Magda S. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Magda S., who was born in Chop, Czechoslovakia in 1925 to a family of nine children. She recalls growing up in Uz?h?horod; Hungarian occupation in 1938; her father's arrest for assisting relatives escaping from Slovakia; German occupation in 1944; refusing to leave her family when non-Jews offered to provide false papers and hide her; forced relocation to a lumber yard; deportation to Auschwitz; separation from her parents and brothers upon arrival; twice going through selections as a replacement for her younger, weaker sister; their transfer to Stutthof; working at an ammunition factory; observing Yom Kippur; attempts to work less on Sabbath; receiving food and encouragement from French POWs; their escape from a death march; and liberation by Soviet troops. Mrs. S. describes walking to Bydgoszcz; assistance from the Joint in Warsaw; traveling to Chop and Uz?h?horod; avoiding rape by Soviet soldiers; learning no other immediate family members had survived; living with an uncle in Nya?regyha?za and in an orphanage in Prague; and emigration to join relatives in the United States in 1946. Mrs. S. discusses the importance of the three sisters to each others' survival and her children's wish to learn about her experiences from this testimony. She shows photographs and drawings.
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
- S., Magda, -- 1925-
Corporate Bodies
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
- Stutthof (Concentration camp)
- American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee.
Subjects
- Survivor-child relations.
- Aid by non-Jews.
- Postwar experiences.
- False papers.
- Mutual aid.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Children.
- Prisoners of war -- Poland.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Video tapes.
- Women.
- Orphanages.
- Concentration camp inmates -- Religious life.
- Child survivors.
- Hungarian occupation.
- Sisters.
- Forced labor.
- Death marches.
- Escapes.
Places
- Chop (Ukraine)
- Czechoslovakia.
- Ungvár (Hungary)
- Nyáregyháza (Hungary)
- Užhorod (Czechoslovakia)
- Bydgoszcz (Poland)
- Uz︠h︡horod (Ukraine)
- Prague (Czech Republic)
- Warsaw (Poland)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat