Mala Z. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Mala Z., who was born in Kalisz, Poland in 1920. She recalls a comfortable childhood; attending Catholic school; her father's death in 1936; active participation in Hashomer Hatzair and Maccabi; antisemitic incidents; preparing for emigration to Israel to a kibbutz; German invasion; fleeing to Warsaw; meeting Mordecai Anielewicz; returning to Kalisz; her mother's refusal to flee; helping to move a kibbutz from Wohyn?; traveling to Warsaw, posing as a Volksdeutsche; escaping to L'viv in the Soviet zone; Zionist activities; deportation to Siberia in 1940; forced labor; imprisonment in Arkhangel?sk, then transfer as a Polish citizen to Kazakhstan; working in a kolkhoz, then in the Shymkent hospital; reunion with her sister in Novorossii?sk in 1944; marriage in Gorlice in 1945; organizing illegal immigration under Haganah auspices; traveling to Czechoslovakia, then Austria; living in displaced persons camps in the Rothschild Hospital and Bad Reichenhall; assistance from UNRRA; and emigration to Canada. Mrs. Z. discusses the shock of realizing her losses when attending synagogue in Vancouver, and her strong sense of Jewish identity and commitment to Israel.
Extent and Medium
4 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
- Z., Mala, -- 1920-
- Anielewicz, Mordecai, -- 1919-1943.
Corporate Bodies
- Maccabi World Union.
- World Hashomer Hatzair.
- Haganah (Organization)
- Bad Reichenhall (Displaced persons camp)
- United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration.
Subjects
- Aid by non-Jews.
- Postwar experiences.
- Zionist organizations.
- Soviet occupation.
- Refugee camps.
- Antisemitism -- Prewar.
- Forced labor.
- Sisters.
- Jews -- Migrations.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Prisoners and prisons,Soviet.
- Refugees, Jewish.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- Women.
- Video tapes.
- Holocaust survivors.
Places
- Novorossiīsk (Russia)
- Shymkent (Kazakstan)
- Rothschild Hospital (Vienna, Austria : Refugee camp)
- Gorlice (Poland)
- L'viv (Ukraine)
- Arkhangelʹsk (Russia)
- Warsaw (Poland)
- Wohyń (Poland)
- Poland.
- Kalisz (Poland)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat