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Dr. Patrick Bernhard

Cummings Foundation Fellow
“Origins of a Fascist Interpol: German Police Collaboration with Franco’s Regime During and After the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1943”

Professional Background

Dr. Patrick Bernhard is an assistant professor of history at Trinity College Dublin (Ireland). He earned his PhD in history from the University of Munich (Germany) in March 2003.

While in residence at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Dr. Bernhard conducted research on his project entitled, “Origins of a Fascist Interpol: German Police Collaboration with Franco’s Regime During and After the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1943.”

Dr. Bernhard speaks German natively and is fluent in English and Italian. He also possesses linguistic skills in French and Spanish.

Dr. Bernhard has authored and edited several published works including: Den Kalten Krieg denken. Beiträge zur sozialen Ideengeschichte seit 1945 (2012); “Behind the Battle Lines: Italian Atrocities and anti-Jewish Persecution in North Africa, 1940-1943,” for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (2012); “The Beginning of a Fascist Interpol: Italo-German Police Collaboration with Franco’s Regime During and After the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1944,” for the Journal of Modern History (2011); Zivildienst zwischen Reform und Revolte: Eine bundesdeutsche Institution im gesellschaftlichen Wandel, 1961-1982 (2005); and Die Schweiz und Deutschland, 1945-1961 (2004).

Fellowship Research

For his Cummings Foundation Fellowship Dr. Bernhard examined archival holdings at the Museum in order to fully understand the depth of collaboration between the police of Nazi Germany and that of Franco’s Spain. Most people are unaware of the support given by the German police to Franco and his forces in order to fight “enemies” that were not on the battlefield, such as dissenters. Dr. Bernhard examined several archival series held at the Museum including those about Spain, the Spanish Border Police, and the Papers of Joseph Shadur and Dolf Ringel.

Dr. Bernhard was in residence at the Mandel Center from September 1 to December 31, 2014.