Hitler Youth

Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow gives an excellently written, eye-opening view into Hitler's use and abuse of children in his rise to power and the Third Reich. While it is aimed at a juvenile or young adult audience, even adults can flip through the pages, looking at the photographs and reading about the lives of several of the children of the Hitler Youth and take something from it... the other side.

The 10 chapters of the book follow Hitler's rise to power, the organization and education of the Hitler Youth, what they were made to do before and during the war, and what happened to them after the resistance. Also included are a foreward and epilogue, timeline, author's notes, information about the photographs, a bibliography and an index. All of these make for an interesting and educational read, and a look into the other side of the Holocaust.


Stunning photographs mark nearly every page of the book, showing happy faces of families, child soldiers marching through the mud, Hitler's speeches, Jewish families in torment and the devastation of war. The book shares the back story of what happened during those gruesome years and how not everyone realized that what they were being asked to do was wrong. "'I can remember the feeling I had when he spoke,' said Sasha Schwarz, who was eleven when Hitler came to power. 'At last,' I said, 'here's somebody who can get us out of this mess'" (19). Was she ever wrong.

The CCBC (Cooperative Children’s Book Center Choices, 2006) says of Hitler Youth, "Bartoletti’s carefully researched, fascinating narrative is a compelling work of non-fiction. She provides extensive documentation in a volume that not only informs but also inspires readers to ask difficult questions about choices they may face in their own lives."


That simple review leads to a good dicussion for teens. How does your life compare to the teens of the Hitler Youth? Does it at all? What would they think if they lived now?

Bartoletti, Susan Campbell. 2005. Hitler Youth. New York: Scholastic. ISBN 9780439353793