Pessia B. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Pessia B., who was born in 1922 in Zheludok, Poland (presently Belarus), one of seven children. She recounts her family's Zionist beliefs and activities; the emigration of two older sisters to Palestine; Soviet occupation; joining her sister in Vilna, intending to emigrate; returning home; traveling to Lida; brief incarceration in Eis?is?ke?s; returning home; German invasion; a brother and sister fleeing east; anti-Jewish restrictions; forced labor; hearing a mass shooting of Jews and seeing the open grave; hiding with others during a round-up; discovery; escape; hiding with two children; Polish guards helping her join surviving Jews (she posed as the wife of her future husband); transfer to the Szczuczyn ghetto; living with an aunt; transfer to Lida; escaping with her future husband and others; joining the Bielski brigade; battles with Germans and non-Jewish partisans; moving often by foot; assistance from local farmers; liberation by Soviet troops; traveling to Nowogrodek; returning home seeking relatives (no one survived); antisemitic attacks; contact with her sister in Israel; joining her uncle, Yitzhak Zuckerman, in ?o?dz?; seeking her husband's relatives in Pabianice (there were none); Zuckerman organizing illegal emigration to Palestine; traveling to Bucharest; obtaining false Greek identity papers; traveling to Graz, then Italy; and emigration to Palestine by boat. Ms. B. notes nightmares resulting from her experiences, and the loss of many relatives, including her brother who was killed in combat as a Soviet soldier.

5 videocassettes