Joseph Goebells

Joseph Goebells

November 9, 1938
           November 9 was like any other day for me.  I remember receiving the last of my birthday gifts, since it was about ten or eleven days after my birthday.  It was my 41st birthday.  I was just going over the plan I had set up for that night with my fellow Nazi soldiers.  After all, I was in charge.  I was Hitler’s chief in propaganda.  I was the one who planned the attack, in which we used the murder as an excuse for it.  About 24 hours after my acquaintance, Ernst vom Rath was shot.  I suggested that all of the Nazi party and even other Germans to take part in throwing rocks at Jewish buildings and vandalizing them in any way possible.  All of the other Nazis thought it was a good idea and I knew at that point that it was going to turn out good.  All of this was discussed at a mandatory meeting I had set up for all Nazis to go to and participate in.  At midnight on November 9, 1938, we all set out for a riot that would eventually be known as ‘Kristallnacht’.  I was pretty proud of leading an attack that worked very well and caused many Jews to flee Germany.  I fired stones at windows, making glass shatter everywhere.  I seemed heartless; I did all of these actions without feeling any sympathy for the Jews, because I don’t like them.  In fact, I hated them and still do now.  I remember lighting a fire inside one old man’s synagogue, which burnt it to the ground and he just sat on the curb, crying.  I felt happy, although I realize that I did a terrible thing.  The attack that I had planned lasted for the whole night into the next morning, for hours and hours.  I think that during that attack, we scared the Jews a lot.  I now regret what I planned only a little bit.

May 1, 1945           

    I am starting to regret everything I have done in my life.  I think it is time to take my own life.  The house I live in is crazy, my kids, wife, and I, are stressed out everyday and I do not want to live this way.  At eight o’clock, my family is going to go to one of my personal doctors and I am going to have him perform a special operation. He is going to knock my kids and wife unconscious and kill them, and then he will kill me.  So, I guess this is my last journal entry.  Goodbye.