Suicide of Hitler in Berlin
The advance of Soviet troops and the treatment of Benito Mussolini's body unhinge Hitler. He and his wife, Eva Braun, commit suicide in a command bunker beneath Berlin.
Execution of Benito Mussolini
Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, who was removed from office in September 1943, is caught trying to flee Italy and executed by partisans. His body is publicly displayed to jeering crowds and then thrown into a gutter.
British forces liberate Bergen-Belsen
British troops liberate Bergen-Belsen in northwest Germany, finding approximately 60,000 prisoners still alive and thousands of unburied dead throughout the camp. They document the horrors inflicted by the Nazis on Jews and other inmates. Many of the survivors are gravely ill and some 13,000 of them die after liberation.
American forces liberate Buchenwald
The US Army under General Dwight Eisenhower liberates the concentration camp Buchenwald, finding over 20,000 prisoners. Eishenhower visits the liberated camp and urges American troops to witness the effects of the Nazi genocide against the Jews.
Soviet forces liberate Auschwitz
Soviet troops reach the Auschwitz camp complex and find about 7,000 prisoners still alive in Auschwitz, Birkenau, and Monowitz, most of them severely ill. Despite Nazi efforts to destroy evidence of mass murder, the Soviets find warehouses filled with the sorted belongings of the victims: shoes, eyeglasses, dentures, hair, as well as evidence of mass graves.