Dr. Aharon Pick diary
Extent and Medium
folders
3
Creator(s)
- Aharon Pick
Biographical History
Dr. Aharon (Aaron) Pick (also spelled Pik or Pieck) (1872-1944) was born in Kėdainiai, Lithuania and practiced medicine and participated actively in Jewish cultural life in Šiauliai (Shavli). He and his family were forced into the Šiauliai ghetto in 1941, and Aharon worked in the ghetto hospital until his death following an illness in June 1944. His wife, Dvorah (Deborah) Tatz Pick, survived the ghetto but perished at Stutthof. Their son Tedik (David, 1922-1975) escaped the ghetto shortly before its liquidation, led Jewish survivors west for the Bricha after liberation, and immigrated to Palestine in 1948. In 1949 he married Haia Nudel (b. 1928), who had survived the Šiauliai ghetto and the Stutthof concentration camp.
Archival History
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Acquisition
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection
Funding Note: The cataloging of this collection has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
Funding Note: The accessibility of this collection was made possible by the generous donors to our crowdfunded Save Their Stories campaign.
Funding Note: The translation of this collection was made possible by a donation coordinated by Mr. Andrew Cassel.
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum acquired the diary from Haia Pick in 2000.
Scope and Content
Dr. Aharon Pick (also spelled Pik or Pieck) created his diary in the Šiauliai ghetto between 1941 and 1944. In it, he remembers life in Lithuania before the Soviet take over in June 1940, life under the Soviet regime, his efforts to have his son be accepted at Vilna University, and the situation in Lithuania and in Šiauliai, particularly on the eve of the German invasion in June 1941. He then describes Šiauliai ghetto, educational and cultural activities in the ghetto, unsanitary conditions and public health in the ghetto, and Judenrat activities in the ghetto. David Pick buried the diary after his father’s death in June 1944 and retrieved it following liberation in July 1944.
System of Arrangement
The Dr. Aharon Pick diary is arranged as a single series: I. Dr. Aharon Pick diary, 1941-1944
People
- Piḳ, Aharon, 1872-1944.
Subjects
- Physicians--Lithuania.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Lithuania--Šiauliai--Personal narratives.
- Jews--Lithuania--Šiauliai.
- Jewish ghettos--Lithuania--Šiauliai.
- Šiauliai (Lithuania)--History--German occupation, 1941-1944.
Genre
- Document
- Diaries.