Sophie L. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Sophie L., who was born in ?o?dz?, Poland in 1921. She recalls her family's Zionist beliefs; membership in Betar; her older brother's emigration to Palestine in 1938; attending a Jabotinsky lecture; German invasion; being drafted as a nurse into the Polish army; returning to ?o?dz?; anti-Jewish measures; ghettoization; her father's death from starvation; deportation of her mother and two sisters (she never saw them again); watching children being thrown to the pavement from the fourth story during a round-up; working as a ghetto administrator; joining the underground; deportation to Auschwitz in 1944; appells, selections, and slave labor; transfer to Ravensbru?zck, then Mu?phlhausen; and liberation by British troops from Bergen-Belsen. Mrs. L. describes moving to Hannover; attending a Zionist meeting in Bergen-Belsen; reunion with her brother, who was in the Jewish brigade; marriage; emigration to Palestine in 1946; her daughter's birth; and emigration to the United States in 1951. She discusses the importance of luck and coincidence to her survival; reluctance to share her experiences with her children; her nightmares; the importance of being socially active; her involvement in Holocaust survivors' groups; and her attachment to Israel.
Extent and Medium
1 videocassette
Conditions Governing Access
This testimony is open with permission.
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.
Rules and Conventions
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Process Info
compiled by Staff of the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
People
- L., Sophie, -- 1921-
- Jabotinsky, Vladimir, -- 1880-1940.
Corporate Bodies
- Bergen-Belsen (Concentration camp)
- Betar.
- Ravensbrück (Concentration camp)
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
Subjects
- Draft -- Poland.
- Jews -- Poland -- Łódź.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Forced labor.
- Resistance.
- Jewish ghettos.
- Nightmares.
- Video tapes.
- Women.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Zionist organizations.
- Mutual aid.
- Postwar effects.
- Postwar experiences.
- Survivor-child relations.
Places
- Hannover (Germany)
- Łódź (Poland)
- Łódź ghetto.
- Israel.
- Mühlhausen (Erfurt, Germany : Concentration camp)
- Poland.
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat