Rachel K. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Rachel K., who was born in France in 1935 to Polish-Russian immigrants, the youngest of three daughters. She recounts her parents' isolation from French society; her mother's store in Aulnay-sous-Bois; being sent to summer camp the first two years of the war; her mother refusing to have them wear the star; being smuggled with her mother and sisters to the unoccupied zone in 1942 (her father refused to leave); receiving assistance and false papers from the Resistance through Edmond Michelet; her father joining them; living in a hotel in Brive, then in a remote farmhouse; the owner bringing them supplies; being moved with her sisters to a convent; extreme kindness from the nuns; staying with their parents a few holidays and summers; being separated from the non-Jewish children in the convent; reunion with their parents after liberation; returning to Paris; and emigration to the United States in 1950 to join relatives. Ms. K. discusses constant fear during the war; the bravery of her mother and non-Jews who helped them; her parents' increased religiosity after the war; her atheism and lack of Jewish identity; seldom discussing the past with her parents, siblings, husband, or daughter; and continuing antipathy toward Germans.

2 videocassettes