Bryan Mark Rigg

Bryan Mark Rigg (born March 16, 1971 in Texas , USA ) is a German -born American historian and writer . Rigg became famous for his work on Hitler's Jewish soldiers .

biography

Bryan Mark Rigg was raised Baptist by his family. In 1991 he went to Germany to learn the language of his ancestors who immigrated from Germany in 1863. As a history student, he wanted to learn more about his family history and found out that a great-grandmother had belonged to the Jewish community. Rigg professed Judaism.

In 1996 Rigg graduated from Yale University with a bachelor's degree in history with honors . At the University of Cambridge , he made his Masters in 1997 ; in 2000 he received his PhD in philosophy ( Ph. D. ). He served as a volunteer in the Israeli army and as an officer in the US Marine Corps . Rigg has taught Holocaust, military history, and religion at American Military University in Manassas, Virginia and Southern Methodist University, Dallas. In 2006 he ended this activity.

In December 2008, Rigg founded his own company, RIGG Wealth Management, LLC.

Awards

Rigg received the William E. Colby Award in 2003 for the book Hitler's Jewish Soldiers .

Hitler's Jewish soldiers

In his work Hitler's Jewish soldiers , Rigg points out that even after 1940, “mixed-race Jewish” and “ Jewish-versed ” served in the Wehrmacht , although there was an order to release them. Some remained as officers in the Wehrmacht until 1944 with a “driver's license” . Rigg put the number of " Jewish half-breeds " (according to the definition of the First Ordinance on the Reich Citizenship Law ) of conscripted age at 117,000 - 190,000. He therefore estimated the number of servants at 60,000 "half-Jews" and 90,000 "quarter Jews".

Rigg documented 1,671 cases and conducted interviews with 430 surviving German soldiers of Jewish descent and their relatives. The interviewees made source material available to him that had hitherto been unknown or ignored. Subsequent archive studies opened up further important documents. The people listed in his book include Ernst Benda , Egon Bahr , Erhard Milch , Robert Borchardt , Walter Holländer , Walter Lehweß-Litzmann and Bernhard Rogge . According to Riggs , a total of 244 Jewish mongrels received the Iron Cross , one the German Cross in silver, 19 the German Cross in gold and 15 the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross . Rigg states that at least 21 German generals and admirals had Jewish ancestors.

Contemporary documents and interviews that Rigg was able to collect in 8 mm film but also on VHS for his book project were purchased and archived in 1997 for the Federal Military Archive at the Bundeswehr Military History Research Office (MGFA) in Potsdam .

Riggs theses did not remain undisputed. The historian Beate Meyer criticizes Riggs book as a "sham package". She accuses the author of a lack of source criticism and objects to the figures mentioned. There were a maximum of 33,000 "half-breeds" or "Versippte" with them who were fit for military service, of whom only some were drafted. Christoph Rass describes Riggs' figure of 150,000 Wehrmacht members of Jewish descent as "rightly controversial".

Publications

• Hitler's Jewish soldiers. Schöningh Verlag, Paderborn 2003. ISBN 3-506-70115-0 .
• Rabbi Schneersohn and Major Bloch: an incredible story from the first year of the war. Hanser, Munich 2006. ISBN 978-3-446-20730-1 .
• The Untold Stories of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers University of Kansas Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-7006-1638-1

Web links

• Literature by and about Bryan Mark Rigg in the catalog of the German National Library
• Review by Beate Meyer, Die ZEIT, November 6, 2003
• Abstract in pearl diver

Footnotes

1. ↑ Igal Avidan: POLITICAL LITERATURE - Bryan Mark Rigg: Hitler's Jewish Soldiers . Retrieved January 25, 2013 (" ... American historian Bryan Rigg ... " on dradio.de ). 
2. ^ Dorie Baker: Alumnus Bryan Rigg reveals untold story of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers . (No longer available online.) May 3, 2002, archived from the original on October 15, 2012 ; Retrieved January 25, 2013 (" He returned to his family in Texas, where he had grown up as a devout Baptist ... " in Volume 30, Number 28). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ^ Dorie Baker: Alumnus Bryan Rigg reveals untold story of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers . (No longer available online.) May 3, 2002, archived from the original on October 15, 2012 ; Retrieved January 25, 2013 (" He now identifies himself as Jewish " in Volume 30, Number 28). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ^ First Unitarian Church of Dallas: Krystallnacht: The Night of Broken Glass . (No longer available online.) Formerly in the original ; Retrieved January 25, 2013 (" BRYAN MARK RIGG received his BA with honors in history from Yale University and received the Henry Fellowship for graduate study at Cambridge University, where he received his MA and Ph.D. He has served as a volunteer in the Israeli Army and as an officer in the US Marine Corps. [...] His books, Hitler's Jewish Soldiers, Rescued from the Reich and Lives of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers, have been featured in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and London Daily Telegraph. ").  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.    
5. ^ German Academic Exchange Service eV (DAAD): Bryan Mark Rigg . Retrieved January 25, 2013 (2010-06-23 from daad.de ). 
6. ^ First Unitarian Church of Dallas: Krystallnacht: The Night of Broken Glass . (No longer available online.) Formerly in the original ; Retrieved January 25, 2013 (" BRYAN MARK RIGG [..] Currently he owns his own financial advisory firm RIGG Wealth Management, LLC. His books, Hitler's Jewish Soldiers, Rescued from the Reich and Lives of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers, have been featured in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and London Daily Telegraph. ").  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.    
7. ^ German Academic Exchange Service eV (DAAD): Bryan Mark Rigg . Retrieved January 25, 2013 (2010-06-23 from daad.de ). 
8. ↑ Table with comparative figures in Rigg, Hitler's Jewish soldiers, p. 76
9. ^ Dorie Baker: Alumnus Bryan Rigg reveals untold story of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers . (No longer available online.) May 3, 2002, archived from the original on October 15, 2012 ; Retrieved January 25, 2013 ("Rigg estimates that there were 60,000 half-Jews in the Nazi army and 90,000 quarter-Jews." in Volume 30, Number 28). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
10. ^ Review by Beate Meyer, Die ZEIT, November 6, 2003
11. ↑ Review by Christoph Rass in: Birthe Kundrus , Beate Meyer (ed.): The deportation of Jews from Germany: Plans-Practice-Reactions 1938-1945, Göttingen 2004, ISBN 3-89244-792-6 , p. 235. online on books.google.de