Archives Unbound:
British and European History
British and European History
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Archives Unbound
===Product Icon===
===Subject Collections===
• African American Studies
• African Studies
• American Studies
• Asian Studies
• British and European History
➡ Central Europe
➡ Colonialism
➡ Eastern Europe
➡ European Military History
➡ France
➡ Germany
➡ Ireland
➡ Northern Europe
➡ Russia/USSR
➡ Southeastern Europe
➡ United Kingdom
• Business and Economic History
• Cultural Studies
• Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies
• Health and Environmental Studies
• Holocaust Studies
• International Relations
• Latin American & Caribbean Studies
• Law, Politics, and Radical Studies
• Middle Eastern Studies
• Native American Studies
• Religious Studies
===Subject Collections===
• African American Studies
• African Studies
• American Studies
• Asian Studies
• British and European History
➡ Central Europe
➡ Colonialism
➡ Eastern Europe
➡ European Military History
➡ France
➡ Germany
➡ Ireland
➡ Northern Europe
➡ Russia/USSR
➡ Southeastern Europe
➡ United Kingdom
• Business and Economic History
• Cultural Studies
• Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies
• Health and Environmental Studies
• Holocaust Studies
• International Relations
• Latin American & Caribbean Studies
• Law, Politics, and Radical Studies
• Middle Eastern Studies
• Native American Studies
• Religious Studies
Archives Unbound: British and European History
This collection provides opportunities for an interdisciplinary examination of historical events in the United Kingdom and Europe. Included are US classified country reports, newspapers, pamphlets, propaganda, and many other primary sources that give insight on specific regional changes during and after the war.
European Military History
Afghanistan in 1919: The Third Anglo-Afghan War - This collection presents the complete files of the Political Warfare Executive (PWE) kept at the U.K. National Archives as FO 898 from its instigation to closure in 1946, along with the secret minutes of the special 1944 War Cabinet Committee "Breaking the German Will to Resist."
Allied Propaganda in World War II and the British Political Warfare Executive - This collection presents the complete files of the Political Warfare Executive (PWE) kept at the U.K. National Archives as FO 898 from its instigation to closure in 1946, along with the secret minutes of the special 1944 War Cabinet Committee "Breaking the German Will to Resist."
British Campaign in Mesopotamia, 1914-1918 - The Mesopotamian Campaign deserves to be far better known than it is—both in terms of its impact on the war and the subsequent course of the history of the Middle East. This new collection provides the opportunity to review the telegrams, correspondence, minutes, memoranda, and confidential prints gathered together in the India Office Military Department on Mesopotamia. In 1914 the British/Indian Army expedition to Mesopotamia set out with the modest ambition of protecting the oil concession in Southern Persia but, after numerous misfortunes, ended up capturing Baghdad and Northern Towns in Iraq. Initially, the mission was successful in seizing Basra but the British/Indian forces found themselves drawn North, becoming besieged by Turkish forces at Kut. After various failed relief attempts the British surrendered and the prisoners suffered appalling indignities and hardship, culminating in a death march to Turkey. In 1917, a new Commander-in-Chief was appointed but, as usual in Iraq, military policy kept changing. Hopes that the Russians would come into the war were dashed by the Revolution. Operations were further frustrated by the hottest of summers. Fighting against Turkish forces continued right up to the Armistice. The conduct of the Campaign was subject to a Commission of Inquiry which was highly critical of numerous individuals and the administrative arrangements.
Conditions & Politics in Occupied Western Europe, 1940-1945 - These historical documents capture the hidden history of war-torn Europe and offer researchers, teachers, and students many new perspectives on politics, diplomacy, and everyday life in the German-occupied countries. Here is the complete record of political life in Occupied Western Europe available to the British Government during World War II from the original intelligence reports received by the British Foreign Office following the breakdown of normal diplomatic relations during wartime from class "FO 371" at The National Archives. The collection includes detailed information indexed by year and section, from the occupied states of Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, and the Vatican, and the neutral countries—Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. Some of the topics covered include the German attempts to win over important groups in occupied countries, the reaction to, and effect of, the German occupation, the propaganda struggle, the creation of the first resistance units, the repercussions of events such as the German invasion of Russia and essays on life under occupation in France, the Low Countries, and Norway.
La Guerra Civil Española - This collection presents approximately 3,000 rare pamphlets, including publications from Spain, Portugal, Latin America, and the Philippines, as well as more than 100 German pamphlets published in Spanish. Distributed throughout Spain, Germany, Italy, the Soviet Union, and North America, the pamphlets in this collection represent the opinions and philosophies of the insurgents, anarchists, socialists, and communists. The pamphlets contain a wealth of information on Spanish and international history, ideology, political science, church and state conflicts, nationalism, socialism, fascism, and communism.
Military Leaders of World War I: Official and Private Papers of Generaloberst Hans von Seeckt - The materials reproduced in this collection consist of letters and other papers of Generaloberst Hans von Seeckt, prominent German military strategist of World War I. At various times he served on military missions to Turkey and China. After World War I, as military head of the Reichswehr, he was considered the organizer and "father" of the army of the German Republic.
Nazi Bank and Financial Institutions: U.S. Military Government Investigation Reports and Interrogations of Nazi Financiers, 1945-1949 - This publication comprises two collections, Records Regarding Bank Investigations and Records Relating to Interrogations of Nazi Financiers, from the records of the Office of the Finance Division and Finance Advisor in the Office of Military Government, U.S. Zone(Germany) (OMGUS), during the period 1945–1949. Records Regarding Bank Investigations, 1945–1949, consists primarily of memorandums, letters, cables, reports, exhibits, newspaper clippings, and civil censorship intercepts on the financing of the German war effort and German financial institutions. The records include reports on Nazi gold, the use of Swiss banks, and links between German and Swiss banks, inclusive of Commerzbank, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Golddiskontbank, Dresdner Bank, and Reichs-Kredit-Gesellschaft. The investigations contain information regarding Aryanization, bank operations outside of Germany, industrial ties, liquidation proposals, and the restitution of Hungarian property. Records Relating to Interrogations of Nazi Financiers, 1946–1947 consists of interrogation reports and transcripts, exhibits, and questionnaires. Names included are Bernhard Berghaus, Alois Alzheimer, August von Finck, Eduard Hilgard, Kurt Schmitt, and Franz Schwede-Coburg. Also among these records are files relating to Carlowitz & Company and Japanese firms operating in Germany.
Nazism in Poland: The Diary of Governor-General Hans Frank - This collection reproduces the Tagebuch or journal of Dr. Hans Frank (1900-1946), the Governor-General of German-occupied Poland from October 1939 until early 1945. The journal is in typed format, in chronological order, covering all aspects of Generalgouvernment (GG) administration from its seat in the royal Wawel castle in Krakau (Kraków). The entries reflect administrative matters, rather than the spontaneous thoughts or feelings usually found in a diary.
Patriotes aux Armes! (Patriots to Arms!): The Underground Resistance in France, Belgium, Holland, and Italy, 1939-1945 - This Collection consists of newspapers and periodicals, broadsides, leaflets, books and pamphlets, and other ephemera produced by or relating to the underground resistance in Belgium, France, Italy, and The Netherlands during the Second World War. Also included are related materials: ephemera from the pre-War and “Phony War” periods; Free French and other foreign publications; items related to the liberation of Paris and to the period immediately after the liberation; autograph letters and manuscripts; and books inscribed by their authors. Most of the documents are in French, while some are in German, Flemish, Dutch, Italian, and Yiddish.
Post-War Europe: Refugees, Exile and Resettlement, 1945-1950 - This online archive delivers essential primary sources for the study and understanding of the challenges facing the European peoples in the aftermath of World War II. It covers the politics and administration of the post-war refugee crisis in Europe well as the day-to-day survival of the refugees themselves. Although the War in Europe ended officially in May 1945, the struggle continued for the millions of homeless people who had been displaced as a result of military action, deportation into labor or concentration camps, local racism and discrimination, or the relocation of national borders. The burden of the refugee problem taxed the Allied governments and Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) relief groups in their attempts to administer, feed and house moving people searching for their lost families and a permanent home. A rapid repatriation program was organized but many Displaced Persons (DPs) could not or would not return to their homelands. Emigration programs struggled against the reluctance of nations outside Europe to assist in the resolution of this humanitarian catastrophe.
Psychological Warfare and Propaganda in World War II: Air Dropped and Shelled Leaflets and Periodicals - This publication collection consists of over 1,000 airdropped and shelled leaflets and periodicals created and disseminated during the Second World War. The majority of items in this collection were printed by the Allies then air or container dropped, or fired by artillery shell over German-occupied territory. Many leaflets and periodicals have original publication codes and were printed in over 10 languages. Only shelled leaflets, Germans to Allies (115 items), are in English.
Records of the Deutsche Ausland-Institut, Stuttgart: Records on Resettlement - This collection includes Nazi records on resettlement kept or collected by the Deutsches Ausland-Institut (German Foreign Institute, DAI), Stuttgart, seized from the Axis Powers during and after WWII. These records are most valuable in documenting the implementation and modification of National Socialist race doctrine. Included are records of resettlement negotiations and agreements with the Russians, Rumanians, and Italians and records describing the treatment and attitudes of all kinds of resettlers. In addition, the collection throws light on the conflict between diverse SS agencies as well as between the SS and other agencies of Party and State. In fact, it documents nearly all aspects of resettlement, not least through the untranslatable language in which this project in demographic engineering was conducted.
Records of the Office of the Reich Commissioner for the Strengthening of Germandom - The Reich Commissioner for the Strengthening of Germandom (Reichskommissar für die Festigung deutschen Volkstums, RKFDV) was an office in Nazi Germany responsible for repatriation, and settlement of both German citizens and ethnic Germans who lived abroad, into Nazi Germany and German-held territories. This collection of RKFDV records seized from the Axis Powers covers primarily the records of the Chief Staff Office (Stabshauptamt). Some records of other offices of the RKFDV are also included: Kattowitz office, Aussiedlungsstab Kauen (Kaunas/Kowno), Zentralbodenamt. A small amount of material of the Höhere SS- und Polizeiführer Süd (Wehrkreis VII) als Beauftragter des RKFDV, Sonderstab Henschel and Getto-Verwaltung Litzmannstadt (Lodz) are also included.
SAFEHAVEN Reports on Nazi Looting of Occupied Countries and Assets in Neutral Countries - SAFEHAVEN was the code name of a project of the Foreign Economic Administration, in cooperation with the State Department and the military services, to block the flow of German capital across neutral boundaries and to identify and observe all German overseas investments. The records reproduced in the collection consist primarily of reports and letters, cables, and military attaché reports referring to specific SAFEHAVEN reports or SAFEHAVEN-related topics. Such topics include information on alleged art looting; business matters (including alleged patent transfers) pertaining to leading German industrial firms such as Bosch and I.G. Farben; and various Third Reich personalities.
The Economy and War in the Third Reich, 1933-1944 - This official statistical source provides rare, detailed data on the German economic situation during the Third Reich up to and throughout World War II. Consisting of Monatliche Nachweise-ber den Auswartigen Handel Deutschlands (January 1933-June 1939); Der Aussenhandel Deutschlands Monatliche Nachweise (July 1939); and Sondernachweis der Aussenhandel Deutschlands (August 1939-1944).
This collection provides opportunities for an interdisciplinary examination of historical events in the United Kingdom and Europe. Included are US classified country reports, newspapers, pamphlets, propaganda, and many other primary sources that give insight on specific regional changes during and after the war.
European Military History
Afghanistan in 1919: The Third Anglo-Afghan War - This collection presents the complete files of the Political Warfare Executive (PWE) kept at the U.K. National Archives as FO 898 from its instigation to closure in 1946, along with the secret minutes of the special 1944 War Cabinet Committee "Breaking the German Will to Resist."
Allied Propaganda in World War II and the British Political Warfare Executive - This collection presents the complete files of the Political Warfare Executive (PWE) kept at the U.K. National Archives as FO 898 from its instigation to closure in 1946, along with the secret minutes of the special 1944 War Cabinet Committee "Breaking the German Will to Resist."
British Campaign in Mesopotamia, 1914-1918 - The Mesopotamian Campaign deserves to be far better known than it is—both in terms of its impact on the war and the subsequent course of the history of the Middle East. This new collection provides the opportunity to review the telegrams, correspondence, minutes, memoranda, and confidential prints gathered together in the India Office Military Department on Mesopotamia. In 1914 the British/Indian Army expedition to Mesopotamia set out with the modest ambition of protecting the oil concession in Southern Persia but, after numerous misfortunes, ended up capturing Baghdad and Northern Towns in Iraq. Initially, the mission was successful in seizing Basra but the British/Indian forces found themselves drawn North, becoming besieged by Turkish forces at Kut. After various failed relief attempts the British surrendered and the prisoners suffered appalling indignities and hardship, culminating in a death march to Turkey. In 1917, a new Commander-in-Chief was appointed but, as usual in Iraq, military policy kept changing. Hopes that the Russians would come into the war were dashed by the Revolution. Operations were further frustrated by the hottest of summers. Fighting against Turkish forces continued right up to the Armistice. The conduct of the Campaign was subject to a Commission of Inquiry which was highly critical of numerous individuals and the administrative arrangements.
Conditions & Politics in Occupied Western Europe, 1940-1945 - These historical documents capture the hidden history of war-torn Europe and offer researchers, teachers, and students many new perspectives on politics, diplomacy, and everyday life in the German-occupied countries. Here is the complete record of political life in Occupied Western Europe available to the British Government during World War II from the original intelligence reports received by the British Foreign Office following the breakdown of normal diplomatic relations during wartime from class "FO 371" at The National Archives. The collection includes detailed information indexed by year and section, from the occupied states of Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, and the Vatican, and the neutral countries—Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. Some of the topics covered include the German attempts to win over important groups in occupied countries, the reaction to, and effect of, the German occupation, the propaganda struggle, the creation of the first resistance units, the repercussions of events such as the German invasion of Russia and essays on life under occupation in France, the Low Countries, and Norway.
La Guerra Civil Española - This collection presents approximately 3,000 rare pamphlets, including publications from Spain, Portugal, Latin America, and the Philippines, as well as more than 100 German pamphlets published in Spanish. Distributed throughout Spain, Germany, Italy, the Soviet Union, and North America, the pamphlets in this collection represent the opinions and philosophies of the insurgents, anarchists, socialists, and communists. The pamphlets contain a wealth of information on Spanish and international history, ideology, political science, church and state conflicts, nationalism, socialism, fascism, and communism.
Military Leaders of World War I: Official and Private Papers of Generaloberst Hans von Seeckt - The materials reproduced in this collection consist of letters and other papers of Generaloberst Hans von Seeckt, prominent German military strategist of World War I. At various times he served on military missions to Turkey and China. After World War I, as military head of the Reichswehr, he was considered the organizer and "father" of the army of the German Republic.
Nazi Bank and Financial Institutions: U.S. Military Government Investigation Reports and Interrogations of Nazi Financiers, 1945-1949 - This publication comprises two collections, Records Regarding Bank Investigations and Records Relating to Interrogations of Nazi Financiers, from the records of the Office of the Finance Division and Finance Advisor in the Office of Military Government, U.S. Zone(Germany) (OMGUS), during the period 1945–1949. Records Regarding Bank Investigations, 1945–1949, consists primarily of memorandums, letters, cables, reports, exhibits, newspaper clippings, and civil censorship intercepts on the financing of the German war effort and German financial institutions. The records include reports on Nazi gold, the use of Swiss banks, and links between German and Swiss banks, inclusive of Commerzbank, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Golddiskontbank, Dresdner Bank, and Reichs-Kredit-Gesellschaft. The investigations contain information regarding Aryanization, bank operations outside of Germany, industrial ties, liquidation proposals, and the restitution of Hungarian property. Records Relating to Interrogations of Nazi Financiers, 1946–1947 consists of interrogation reports and transcripts, exhibits, and questionnaires. Names included are Bernhard Berghaus, Alois Alzheimer, August von Finck, Eduard Hilgard, Kurt Schmitt, and Franz Schwede-Coburg. Also among these records are files relating to Carlowitz & Company and Japanese firms operating in Germany.
Nazism in Poland: The Diary of Governor-General Hans Frank - This collection reproduces the Tagebuch or journal of Dr. Hans Frank (1900-1946), the Governor-General of German-occupied Poland from October 1939 until early 1945. The journal is in typed format, in chronological order, covering all aspects of Generalgouvernment (GG) administration from its seat in the royal Wawel castle in Krakau (Kraków). The entries reflect administrative matters, rather than the spontaneous thoughts or feelings usually found in a diary.
Patriotes aux Armes! (Patriots to Arms!): The Underground Resistance in France, Belgium, Holland, and Italy, 1939-1945 - This Collection consists of newspapers and periodicals, broadsides, leaflets, books and pamphlets, and other ephemera produced by or relating to the underground resistance in Belgium, France, Italy, and The Netherlands during the Second World War. Also included are related materials: ephemera from the pre-War and “Phony War” periods; Free French and other foreign publications; items related to the liberation of Paris and to the period immediately after the liberation; autograph letters and manuscripts; and books inscribed by their authors. Most of the documents are in French, while some are in German, Flemish, Dutch, Italian, and Yiddish.
Post-War Europe: Refugees, Exile and Resettlement, 1945-1950 - This online archive delivers essential primary sources for the study and understanding of the challenges facing the European peoples in the aftermath of World War II. It covers the politics and administration of the post-war refugee crisis in Europe well as the day-to-day survival of the refugees themselves. Although the War in Europe ended officially in May 1945, the struggle continued for the millions of homeless people who had been displaced as a result of military action, deportation into labor or concentration camps, local racism and discrimination, or the relocation of national borders. The burden of the refugee problem taxed the Allied governments and Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) relief groups in their attempts to administer, feed and house moving people searching for their lost families and a permanent home. A rapid repatriation program was organized but many Displaced Persons (DPs) could not or would not return to their homelands. Emigration programs struggled against the reluctance of nations outside Europe to assist in the resolution of this humanitarian catastrophe.
Psychological Warfare and Propaganda in World War II: Air Dropped and Shelled Leaflets and Periodicals - This publication collection consists of over 1,000 airdropped and shelled leaflets and periodicals created and disseminated during the Second World War. The majority of items in this collection were printed by the Allies then air or container dropped, or fired by artillery shell over German-occupied territory. Many leaflets and periodicals have original publication codes and were printed in over 10 languages. Only shelled leaflets, Germans to Allies (115 items), are in English.
Records of the Deutsche Ausland-Institut, Stuttgart: Records on Resettlement - This collection includes Nazi records on resettlement kept or collected by the Deutsches Ausland-Institut (German Foreign Institute, DAI), Stuttgart, seized from the Axis Powers during and after WWII. These records are most valuable in documenting the implementation and modification of National Socialist race doctrine. Included are records of resettlement negotiations and agreements with the Russians, Rumanians, and Italians and records describing the treatment and attitudes of all kinds of resettlers. In addition, the collection throws light on the conflict between diverse SS agencies as well as between the SS and other agencies of Party and State. In fact, it documents nearly all aspects of resettlement, not least through the untranslatable language in which this project in demographic engineering was conducted.
Records of the Office of the Reich Commissioner for the Strengthening of Germandom - The Reich Commissioner for the Strengthening of Germandom (Reichskommissar für die Festigung deutschen Volkstums, RKFDV) was an office in Nazi Germany responsible for repatriation, and settlement of both German citizens and ethnic Germans who lived abroad, into Nazi Germany and German-held territories. This collection of RKFDV records seized from the Axis Powers covers primarily the records of the Chief Staff Office (Stabshauptamt). Some records of other offices of the RKFDV are also included: Kattowitz office, Aussiedlungsstab Kauen (Kaunas/Kowno), Zentralbodenamt. A small amount of material of the Höhere SS- und Polizeiführer Süd (Wehrkreis VII) als Beauftragter des RKFDV, Sonderstab Henschel and Getto-Verwaltung Litzmannstadt (Lodz) are also included.
SAFEHAVEN Reports on Nazi Looting of Occupied Countries and Assets in Neutral Countries - SAFEHAVEN was the code name of a project of the Foreign Economic Administration, in cooperation with the State Department and the military services, to block the flow of German capital across neutral boundaries and to identify and observe all German overseas investments. The records reproduced in the collection consist primarily of reports and letters, cables, and military attaché reports referring to specific SAFEHAVEN reports or SAFEHAVEN-related topics. Such topics include information on alleged art looting; business matters (including alleged patent transfers) pertaining to leading German industrial firms such as Bosch and I.G. Farben; and various Third Reich personalities.
The Economy and War in the Third Reich, 1933-1944 - This official statistical source provides rare, detailed data on the German economic situation during the Third Reich up to and throughout World War II. Consisting of Monatliche Nachweise-ber den Auswartigen Handel Deutschlands (January 1933-June 1939); Der Aussenhandel Deutschlands Monatliche Nachweise (July 1939); and Sondernachweis der Aussenhandel Deutschlands (August 1939-1944).
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Archives Unbound