Advocate for the Doomed

“[Chronicles] the efforts of this principled and persistent man to save Jews and others from the horrors of Nazism.” —Foreign Affairs

The private diary of James G. McDonald (1886–1964) offers a unique and hitherto unknown source on the early history of the Nazi regime and the Roosevelt administration’s reactions to Nazi persecution of German Jews. Considered for the post of US ambassador to Germany at the start of FDR’s presidency, McDonald traveled to Germany in 1932 and met with Hitler soon after the Nazis came to power. Fearing Nazi intentions to remove or destroy Jews in Germany, in 1933 he became League of Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and sought aid from the international community to resettle outside the Reich Jews and others persecuted there. In late 1935 he resigned in protest at the lack of support for his work.

This is the eagerly awaited first of a projected three-volume work that will significantly revise the ways that scholars and the world view the antecedents of the Holocaust, the Shoah itself, and its aftermath.

“A compelling look at one man’s efforts to do something about a looming catastrophe. At times the book is inspiring—McDonald’s prescience and energy are simply amazing. But because we know what is soon to happen to Europe’s Jews, we share his frustration that no one seems to be listening. We feel what it was to be an advocate for the doomed.” —The Wall Street Journal

“The diaries show that McDonald believed as early as 1933 that the Nazis were considering the mass killing of Europe’s Jews.” —The New York Times