Essay 1285

From worldwide news sources…

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Nazi’s chosen children reunite
Secret program gave Aryan kids to SS families

BY MELISSA EDDY

BERLIN -- For decades they suffered in silence, aging Germans who as children were selected by the Nazis for their Aryan qualities and handed over to SS families. Collectively known as “Lebensborn children,” some will gather publicly today for the first time.

Many are trying to make peace with the past. They are asking questions, tracing their roots and demanding that the truth be told about SS chief Heinrich Himmler’s Lebensborn, or “Source of Life,” program.

“It is an important issue, and it is time that it finally comes to light,” said 64-year-old Dagmar Jung, whose adoptive parents refused for years to answer her questions about her past as a Lebensborn child.

This weekend, Jung will be in the eastern town of Wernigerode, where the Nazis ran the “Harz” Lebensborn home, for a meeting of Lebensspuren -- Traces of Life -- a group formed last year. For the first time, part of the session will be open to the public.

Of the group’s 60 members, about two-thirds are Lebensborn children who, now in their 60s, feel a need to break one of the last taboos about the Adolf Hitler era.

Lebensborn was a lesser-known side of Nazi racial experiments. While millions of Jews and others deemed “undesirable” were being slaughtered, thousands of children were selected for Aryan physical qualities and given to families of SS members.

The Nazis kept the program, created in 1935, so secret that many of those selected do not know who they are.

“I want to give others courage,” said Jung, who for 30 years has tried to piece together her true identity “To send the message, no matter how old you are, it is worth it to find out where you came from.”