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JewishHistoryעברית

Expulsion of the Jews of Alsace

Date
13 July 1940 – 30 July 1940Hebrew date: 7th of Tamuz, 5700 – 24th of Tamuz, 5700
Location
AlsaceFrance
Then part of
Nazi Germany
Perpetrators
  • Gauleiter Wagner (State)
Killed (estimate)
No reliable estimate
Expelled (estimate)
3,000[1]More than 3,000 Alsatian Jews expelled (source 1).
Country

1.3% – 1.5% of the Jewish population of Nazi Germany (c. 1939)[30]

Worldwide

0.018% of the worldwide Jewish population (c. 1939)[3]

Category
Expulsion
Confidence
Medium

Summary

After the armistice of June 1940, Alsace was attached in practice to the German Reich and placed under Gauleiter Wagner, although no treaty recorded the annexation. A circular of 13 July 1940 ordered that the region be cleared of Jews. The Strasbourg and Bouxwiller museum exhibition states that people were sometimes given only a few hours to leave, were limited to 30 kilograms of luggage and 150 Reichsmarks, and had their homes sealed and their goods sold. USHMM dates the expulsion of more than 3,000 Alsatian Jews to southern (Vichy) France to 16–30 July 1940. The same exhibition records that the Weil family of Bouxwiller was taken away on 14 July 1940. It also states that Moselle was annexed at the same time and that Nazi anti-Jewish legislation was applied in both Alsace and Moselle.

Sources

  1. 1940: Key Dates. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  2. Fleeing to Survive. The Jews of Alsace in the Nazi Maelstrom. Musées de la Ville de Strasbourg and Musée judéo-alsacien de Bouxwiller

Jewish population (estimates)

  • Worldwide: 16,500,000 – 16,633,675[3]c. 1939DellaPergola's revised core estimate for 1 January 1939 is 16.5 million. The American Jewish Year Book 1948–49 compiled 16,633,675 at the end of 1939.
  • Nazi Germany: 202,000 – 237,723[30]c. 1939End of 1939, about 202,000 Jews remained in Germany (USHMM refugees article); on the eve of war USHMM also cites about 214,000 in Germany proper (1937 borders). The losses-by-country table lists 237,723 as the Jewish population of Germany in 1939. These figures are for Germany proper (Altreich), not Greater Germany. For Altreich + annexed Austria at end-1939, USHMM gives about 202,000 + 57,000 = ~259,000 residual; Austria alone had about 185,000–192,000 at the March 1938 Anschluss (USHMM losses table / Austria article). Also: Eve of / early war, Altreich borders unless noted. USHMM Losses: 237,723 in 1939. USHMM German Jews: approximately 214,000 in Germany proper (1937 borders) on the eve of World War II. AJYB Moskowitz: 202,400 on 31 December 1939 (Reichsvertretung report). Not Greater German Reich (excludes Austria/Protectorate unless a source says so).

Sources for population estimates

  1. Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2024. American Jewish Year Book 2024, via Berman Jewish DataBank (2025)
  2. Sergio DellaPergola, Notes toward a Demographic History of the Jews. Genealogy 8(1) (2024)
  3. Jewish Population of Europe in 1933. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  4. Jewish Population of the World. American Jewish Year Book 1948–1949, via Berman Jewish Policy Archive (1949)
  5. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Voluntary Conversions and Diaspora: A Human Capital Interpretation of Jewish History. American Economic Association annual meeting paper (2007)
  6. Jews in the USSR (1926–1959). Demographic Changes. JewishGen Belarus SIG (table compiled from the 1939 All-Union census)
  7. Mandate for Palestine. Report of the Mandatory to the League of Nations (Palestine Administration, 1922). United Nations UNISPAL (British mandatory report) (1922)
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  10. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Religious Norms, Human Capital, and Money Lending in Jewish European History. Handbook chapter PDF via zvi-eckstein.com
  11. Sergio DellaPergola, Some Fundamentals of Jewish Demographic History. Berman Jewish Policy Archive (PDF) (2001)
  12. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, THE CHOSEN FEW: HOW EDUCATION SHAPED JEWISH HISTORY, 70–1492 (book summary). Bar-Ilan University Economics seminar PDF (Princeton University Press forthcoming summary)
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  20. Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2024. American Jewish Year Book 2024, via Berman Jewish DataBank / Israel CBS host (2025)
  21. Sergio DellaPergola, Demographic Trends in Israel and Palestine: Prospects and Policy Implications. American Jewish Year Book 2003, via Berman Jewish DataBank (2003)
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  23. US Jewish Population Pocket Demographics 2.0. Berman Jewish DataBank / Jewish Federations of North America (2018)
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  29. Robin R. Mundill, The Jews under Edward I (PhD thesis). University of St Andrews
  30. Stéphane Mechoulan, The Expulsion of the Jews from France in 1306: a modern fiscal analysis. University of Toronto Department of Economics working paper (2004)
  31. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Appendix A: Sources and Methodology for Section 2 (Jewish and total population in Germany-Austria and Poland-Lithuania). Authors' appendix PDF (citing Weinryb, Stampfer, Kupovetsky, Guggenheim, Toch, Battenberg, Israel) (2018)
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  50. Greece. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  51. Lithuania. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
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  54. Jacqueline Shields, Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries. Jewish Virtual Library
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