Ola S. Holocaust testimony

Identifier
HVT 2035
Language of Description
English
Level of Description
Collection
Source
EHRI Partner

Abstract

Videotape testimony of Ola S., who was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1914. She recalls her assimilated family; economic difficulties as antisemitism increased; German invasion; her brother's escape to Soviet territory and her sister's to Vilna, Japan, then Canada; marriage; ghettoization and subsequent poverty, starvation, deportations (including her parents), relocations, forced labor, and smuggling; and her husband's job as a policeman which enabled her to be smuggled as a boy into a forced labor camp in March 1943. She describes a former maid's efforts to hide her; obtaining false papers; working as a housekeeper; hearing Poles express joy at the ghetto's destruction; losing contact with her husband (she never saw him again); relocation to Pruszko?w following the Warsaw uprising; and liberation. Mrs. S. tells of returning to Warsaw; traveling to Lublin; reunion with her brother in Austria; residing in Germany; joining her sister in Canada; marriage; and emigration to the United States. She discusses the importance of her hope of joining her sister in Canada to her survival and the many Poles who could have betrayed her and did not.

Extent and Medium

3 videocassettes (3/4" u-matic)

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

Subjects

Places

Genre

This description is derived directly from structured data provided to EHRI by a partner institution. This collection holding institution considers this description as an accurate reflection of the archival holdings to which it refers at the moment of data transfer.