michael Lippert. They handed him a Browning pistol with one cartridge, and said that he had 10 minutes to use it on himself, or they would do it for him. He refused, saying, "If I am to be killed, let Adolf do it himself." Eicke and Lippert then carried out their threat. Röhm was 46 years old.

There are 85 documented cases of people killed in the Night of the Long Knives. The actual death toll is usually considered by historians to be over 200, and may be as high as 1,000. But it did what Hitler wanted it to do: It strengthened and consolidated his support within the military, and provided a legal grounding for the Nazis, as the German courts and cabinet quickly swept aside centuries of legal prohibition against extrajudicial killings to demonstrate their loyalty to the regime. Now, without question, Hitler was, in the words he used before a July 13 speech to the Reichstag, "the supreme administrator of justice of the German people."

Hitler's sense of justice wasn't the only perverted thing about his government.

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June 30, 1934 was a Saturday. Magician Harry Blackstone Jr. was born. And these baseball games were played:

* The Brooklyn Dodgers beat their arch-rivals, the New York Giants, 8-4 at the Polo Grounds. Ray Benge outpitched Carl Hubbell. Jimmy Jordan went 4-for-5 with an RBI. Giants player-manager Bill Terry and Mel Ott each went 1-for-4 with an RBI.

* The Boston Braves beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 6-2 at Braves Field in Boston.

* The Philadelphia Athletics beat the Boston Red Sox, 7-6 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. Bob Johnson saved the A's with a home run in the bottom of the 9th inning, and then Frankie Hayes singled Bing Miller home with the winning run in the bottom of the 10th. Jimmie Foxx went 0-for-4 with a walk for the A's.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 6-4 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Paul Waner went 1-for-5, and Lloyd Waner went 1-for-4 with a walk.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 11-4 at Crosley Field in Cincinnati. The Reds scored 9 runs in the bottom of the 8th inning.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Cleveland Indians, 2-1 at Comiskey Park in Chicago.

* The St. Louis Browns beat the Detroit Tigers, 4-3 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. Harlong Clift singled Rollie Hemsley home with the winning run in the bottom of the 10th inning. Tigers player-manager Mickey Cochrane went 2-for-3 with 2 walks and 2 RBIs. Hank Greenberg went 1-for-5.

* And, in what is, as far as I know, a unique example in MLB history, the New York Yankees were supposed to play the Washington Senators at Griffith Stadium, but, according to Baseball-Reference.com, the game was postponed -- due to wind. Not rain, not snow, not cold, but wind.

It was postponed until August 7, as part of a doubleheader. The Yankees won the opener, 4-3. The Senators won the nightcap, 6-3. Over the 2 games, Babe Ruth, in his last season as a Yankee, went 0-for-6 (only pinch-hitting in the nightcap); Lou Gehrig went 1-for-9 with a walk and an RBI; and Senators shortstop-manager Joe Cronin went 2-for-8.

June 10, 1942: The Lidice Massacre

June 10, 1942: The Nazis perpetrate the Lidice massacre in Czechoslovakia, as revenge for the assassination of "Protector" Reinhard Heydrich.

All 173 men over 15 years of age from the village were executed. Another 11 men who were not in the village were arrested and executed soon afterwards, along with several others already under arrest. The 184 women and 88 children were deported to concentration camps. A few children considered racially suitable for Germanisation were handed over to SS families, and the rest were sent to the Chełmno extermination camp, where they were gassed to death.

About 340 people from Lidice died because of the German reprisal. After the war ended, only 153 women and 17 children returned.

This is why you stop Nazis before they get the power to do this.

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June 10, 1942 was a Wednesday. These baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Detroit Tigers, 4-1 at Yankee Stadium. Johnny Murphy, in relief of Marv Breuer, gave up a home run to Ned Harris in the top of the 11th inning. Al Benton went the distance for win. Joe DiMaggio went 0-for-4 with a walk.

* The New York Giants beat the Cincinnati Reds, 6-1 at Crosley Field in Cincinnati. Mel Ott went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the St. Louis Browns, 10-3 at Fenway Park in Boston. Ted Williams went 0-for-3 with 2 walks, but had an RBIs on 2 groundouts.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Philadelphia Athletics, 4-1 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Washington Senators, 4-3 at Griffith Stadium in Washington. In the top of the 12th, Red Embree grounded to short, a fielder's choice that scored Ray Mack with the winning run.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Boston Braves, 3-0 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Rip Sewell pitched a 4-hit shutout. Former Pirate Paul Waner went 1-for-3 with a walk for the Braves.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 5-2 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

* And the Brooklyn Dodgers and the St. Louis Cardinals were rained out at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. The game was made up on August 27. The Dodgers won, 4-1. Curt Davis went the distance, and had 2 RBIs in his own cause. Rookie Stan Musial went 1-for-4.

May 27, 1942: The Assassination of Reinhard Heydrich

May 27, 1942: Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazis' Military "Protector" of Czechoslovakia, is assassinated by a thrown bomb, although he lives until June 4. He was 38 years old.

Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich was born on March 7, 1904 in Halle, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. He was a true believer in the Nazi cause, and rose through the ranks of the SS. He helped organize Kristallnacht, the coordinated attacks against Jews throughout Nazi Germany and parts of Austria on November 9 and 10, 1938.

He was appointed Director of the Reich Security Main Office on September 27, 1939, and Protector of Bohemia and Moravia, including much of the present-day Czech Republic, on September 29, 1941, essentially serving as Chancellor Adolf Hitler's "viceroy" there. He still held both posts at the time of his death.

Upon his arrival in the Czech capital of Prague, Heydrich sought to eliminate opposition to the Nazi occupation by suppressing Czech culture (suppressing national culture was done in other Nazi-controlled lands), and deporting and executing members of the Czech resistance. He was directly responsible for the Einsatzgruppen, the special task forces that travelled in the wake of the German armies and murdered more than 2 million people by mass shooting and gassing, including 1.3 million Jews.

Hitler called him "the man with the iron heart," and was ready to transfer to him to France, where the Resistance was gaining ground. Had he lived, he could have helped the Nazis win the war. He was, arguably, to the Nazis what Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson was to the Confederate States of America: The psychotic genius whose early death doomed the cause.

Due to this, and his role as a true believer in Nazi bigotry, people who write alternate history stories where the Nazis won the war often place Heydrich as the Führer, or at least as a leading potential successor to an elderly Hitler, in their story's "present day."

On May 27, 1942, in anticipation of his transfer to Paris, Heydrich prepared to meet Hitler in Berlin. His car would have to pass a section where the Dresden-Prague road merges with a road to the Troja Bridge, requiring to slow down due to a hairpin bend. As Heydrich's car slowed, Jozef Gabčík took aim with a Sten submachine gun, but it jammed and failed to fire. Heydrich ordered his driver, Klein, to halt and attempted to confront Gabčík rather than speed away.

Jan Kubiš, who had not been spotted by Heydrich or Klein, threw a converted anti-tank mine at the car as it stopped, which landed against the rear wheel. The explosion ripped through the right rear fender and wounded Heydrich in the lung, diaphragm and spleen. Gabčík and Kubiš had both been assigned to the task by the Czech government-in-exile in London. After Kubiš fled, Heydrich ordered Klein to chase Gabčík on foot, and Gabčík shot Klein in the leg before escaping.

Heydrich did not die immediately. On June 2, his immediate boss, Heinrich Himmler, flew to Prague to visit him. Heydrich's father had been a music impresario, and Himmler reported back that the son quoted a line from one of the father's operas: "The world is just a barrel-organ, which the Lord God turns Himself. We all have to dance to the tune which is already on the drum."

Heydrich fell into a coma the next day, and died the next, June 4. He would remain the highest-ranking Nazi official to be assassinated during World War II.

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May 27, 1942 was a Wednesday. These baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees beat the Philadelphia Athletics, 8-3 at Yankee Stadium. Tommy Henrich hit a home run. Joe DiMaggio went 0-for-3, but drew a walk, and had an RBI on a groundout.

* The New York Giants beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 6-2 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. Giants player-manager Mel Ott went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers beat the Boston Braves, 4-1 at Braves Field in Boston. Billy Herman hit a home run.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Washington Senators, 10-1 at Griffith Stadium in Washington. Ted Williams went 2-for-5 with 2 RBIs. Jimmie Foxx did not play in this game, and the Red Sox soon waived him. He was picked up by the Chicago Cubs.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 5-3 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Rookie Stan Musial went 2-for-4.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Cleveland Indians, 9-7 at League Park in Cleveland.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Chicago Cubs, 10-1 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

* And the St. Louis Browns beat the Detroit Tigers, 5-2 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis.

January 20, 1942: The Wansee Conference Produces "The Final Solution"

January 20, 1942: The Wannsee Conference is held outside Berlin. There, a new phrase was created for what to do about the Jewish people of Europe: Die Endlösung, or "The Final Solution." Because they didn't think that what they were already doing – arresting, imprisoning, sending to slave-labor camps – was enough.

Harvests were poor in Germany in 1940 and 1941, and food supplies were short, as large numbers of forced laborers had been brought into the country to work in the armaments industry. If these workers, as well as the German people, were to be adequately fed, there must be a sharp reduction in the number of "useless mouths," of whom the millions of Jews under German rule were considered, in the light of Nazi ideology, the most obvious example.

On July 31, 1941, Hermann Göring gave written authorization to SS Senior Group Leader Reinhard Heydrich to prepare and submit a plan for a "total solution of the Jewish question" in territories under German control, and to coordinate the participation of all involved government organizations. Various occurrences in World War II led to delays. On January 8, 1942, Heydrich sent new invitations to a meeting to be held on January 20. The venue for the rescheduled conference was a villa at Am Großen Wannsee 56-58, 14 miles southwest of central Berlin.

The resulting Generalplan Ost (General Plan for the East) called for deporting the population of occupied Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union to Siberia, for use as slave labor or to be murdered. The minutes of the Wannsee Conference estimated the Jewish population of the Soviet Union to be 5 million, including nearly 3 million in Ukraine.

In addition to eliminating Jews, the Nazis also planned to reduce the population of the conquered territories by 30 million people through starvation, in an action called the Hunger Plan, devised by Herbert Backe. Food supplies would be diverted to the Wehrmacht (German armed forces) and German civilians. Cities would be razed, and the land allowed to return to forest or resettled by German colonists.

The objective of the Hunger Plan was to inflict deliberate mass starvation on the Slavic civilian populations under German occupation by directing all food supplies to the German home population and the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front. Nazi ideology had the Slavic peoples as a "lesser" "race," along with Jews. According to the historian Timothy Snyder, 4.2 million Soviet citizens -- largely Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians -- were starved by the Nazis as a result of Backe's plan.

Oppression had already been underway for 9 years. Now, the Holocaust began.

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January 20, 1942 was a Tuesday. Baseball and football were out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. There was 1 game in the NHL: The New York Rangers beat the Boston Bruins, 4-2 at the Boston Garden.