Rachel L. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Rachel L., who was born in Zduńska Wola, Poland in 1926, one of six children in a Hasidic family. She recounts attending public school; cordial relations with non-Jews; vacationing in Andrzejów; returning to Łódź; German invasion; her parents hiding their valuables; eviction from their home; ghettoization; living with an aunt; retrieving their valuables; trading them for necessities; her privileged position in the kitchen; sharing extra food with her family; deportation of her parents and siblings, except one sister; brief hospitalization; hiding with her sister during round-ups; deportation to Auschwitz/Birkenau; slave labor in a munitions factory; transfer with her sister to Bergen-Belsen, then several days later to Elsnig; German guards leaving them extra food; train transport; escaping during Allied bombings; capture by German soldiers; her sister being wounded; their separation; liberation by Soviet troops; locating her sister in a Magdeburg hospital; her death; traveling to Hildesheim; illegal emigration to Palestine via Aachen, Brussels, and Antwerp; quarantine in ʻAtlit; and reunion with relatives. Ms. L. notes not sharing her experiences, even with her children.
Extent and Medium
6 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
- L., Rachel, -- 1926-
Corporate Bodies
- Birkenau (Concentration camp)
- Bergen-Belsen (Concentration camp)
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
Subjects
- Women.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Children.
- Jewish children in the Holocaust.
- Jewish ghettos.
- Jews -- Poland -- Łódź.
- Forced labor.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Video tapes.
- Postwar experiences.
- Hiding.
- Child survivors.
- Concentration camp inmates -- Family relationships.
- Sisters.
- Survivor-child relations.
- Hospitals in Jewish ghettos.
- Mutual aid.
- Aid by non-Jews.
Places
- Antwerp (Belgium)
- Palestine -- Emigration and immigration.
- Aachen (Germany)
- Brussels (Belgium)
- Elsnig (Germany : Concentration camp)
- ʻAtlit (Israel)
- Łódź ghetto.
- Zduńska Wola (Poland)
- Poland.
- Magdeburg (Germany)
- Hildesheim (Germany)
- Andrzejów (Poland)
- Łódź (Poland)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat