Renee B. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Renee B., who was born in Duisburg, Germany, in 1927. Mrs. B. recalls her discomfort as the only Jew at a Catholic primary school; older Jewish friends who left Germany in the 1930s; fleeing with her parents on Kristallnacht to a former housekeeper's home; commuting daily to a Jewish school in Cologne after 1939; detention in a slaughterhouse before deportation; and arrival at the Ri?ga ghetto in December 1941. She describes her family's narrow escape from a selection; seeing the bodies of Jewish policemen executed for an attempted uprising; transfer to a railroad work camp at Priekule in mid-1943; surviving a selection with her mother (her father was killed); evacuation by barge to Stutthof in summer 1944; transfer to another railroad camp at Stolp; separation from her mother after their march back to Stutthof; a death march; being placed aboard mined boats on the Baltic; and liberation by British troops after she came ashore at Neustadt. She recounts developing a story of Swiss origins which she told postwar acquaintances to avoid explaining her Holocaust experience. The testimony includes Mrs. B's written narratives, poetry and painting.

2 videocassettes (3/4" u-matic)