Archival Descriptions

Displaying items 141 to 160 of 816
Holding Institution: Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
  1. Renate R. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Renate R., who was born in Berlin in 1923. Mrs. R. describes her family background; life in Germany; and their move to Yugoslavia in 1933; her father's illness and death in 1940; the German invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941; and the forced move with her mother and brother to a Jewish section. She describes living with a Yugoslav family and her mother's imprisonment by the Gestapo. Mrs. R. recounts working for the partisans; having to leave the Yugoslav family due to fear of betrayal; thinking of suicide; and being aided by the mother of a school friend who helped arrange...

  2. Isaac F. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Isaac F., who was born in Cie?z?kowice, Poland in 1892. He recalls growing up in a religious family; fleeing to Germany to escape military service; working in a shoe store in Berlin; serving in the German army during World War I; marriage in Cologne after the war; the birth of his two sons; recognizing the danger as the Nazis came to power and emigrating to Holland in 1933; establishing a leather business in Zaandam; German invasion in 1940; unsuccessful attempts to emigrate; obtaining Palestine visas; deportation with his family to Westerbork; cleaning streets; and w...

  3. Maliette W. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Maliette W., who was born in Strasbourg, France in 1929, one of two children of Polish e?migre?s. She recounts her family's orthodoxy; visiting her grandmother in Poland and other relatives in Germany; attending a French school; vacationing with relatives, but without her father, in Paris-Plage when the war broke out; her father bringing a few possessions from Strasbourg after its ordered evacuation; moving to Vichy; attending school; her relatives leaving for Spain; her family's departure for Marseille; obtaining visas to Martinique; interdiction of their ship by the...

  4. Alfred K. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Alfred K., who was born in Vienna, Austria in 1921, the youngest of three brothers. He recounts attending public school; antisemitic harassment; participating in socialist and Zionist organizations; Austrians welcoming the Germans during the Anschluss; one brother emigrating to relatives in the United States, the other, as a physician with a Kindertransport, to England; the concierge protecting him and his parents during Kristallnacht; fleeing with an aunt and uncle to Belgium; living in Antwerp; placement in Merksplas refugee camp; German invasion; fleeing to France;...

  5. Anton P. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Anton P., who was born in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1917. Mr. P., who served in the United States Third Army, tells of being wounded in France; evacuation to England; returning to the front to aid in the relief of Bastogne; his artillery unit's rapid advance across Germany in April 1945; passing through Buchenwald hours after its liberation; and dining with a German who denied knowledge of Buchenwald, but whose home overlooked the camp. He recalls being temporarily reassigned to serve with the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), where h...

  6. Samuel R. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Samuel R., who was born in Koszyce, Poland in 1923. He describes moving to Paris in 1923; collecting money for Spanish children in 1936; joining the Communist Party; learning about Nazism from German and Austrian refugees in 1937 and 1938; the outbreak of war in September 1939; evacuation to Pau in June 1940; joining the Resistance after returning to Paris on July 14, 1940; his father's death on September 2, 1940; and participating in student demonstrations in 1940 and 1941. Mr. R. recalls his arrest in August 1941; release from Drancy in November; hiding with the aid...

  7. Lydia C. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Lydia C., who was born in the Netherlands in 1931. She recounts living in Brussels from nine months of age; observing Jewish customs in their liberal home; her father's anti-Fascist activities; German invasion; a warning to leave due to her father's activities; fleeing with her parents and sisters through France; her father's opportunity to emigrate to England; his refusing to leave his family in Biarritz; living in a monastery with her mother and sister in Toulouse; a brief stay in Paris; living in a nearby refugee center for Dutch citizens (her father was the direct...

  8. Greta M. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Greta M., who was born in Bocholt, Germany in 1924. She describes her family's strong sense of German identification; cordial relations with non-Jews; increasing anti-Jewish restrictions after 1936; being forced to sell the family business; the trauma of witnessing the violent destruction of a Jewish-owned store during Kristallnacht; expulsion from school in 1938; support from some German friends; being sent to Frankfurt for six weeks in 1939; her brother's departure for England; and her leaving, with her younger sister, on a children's transport in July (they never s...

  9. Werner N. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Werner N., who was born in Berlin, Germany in 1911. He relates his father's service in World War I; a brief family history; attendance at gymnasium in Berlin; work for an international dental supply firm; his father's feeling of safety during Hitler's rise to power because he was a World War I veteran; his sister's emigration to Palestine in 1934; his attempts to emigrate to the United States; and being able to hide during Kristallnacht because he was forewarned. Mr. N. describes leaving for Shanghai in 1939; obtaining a job and living quarters; deteriorating conditio...

  10. Rachel F. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Rachel F., who was born in Skarz?ysko-Kamienna, Poland in 1924. She describes attending public and religious schools; orthodox observances in her close, extended family; German-Jewish refugees arriving in the early 1930s; German invasion in September 1939; anti-Jewish measures; ghettoization in 1941; volunteering to go to Skarz?ysko-Kamienna labor camp in June 1942; slave labor at the munitions factory; public executions; learning the ghetto was liquidated in October; a brief visit with her brother in 1943 (she never saw him again); transfer to Cze?stochowa in summer ...

  11. Molly B. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Molly B., who was born in Heidelberg, Germany in 1920. She recounts her father's service in World War I; her family's German patriotism; attending public school; cordial relations with non-Jews; changes in 1933 when Hitler came to power; a mandatory "racial science" course; the pain of being snubbed by a former friend; her parents' loss of their citizenship because they were naturalized; attempts to emigrate; attending vocational school near Lake Constance, then learning dressmaking in Heidelberg and Berlin to prepare for emigration; loss of the family business due to...

  12. Shmuel H. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Shmuel H., who was born in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 1926, the sixth of seven children. He describes his large, extended family, half of which were assimilated, half orthodox; his family's focus on music and humor; wonderful Sabbath dinners; his father's death in 1934; resulting pressures on his immediate family, particularly financial; his mother taking in boarders and Jewish refugees; assistance from some uncles; participating in Mizrachi; his bar mitzvah in 1939; one brother's emigration to Palestine; believing they were safe despite the war; German invasion in May...

  13. Mimi O. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Mimi O., who was born in approximately 1926. Ms. O. recalls growing up in Maria?nske? La?zne?, Czechoslovakia; her family's affluence; participating in a Zionist youth organization; destruction of Jewish stores during Kristallnacht; traveling with her parents to Prague the next day; living in Koli?n; German invasion; a non-Jew deceiving Germans who wanted to arrest Ms. O.'s father; traveling on a children's transport to England; living on a Zionist organization farm; receiving letters from her family through the Red Cross; the group moving to a castle in Wales; learni...

  14. Lisa H. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Lisa H., who was born in Essen, Germany in 1919. She remembers the gradual deterioration of the Jewish situation in Germany, including restrictive legislation as well as overt displays of antisemitism; being sent to London by her parents two weeks before the outbreak of war; working as a cook in Devon; switching from one domestic job to another in London; her emigration to America in 1946; studying Yiddish at the Jewish Institute; learning of the death of her family in Europe; returning to Germany on a visit in the 1950s, where she was able to locate the director of h...

  15. Kathi K. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Kathi K., who was born in Tu?bingen, Germany in 1932 to a Jewish mother and a Christian father. She recounts living in Hockenheim; her maternal grandparents' wealth; moving to Cologne; visiting her grandparents; her mother being hit while protecting her grandfather from the SS; her grandparents' deaths; emigration to Aerdenhout, Netherlands; German invasion; her mother's failing health; frequent fear; forced relocation to Amsterdam because her mother was Jewish; hiding during round-ups; receiving her first communion; her father using his German passport to prevent aut...

  16. Helga K. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Helga K., who was born in Cologne, Germany in 1922. She recalls her family's comfortable, middle-class life in Godesberg; attending church; Nazi ascent to power; learning her father was half-Jewish and her mother Jewish; her family's baptism in 1933; antisemitic measures; expulsion from school; her parents' futile efforts to emigrate; her father's arrest and release during Kristallnacht; her brother's emigration to the United States; her emigration to England in July 1939 to work as a domestic; the outbreak of war; internment as an enemy alien; learning of her father'...

  17. Eva S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Eva S., who was born in Koblenz, Germany in 1923. She recalls family life prior to Nazism; her father's death while preparing to emigrate; anti-Semitic incidents; expulsion from school; being sent to Holland in 1936; her mother joining her in Amsterdam; German invasion in 1940; anti-Jewish restrictions; learning to be a furrier; escaping deportation in 1942 with assistance from Dutch women; working in a fur factory; four days in a collection center (a former theater); deportation to Vught; forced labor in a workshop making fur coats from used garments; learning about ...

  18. Alexandra L. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Alexandra L., who was born in Danzig Free State (presently Gdan?sk, Poland) in 1928. She recalls her family's affluence; cordial relations with non-Jews; her maternal grandmother living with them; antisemitic harassment beginning in 1937; her father's arrest; looting of his store; his non-Jewish employees providing assistance; expulsion from school; not understanding sudden rejection by non-Jewish playmates; attending a Jewish school; a beating by Hitler Youth; destruction of their synagogue; her father contacting a cousin in the United States; her brother's birth in ...

  19. Shoshana N. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Shoshana N., who was born in Berlin, Germany in 1925, the younger of two sisters. She recalls a happy childhood until 1932; attending a Jewish school; harassment en route; fascination with Nazi parades and music; accompanying her father to his sewing factory; participating in sports through Bar Kochba and Maccabi; their nanny's grief when she had to leave due to the Nuremberg laws; confiscation of her father's factory; observing the destruction of Kristallnacht; her sister's emigration to Palestine; emigrating with a group of twenty-five children to Copenhagen in Apri...

  20. Werner H. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Werner H., who was born in Ku?strin, Germany in 1910. He details his brother-in-law's death in September 1938; difficulties in arranging his burial because they were Jewish; arrest with his family during Kristallnacht; forced labor and harsh conditions in Sachsenhausen; his release due to their promise to leave for Shanghai; selling all their possessions; and emigrating from Berlin to Shanghai. Mr. H. recalls the international settlement; going into business with a friend; joining a Jewish volunteer company to patrol the international settlement; Japanese occupation; ...