Charlotte J. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Charlotte J., who was born in Frankfurt am Main in 1908 to a Jewish father and Christian mother, the youngest of four children. She describes being raised in both faiths; a sheltered life prior to the rise of Nazism; termination from her job in 1938 due to anti-Jewish laws; her boss clandestinely bringing her food; being smuggled with a group in 1942 through Graz to Zagreb; being caught; imprisonment in Zagreb, then Graz; release and return to Frankfurt; she and her fiance volunteering to accompany her debilitated father (he was eighty-seven) to Theresienstadt; marriage in Frankfurt on September 15, 1942, the day they were deported; her father's death two weeks later; assignment to the camp administration; her husband's leadership role resulting in his helping many other prisoners; her sister's arrival; sham improvements during the Red Cross visit; her husband obtaining additional food for her when she was pregnant; her daughter's birth in September 1944; her husband's deportation to Auschwitz in October (she never saw him again); liberation; returning to Frankfurt with her daughter and sister in June 1945 to join her brother and other sister; difficult living conditions; and emigration with her daughter to the United States in November 1947, with assistance from the Joint. Ms. J. notes always believing that she would survive. She shows documents and photographs.
Extent and Medium
2 videocassettes (3/4" u-matic)
Conditions Governing Access
This testimony cannot be viewed during the lifetime of the donor.
Conditions Governing Reproduction
Copyright has been transferred to the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies. Use of this testimony requires permission of the Fortunoff Video Archive. This testimony or excerpts cannot be published during the lifetime of the donor.
Rules and Conventions
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Process Info
compiled by Staff of the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
People
- J., Charlotte, -- 1908-
Corporate Bodies
- American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee.
- International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.
- Theresienstadt (Concentration camp)
Subjects
- Holocaust survivors.
- Women.
- Video tapes.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Prisoners and prisons, German.
- Sisters.
- Children of interfaith marriage.
- Fathers and daughters.
- Husband and wife.
- Mutual aid.
- Aid by non-Jews.
- Childbirth in concentration camps.
- Husband -- Death.
- Postwar experiences.
Places
- Germany.
- Frankfurt am Main (Germany)
- Graz (Austria)
- Zagreb (Croatia)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat