Calls made for Canadian auction house to drop the sale of Nazi memorabilia

"Our position is that it's disgusting and unacceptable that people should be buying and selling relics of murder and genocide."

By DONNA RACHEL EDMUNDS
A man wearing a Swastika [Illustrative] (photo credit: CARLOS BARRIA / REUTERS)
A man wearing a Swastika [Illustrative]
(photo credit: CARLOS BARRIA / REUTERS)
A Jewish organization has called on a Canadian auction house to drop the sale of dozens of Nazi memorabilia items, which are being sold as part of a broader estate sale.
Shackelton Auctions near Aylmer, Ontario has been commissioned to sell thousands of items amassed by a prolific collector in his lifetime; among them dozens of items from the Nazi era ranging from guns and swords to flags and lapel pins bearing the swastika, and even bowls bearing Nazi insignia.
The items are being offered within an auction of WWI and WWII items due to close on August 18, but many of the items already have live bids. The auction house has attached a notice to the particular of the sales noting: "The items in this auction do not represent the views of opinions of Shackelton or Sackrider auctions or their staff."
Jaime Kirzner-Roberts of the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies has called for the auction to be halted, and for the Nazi items to be donated to a museum. She is also calling for the law to be amended in Canada to outlaw the sale of such items.
"Our position is that it's disgusting and unacceptable that people should be buying and selling relics of murder and genocide," she said, according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). "We find it very difficult to imagine any legitimate reason why someone would want to possess them."
The concern, Kirzner-Roberts said, is that the items could end up in the hand of Nazi sympathizers, while speculators could profit from items associated with genocide.
"These items should be given to an educational institution or museum where the public can make use of these items as tools for learning about the horrors of racism and genocide," Kirzner-Roberts said.
However, the owner and auctioneers of the auction house, Mike Shackleton, has told CBC that, while he is sympathetic to the views of Kirzner-Roberts, the sale will go ahead.
The items were among the private estate of a "major collector" from Oshawa, Ontario, who was a regular buyer at auctions and antiques sales of everything from vintage license plates and gas pumps, to toys and coins. Shackleton said he didn't believe the man held pro-Nazi views.
His estate has been split into four separate sales, including the military and war-time auction which also includes Canadian patriotic posters, books and music, among other items.
"I do have mixed emotions on selling these items, but the sale is going forward, and it's our hope that these items land in the right hands," Shackleton told CBC. "It is our hope that these items do go to museums or to groups that are going to do the right thing. That will help us remember history so that these things don't happen again."
He added that he did raise the possibility of donating the Nazi items to a museum with the family before the listings went live, but that they opted to go ahead with the sale.
Currently, there is no law in Canada banning the sale of Nazi-related materials, as there are in Germany and Austria.
In February, a Montreal auction house pulled Nazi memorabilia from sale after the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies raised similar concerns.


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