The Diary of a Survivor
Extent and Medium
folder
1
Creator(s)
- Herbert R. Ert
Biographical History
Samson Reichstein (1884, Russia – 1955, USA) was raised Jewish. In 1938, his son, Herbert, was able to immigrate to the United States. On 1 September 1939, Samson was in Ternopol, Poland with his wife, Kathe. After the Germans invaded Poland, Reichstein was held in the Ternopol ghetto. He was separated from his wife, who is believed to have died in Belzec. Samson was interned in a concentration camp, but later escaped. In 1946, he immigrated to the United States
Archival History
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Acquisition
The memoir was received by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1994.
Scope and Content
The memoir details the separate lives of Herbert R. Ert and that of his father, Samson Reichstein. In addition to describing Ert's life in the United States, the memoir also describes Reichstein's simultaneous experiences in Nazi-occupied Europe. The author has indicated that, contrary to the text of the memoir, his mother died in Belzec, and not Bergen-Belsen, and that the Anne Frank which he mentions in his memoir was not the diarist. He mistook her for an adolescent of the same name.
People
- Ert, Herbert R.
- Reichstein, Samson.
Subjects
- Poland--History--Occupation, 1939-1945.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Personal narratives.
- Jewish ghettos--Ukraine--Ternopol.
- United States--Emigration and immigration.
Genre
- Diaries.
- Document