What primary historical sources establish the six million figure for Jewish victims of the Holocaust?

1. Nazi wartime administrative and camp records: documentary fragments that point to mass murder

Surviving German documents — orders, correspondence about “Final Solution” logistics, camp registers and some transport lists — are primary evidence showing an organized, state-sponsored program to kill Jews across occupied Europe; these records do not contain a single roll call of six million but they provide piece‑by‑piece documentation of systematic deportation and extermination policies and of the operation of death camps such as Auschwitz, Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibor ^{[1] [2] [4]}.

2. Interrogations and affidavits given by perpetrators: Eichmann, Höttl and other sources

Postwar interrogations, affidavits and testimonies from Nazi officials and functionaries — most famously Adolf Eichmann’s statements to SS officer Wilhelm Höttl and other interrogations recorded after liberation — are primary-source testimony that both describe the intent and often quote large victim totals; historians treat these statements as evidence to be weighed alongside documentary and demographic data rather than as a standalone numeric ledger ^{[5] [1]}.

3. Camp and transport-level records and forensic accounting of specific killing sites

Detailed camp-level work sheets, transport manifests, SS reports, and forensic recovery at extermination sites have produced site-by-site victim estimates (for example, conventional tallies for Auschwitz, Treblinka, Belzec, Chelmno, Sobibor and Majdanek) that aggregate into the larger total; these camp figures are derived from surviving records, Nazi reporting, and postwar investigations into mass grave sites ^{[5] [4] [1]}.

4. Postwar demographic reconstruction: population balances and censuses

Historians have used prewar and postwar Jewish population counts, migrations, refugee records, and demographic reconstruction to estimate losses — a procedure that compares expected population baselines with documented survivors and refugees; multiple independent demographic studies since the 1940s have consistently produced estimates in the range of roughly five to six million Jewish deaths, which is why that range is accepted by major institutions ^{[1] [6] [7]}.

5. Victim registries, death certificates and archival aggregations (Yad Vashem, Arolsen, USHMM and national archives)

Large modern archival projects have compiled millions of individual records: Yad Vashem’s Central Database holds millions of names (with roughly 4.5 million names collected as part of that effort), the Arolsen Archives hold millions of documents including death-certificate records issued postwar, and national and museum archives (USHMM, National Archives, JDC, Wiener Library and many university collections) assemble transport lists, community records and survivor testimonies that, taken together, substantiate large-scale loss even while acknowledging there is no single contemporaneous ledger of every victim ^{[1] [3] [8] [9]}.

6. How historians synthesize these primary sources — and the methodological limits

Scholars synthesize heterogeneous primary evidence — fragmentary Nazi records, perpetrator interrogations, camp-specific documentation, demographic reconstruction and millions of survivor and witness testimonies — to arrive at the consensus range of roughly five to six million Jewish victims; reputable institutions emphasize that no single document lists all victims and that the six‑million figure is the result of cumulative, convergent research rather than one definitive wartime tally, a nuance highlighted by archives such as Arolsen and institutions like the USHMM and national archives ^{[3] [2] [1] [9]}.