I haven’t posted pictures of many of the things we have seen and done on this trip, because I do not feel comfortable photographing sites of atrocities or memorials to horrors. We have been to Sachsenhausen, the Wannsee Villa, the Memorial of the Murdered Jews of Europe and Track 17 to name a few. As someone who learned a good bit about the Holocaust while growing up and in college, I have learned so much more, and on a more intricate level in these last 7 days.
A recurring theme has been the lack of meaningful consequence to the perpetrators, both those at the high and low levels. We see the sites of unimaginable acts that were surrounded by unremarkable neighborhoods and daily life as those acts were happening, and are surrounded by unremarkable neighborhoods and daily life now. Some perpetrators had punishments, many did not. It is unsatisfying, although that seems like such an inadequate description.
Today we visited the Nuremberg Courthouse. I came to the courthouse in 2002 and very much wanted to see the courtroom of the Nuremberg Trials. I didn’t know then that it was a regular, operational courthouse. There wasn’t much to see. About 8 or 9 years ago, they opened a visitors center, not just to see the courthouse but to explain the process of how the Allies worked through uncharted legal territory, interpreting law that didn’t even really exist yet, conducting a trial while simultaneously still investigating, and with respect for due process to even the most horrible of actors.
The paucity of meaningful consequence is still unsatisfying, and I’m not sure if there even is any kind of consequence that could be. But from what we learned today, I took comfort in seeing how hard so many worked, how much they truly did try, to bring about justice in an impossible situation where there is none.
Elizabeth Collura lives in Pittsburgh, PA.