Lesson Y9-U05-L01

Y9-U05-L01 The Nazi Police State Quiz: KS3 History, Unit 18

20 questions

Written by Revision Ninja · Last reviewed 11 October 2026

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Lesson Y9-U05-L01, The Nazi Police State: 20 multiple choice questions for the KS3 History (National Curriculum), Unit 18: Year 9: Life in Nazi Germany, written with Revision Ninja.

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The 20 questions

  1. Which elite force began in the 1920s as Hitler's personal bodyguard of about 300 men?

    • The Reichswehr
    • The SS
    • The SA
    • The Hitler Youth

  2. Who led the SS and ran the police state under Hitler?

    • Ernst Rohm
    • Heinrich Himmler
    • Hermann Goering
    • Joseph Goebbels

  3. What does 'Gestapo' stand for?

    • German Economic Security Police, responsible for trade inspections
    • Reich Security Service for the Army, based in Berlin's barracks
    • Geheime Staatspolizei, the secret state police
    • National Labour Front for Workers, which ran factories and unions

  4. What did 'protective custody' mean in the police state?

    • Arrest without charge or trial, and being sent to a camp
    • Guards placed to protect parliament members during each sitting
    • A pardon given to prisoners at Christmas and other public holidays
    • A free trial before a people's court with a lawyer and witnesses

  5. Which concentration camp opened near Munich in March 1933?

    • Auschwitz
    • Buchenwald
    • Belzec
    • Dachau

  6. How did the Gestapo build files on people it suspected?

    • By printing daily newspapers for the government
    • By tapping phones and opening post
    • By training young boys for the army
    • By organising rallies at Nuremberg

  7. About how many Gestapo officers were there for a population of 66 million?

    • About 3.2 million
    • About 320,000
    • About 3,200
    • About 32,000

  8. By what date had Himmler's SS controlled all police across Germany, including the Gestapo?

    • By 1933
    • By 1945
    • By 1936
    • By 1939

  9. Which groups were held in the early concentration camps of 1933?

    • Communists, Socialists and trade unionists
    • Olympic athletes who had criticised the regime
    • Nazi Party members who had lost their seats
    • Foreign journalists who visited Berlin

  10. Why did the threat of being 'sent away' keep most people in line?

    • They feared arrest without trial and being sent to a brutal camp
    • The camps were open to public visits on weekends and public holidays
    • They were paid by the state to stay quiet about what they had seen
    • Camps only held criminals who had been found guilty in a court

  11. How could a Gestapo of only about 32,000 officers control 66 million people?

    • Ordinary Germans informed on their neighbours, so people policed themselves
    • The SS had two million officers watching every street in every German city
    • The Gestapo had a secret army of ten million soldiers hidden across the country
    • The Gestapo only watched the army and ignored the civilians living nearby

  12. What is the name for an ordinary person who secretly reported neighbours or workmates to the authorities?

    • A propagandist
    • An informant
    • A Reichstag deputy
    • A government minister

  13. Which feature was typical of members of the SS?

    • They were elected by local councils
    • They were required to be over sixty years old
    • They were hand-picked for loyalty and 'racial purity'
    • They were chosen by lottery from the army

  14. What did the SS's role in the Night of the Long Knives in 1934 prove?

    • The SS was limited to guarding prisons
    • The SS was too weak to control the SA
    • The SS had been banned by the army
    • The SS had enough power to murder Nazi rivals

  15. What is a 'police state'?

    • A country where government uses police, spies and fear to control what people do, say and think
    • A country ruled by the army, with no courts, no independent judges and no elections
    • A country with no police force at all, relying on local volunteers only
    • A country where the police are elected by voters in every local district

  16. What could the Gestapo do to a suspect without any charge or trial?

    • Arrest them and send them to a camp
    • Ask the army to hand them to a foreign court
    • Hold a public hearing before the Reichstag
    • Fine them for speaking in a public square

  17. Why did the Nazis build the camps in the years after 1933?

    • The army ran them from the start to train soldiers in discipline and weapons use
    • They were closed by the Gestapo after one year when funding for them was cut
    • They were set up within weeks of Hitler taking power, to hold opponents and persecuted groups
    • They were built only after the war began in 1939 to hold foreign prisoners of war

  18. Which was the main source of the Gestapo's power, according to historians?

    • Fear of being watched and reported
    • A huge army of soldiers stationed in every town
    • A large network of paid foreign spies
    • Special uniforms that people respected

  19. What was the aim of the police state in Nazi Germany?

    • To ensure that elections were held every year in every German state and city
    • To make people too frightened to even think about opposing the Nazis
    • To protect Germany from foreign spies and sabotage by neighbouring states only
    • To give every German a free trial before a court of ordinary judges

  20. Why might ordinary Germans have helped keep the police state going?

    • Only the army supported the police state while civilians remained neutral
    • Informing on others and censoring themselves spread control beyond the police
    • The police state had no real effect on ordinary Germans in their daily lives
    • Ordinary Germans were forced to join the SS by law in every district of Germany

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