Helen F. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Helen F., who was born in Ko?o, Poland in 1923. She recalls her happy childhood; German invasion; fleeing to Warsaw in December 1939; returning to Ko?o; returning to Warsaw after learning her family was there; her sister's departure for the Soviet zone in May 1940; ghettoization; trying to maintain some normalcy; starvation and typhus; traveling with false papers to Lublin to visit her grandfather; her mother's killing during a round-up in August 1942; escaping from the Umschlagplatz with assistance from her cousin; hiding in a factory cellar for almost a year; her marriage in February 1943; escaping through the sewers with her father and husband during the ghetto uprising; her father hiding with assistance from a Polish woman (he was later denounced and killed); fleeing to Vienna with her husband after their hiding place was exposed; working at a factory, posing as non-Jewish Polish workers; Allied bombings in 1944; revealing they were Jewish after the war; and emigrating to the United States in 1947. Mrs. F. discusses ghetto life in detail; postwar depression; and her discomfort during a trip to Poland in 1968.
Extent and Medium
2 videocassettes
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
- F., Helen, -- 1923-
Subjects
- Video tapes.
- Women.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Postwar experiences.
- Aid by non-Jews.
- Marriage in Jewish ghettos.
- Hiding.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Atrocities.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Psychological aspects.
- Jewish ghettos.
- Jews -- Poland -- Warsaw.
- False papers.
- Husband and wife.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Jews -- Rescue.
- Fathers and daughters.
Places
- Warsaw (Poland)
- KoĹo (Konin, Poland)
- Poland.
- Vienna (Austria)
- Warsaw ghetto.
- Lublin (Poland)
- Warsaw (Poland) -- History -- Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, 1943.
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat