William S. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of William S., who was born in Krako?w, Poland in 1918, one of three children. He recounts attending public school; working repairing bicycles; antisemitic harassment; German invasion; fleeing east with his father, brother, and uncles; returning; meeting his future wife; forced labor cleaning streets; working instead of his father; slave labor in a factory; smuggling chickens into the ghetto; his parents' deportation (he never saw them again); his brother's and future mother-in-law's deportation; marriage; transfer to P?aszo?w; brief visits with his sister and wife; a fellow prisoner offering to share bread; his wife's deportation; joining a transport hoping to find her; arrival in Auschwitz; transfer to Rajsko; assisting with human experiments; transfer to Gross-Rosen; escaping; capture and torture; hospitalization; hiding in a boxcar that went to Buchenwald; liberation by United States troops; hospitalization; traveling to Wroc?aw; reunion with his wife in Krako?w; living in Linz, Bindermichl, and Wegscheid displaced persons camps; his son's birth in 1946; and emigration to the United States from Bremerhaven in 1949. Mr. S. discusses becoming inured to death in the camps and not being able to take revenge on Germans after the war, despite his wish to do so.
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. This testimony may not be used for commercial purposes without prior approval 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
- S., William, -- 1918-
Corporate Bodies
- Buchenwald (Concentration camp)
- Gross-Rosen (Concentration camp)
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
- Płaszów (Concentration camp)
Subjects
- Video tapes.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- Men.
- Forced labor.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Jews -- Poland -- Kraków.
- Jewish ghettos.
- Brothers and sisters.
- Husband and wife.
- Concentration camps -- Psychological aspects.
- Human experimentation in medicine.
- Escapes.
- Refugee camps.
- Antisemitism -- Prewar.
- Marriage in Jewish ghettos.
- Hospitals in concentration camps.
- Postwar experiences.
- Mutual aid.
Places
- Linz (Austria : Refugee camp)
- Poland.
- Kraków (Poland)
- Wrocław (Poland)
- Bremerhaven (Germany)
- Kraków ghetto.
- Rajsko (Poland : Concentration camp)
- Bindermichl (Austria : Refugee camp)
- Wegscheid (Austria : Refugee camp)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat