Sonja S. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Sonja S., who was born in Hamburg in 1927 to a Jewish father and Catholic mother. She recalls living in Duisburg; her mother's death; living with her maternal great-aunt in Hamburg; moving back with her father, brother and stepmother in Berlin in 1936; destruction of her father's store on Kristallnacht; her father's deportation to Poland; seeing her father once at the border; his escape; her parents placing her and her brother in a Catholic orphanage (she had been baptized) to wait for a kindertransport to England; her parents' escape to Holland and Belgium; the outbreak of war stranding them; leaving the orphanage in 1942 because she exceeded the age limit; a woman placing her with an anti-Nazi family in Berlin; their move to east Prussia; placement with another family in Königsberg; receiving orders to report to the government; running away to the woman in Berlin; being hidden in a convent; reunion with her brother after the war; learning of her parents' deportations and deaths (she is still traumatized by thoughts of that); marriage; her daughter's birth; divorce; subsequent marriages; and her daughter's emigration to Israel. She discusses continuing health and psychological problems resulting from her war experiences; receiving no compensation for significant family assets; and not sharing her story because no one was interested.

2 videocassettes