Archival Descriptions

Displaying items 29,141 to 29,160 of 33,375
Language of Description: English
  1. Fridrich B. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Fridrich B., who was born in Lúky, Czechslovakia (presently Slovakia) in 1919. He recalls his family bakery; their orthodoxy, particularly his grandfather; confiscation of the bakery in late 1939 due to anti-Jewish laws; draft for forced labor in January 1940; working in Sabinov, Nováky, Prešov, Bratislava, Liptovský Hrádok, and Kežmarok; release and returning home in 1942; an evangelical warning him to flee and providing false papers; deciding to remain with his parents; deportation a few days later to Žilina, then Auschwitz/Birkenau; observing corpses everywh...

  2. Szapsia S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Szapsia S., who was born in Tomaszów Mazowiecki, Poland in 1925 the oldest of four children. He recalls his large, close extended family; antisemitic violence; his father's military draft in 1939; German invasion; briefly seeing his father with other POWs; learning he had been murdered in a mass shooting; his mother sending him to his great aunt; forced labor; a brief visit to his family (he never saw them again); deportation of his aunt and relatives; living with his cousin in a ghetto; a non-Jewish worker providing him with extra food; friendship with two prisoners...

  3. Reva S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Reva S., who was born in S?iauliai, Lithuania in 1927. She recalls ghettoization in 1941; mining peat and digging ditches as a forced laborer; extreme hunger; moving to the Trakai ghetto; deportation of her grandparents and youngest sister; her father's escape from the ghetto (she never saw him again); and deportation to Stutthof with her mother and sister. Mrs. S. describes futile efforts to help her sister avoid selection; transfer with her mother to Elbing, then five months later to Neumarkt; assistance from Italian prisoners of war; transfer to jail; a death march...

  4. Thomas F. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Thomas F., who was born in Illinois. He describes growing up with Jewish friends; his indignation upon encountering antisemitism in college; naval service in the Pacific, then in the Department of Special Assignments in the Bureau of Naval Ordinance in Washington; being assigned to "confirm unusual circumstances discovered" in Ohrdruf in April 1945; shock and horror upon observing stacks of emaciated bodies; returning to the United States; submitting a written report; and new assignments. Mr. F. discusses learning about concentration camps in the press and connecting ...

  5. Rella W. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Rella W., who was born in Mukacheve, Czechoslovakia in 1921, the oldest of eight children. She recalls her family's Hasidism; attending a Czech school; a large and close extended family; Hungarian occupation; one brother's conscription into a Hungarian slave labor battalion; ghettoization; obtaining false papers as a non-Jew; traveling to Budapest; arrest upon arrival; release to a ghetto the next day; deportation to Auschwitz; transfer to Płaszów; slave labor building roads; local prisoners sharing food; transfer back to Auschwitz four months later; seeing her siste...

  6. Ester S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Ester S., who was born in Šal̕a, Czechoslovakia (presently Slovakia) in 1927, the second of four children. She recounts a wonderful childhood; attending a Jewish school, then public high school; her uncle's emigration to Palestine in 1938; Hungarian occupation; antisemitic harassment by classmates; anti-Jewish restrictions resulting in termination of her father's job in 1942; knitting socks to help support the family; her father's arrest; visiting him in Trnovec; his release; visiting relatives in Nové Zámky; meeting her future husband; his draft into a Hungarian s...

  7. Mary L. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Mary L., who was born in I?a?mbol, Bulgaria in 1929. She recalls her comfortable, traditional childhood; her family's deep roots in Bulgaria; learning Ladino; attending Hebrew, then Bulgarian, schools; membership in Maccabi; expulsion in 1939 of foreign Jews, among them an uncle and cousins; antisemitic laws, including confiscation of the family business; the atmosphere of fear when visiting her aunt in Sofia; involvement in underground activities through her cousin (she later discovered they were communist directed); close friendship with other Jewish youth; their so...

  8. Thomas H. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Thomas H., who was born in Bus?k, Poland in 1929. He recalls a large, extended family; Soviet occupation in 1939; German invasion in 1941; ghettoization; forced labor recruitment by the Judenrat; hiding during a round-up in fall 1942; building hiding places; his father and brother being caught during a round-up in May 1943; escaping with his mother and aunt; hiding in a village, the forest, and with a Polish woman; learning from others hiding there that his father and brother had been killed; a police raid (others in hiding were caught); the Polish woman taking them t...

  9. Bella C. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Bella C., who was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1922. She describes her family's prewar life; German occupation; serious injuries from being beaten by a German while trying to protect her mother; fleeing with her father and her younger sister to Bia?ystok to obtain medical attention (she lost an eye); meeting her future husband; traveling with her father and future husband to Omsk; marriage; birth of her daughter; working as a waitress; her husband's return to Omsk after a year of service in the Soviet army; returning to Poland; learning her mother and sisters had been ki...

  10. Karl P. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Karl P., who was born in Grodziec, Poland in 1917. He recalls working in the family business; cordial relations with non-Jews; German invasion; anti-Jewish laws; volunteering for a labor camp in February 1940 to meet his family's quota; deportation to Jeles?nia; sharing packages from home with fellow prisoners; volunteering for transfer to K?obuck in 1941; visiting his sister with assistance from a German; the German helping him to avoid punishment and obtain an easier job; assistance from a Polish guard; losing contact with his parents in 1942 (he never saw them agai...

  11. Edward S. and Frank S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Edward S., who was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1920 and is accompanied by his friend Frank S. He describes his education in Warsaw, moving to Bia?ystok and L?vov; aspiring to be a poet and writer; participation in a literary circle in L?vov which included Frank S.; escape from liquidation of the L?vov ghetto; hiding on Frank S.' balcony; pretending to be a German Jew to acquire a job; escape from the ghetto dressed as a German soldier; running and hiding; and being caught and sent to Buchenwald. He relates his experiences in Buchenwald from 1943 until liberation in Apri...

  12. Aladar M. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Aladar M., who was born in Ti?rgu-La?pus?, Romania in 1927. He describes Hungarian occupation in 1940; anti-Jewish restrictions; German occupation in 1944; deportation with his parents and three brothers to Dej; living for three weeks in a forest camp; separation from his parents and youngest brother upon arrival in Birkenau (he never saw them again); transfer with his oldest brother to Longwy-Thil to build a factory; his indifference upon learning of D-Day; harsh conditions working in a salt mine in Kochendorf in the fall of 1944; transport with his brother to Dachau...

  13. Manfred M. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Manfred M., who was born in Marxheim, Germany in 1919, one of two children. He recounts living with his grandparents; moving to Ho?chst an der Nidder in 1933; the erosion of his friendships with non-Jews; being stoned; expulsion from school in 1935 (he was the only Jewish student); working in a shoe factory; receiving an affidavit from relatives in the United States; emigrating to the United States via Hamburg in 1936; meeting his future wife in 1937 (also a German-Jewish e?migre?); working hard to have his parents, sister, and grandparents join him in 1938, following...

  14. Schifre Z. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Schifre Z., who was born in Dolhinow, near Vilna, Poland, in 1929. Using vivid and poetic language, and taking care to name the Polish non-Jews who helped her and her family, Mrs. Z. describes her prewar childhood; the German occupation of her town; forced labor; the suffering of her brother at the hands of the Nazis; the liquidation and burning of her town while she hid in a nearby village, and what she saw when she returned; and hiding with her family, first in the attics of the house and barn of sympathetic non-Jews, and later, when this became unsafe, in the fores...

  15. Maria G. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Maria G., who was born in Zhornishche, Ukraine in 1928. She recalls her family's move to Kiev in 1934 due to the famine; attending a Ukrainian school; German invasion in 1941; her father's draft; German occupation in September; the order for all Jews to assemble on Melnikov Square on September 29; losing her mother and younger siblings en route to Babi Yar; watching the shooting of all Jews; her terror and fear; moving out of line with her neighbor's daughter; pretending to be Ukrainian sisters, with assistance from a Ukrainian translator; hiding with their Ukrainian ...

  16. Thomas F. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Thomas F., who was born in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia (presently Slovakia), in 1934, the oldest of three children. He recounts his family's assimilated lifestyle; many non-Jewish friends in their building; Passover celebrations with about two hundred relatives; beatings by Hlinka guards during a visit to his grandparents in 1939; harassment by Hlinka guards and others; forced relocation to another apartment in approximately 1940; exemption from deportation obtained by his father's non-Jewish friend; round-up in September 1944; his mother marking the required forms tha...

  17. Ilse L. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Ilse L., who was born in Vienna in 1925. She recalls with fondness her childhood in Vienna; the change in the situation of the Jews beginning in the spring of 1938; being sent to Holland in November, 1938, by her parents, who later perished; her placement in two different foster families; the arrival of her brother in Holland at the end of 1938; and going into hiding in 1942 with the help of a cousin and his non-Jewish girlfriend. She describes living as a Dutch non-Jew by means of false papers; aid from non-Jews, including the Dutch police; and the day to day difficu...

  18. Michel V. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Michel V., a non-Jew, who was born in Ixelles, Belgium in 1916, one of three brothers. He recounts moving to Lier; encountering veterans of World War I; attending school; working in Anderlecht; marriage in 1936; his son's birth; serving in the military; an influx of Jewish refugees; becoming a policeman in 1939; German invasion in May 1940; arresting Communists, Rexists, and those identified as enemy aliens in Brussels; attempting to re-join his military regiment; Belgian capitulation to Germany; capture by the Germans in Antwerp; returning home; joining the undergrou...

  19. Edith R. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Edith R., who was born in Babenhausen, Germany in 1918. She recalls her family's orthodoxy; antisemitic harassment prior to Hitler; helping victims of Nazi violence; Nazis frequently vandalizing the family business starting in 1931; the Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses in April 1933; emigration of several siblings to the United States; her father's severe beating by Nazis; receiving affidavits from her siblings to emigrate to the United States; traveling to Stuttgart with her parents in July 1933; emigration to the United States with her father in October; her mother...

  20. Rose G. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Rose G., who was born in Be?ke?scsaba, Hungary in 1926, one of six children. She recounts being raised in Oradea; her family's orthodoxy; participation in Hashomer Hatzair; Hungarian occupation; her brother's and brother-in-law's draft into Hungarian slave labor battalions; German invasion; ghettoization; help from non-Jewish neighbors; deportation to Auschwitz/Birkenau; selection with two sisters; humiliation, deprivation, and beatings; working near the crematoria; realizing her family's fate; selection for specious medical experiments; hospitalization; surgery; sepa...