Novelist Explores the Dark Legacy of Nazi Maternity Wards in New Book

Caroline De Mulder's novel, Himmler's Children, sheds light on the chilling workings of the Lebensborn program, a Nazi initiative established by Heinrich Himmler in 1935. The program aimed to produce racially "pure" Aryan children through a network of maternity homes for the offspring of SS members. According to De Mulder, the facilities often served as secretive havens for mothers selected based on strict racial criteria, where they could give birth discreetly.

The narrative alternates between the lives of a nurse, a pregnant French woman connected to the SS, and a prisoner from Dachau, depicting the stark contrast between the perceived cleanliness of the Lebensborn homes and the horrors of the concentration camps. The author highlights a harrowing episode where a disabled baby is taken for "Sonderbehandlung," euphemistically indicating extermination, showcasing the brutality beneath the surface.

De Mulder asserts that these maternity wards symbolize a perverse manipulation of motherhood, reducing women to mere vessels for Nazi ideals, while the "Nazi babies" created became stigmatized remnants of a grim history. Her work raises questions about ordinary evil and the complicity of those involved in such a horrific regime.