Esther K. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Esther K., who was born in Svatusa, Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1915. She describes her Orthodox family; attending Hungarian gymnasium in Kos?ice; marriage in 1937; her son's birth in 1938; her husband's service in the Czech, then Hungarian, militaries; Hungarian occupation; expropriation of their business; her husband's escape to Palestine; her second son's birth in 1940; moving to her parents' home; German occupation in March 1944; ghettoization with her family in Sa?toraljau?jhely; deportation to Auschwitz; separation from her parents and children upon arrival on May 20 (she never saw them again); emotional numbness; devastation when separated from her sister; arranging to be with her sister in Birkenau; brutal slave labor; preventing her sister from committing suicide; their evacuation to Bergen-Belsen; transfer to Mu?hlhausen; slave labor in a factory; assistance from a German officer and a doctor; return to Bergen-Belsen; liberation by British troops; and her sister's death shortly thereafter. Mrs. K. recalls recovering in a hospital; returning to Svatusa in September 1945; reunion with her husband a year later; the births of her daughters; and emigrating to Israel in 1949, then to the United States in 1964. She discusses amazement that she survived such horrors and her continuing nightmares.
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
- K., Esther, -- 1915-
Corporate Bodies
- Birkenau (Concentration camp)
- Bergen-Belsen (Concentration camp)
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
Subjects
- Video tapes.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- Women.
- Jewish ghettos.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Sisters.
- Jews -- Hungary -- Sátoraljaújhely.
- Forced labor.
- Nightmares.
- Children -- Death.
- Concentration camps -- Psychological aspects.
- Mutual aid.
- Hungarian occupation.
- Postwar effects.
- Aid by non-Jews.
- Postwar experiences.
Places
- Košice (Slovakia)
- Sátoraljaújhely ghetto.
- Austria.
- Svatusa (Slovakia)
- Mühlhausen (Erfurt, Germany : Concentration camp)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat