Archival Descriptions

Displaying items 1 to 20 of 4,487
Holding Institution: Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
  1. Betsy S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Betsy S., who was born in Brussels, Belgium in 1928. She recounts that her parents were Polish immigrants; German invasion in May 1940; her father continuing his business until 1942; meeting her future husband who was involved in the Resistance; going into hiding with her family; their arrest in June 1944; incarceration in Malines; deportation to Birkenau; separation from her father and brother (they did not survive); the trauma of not recognizing her mother after they were shaved; singing French songs while marching to Auschwitz; separation from her mother (she did n...

  2. Marion P. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Marion P., a Christian rescuer who was born in Amsterdam in 1920. She discusses the situation of the Jewish community in Holland before the war; German occupation in 1940; and the anti-Jewish propaganda and legalized persecution that gradually followed. Mrs. P. tells of witnessing a round-up of Jewish children, which prompted her to become more active in the rescue of Jews and relates how, working through an unofficial network rather than a formal branch of the underground, she effected the rescue of Jewish children and adults. She notes problems arising from the clos...

  3. Julius O. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Julius O., who was born in Schwarzenborn, Germany in 1923. He recalls hostility toward Jews after 1933; attending public school until 1937; a carpentry apprenticeship in Kassel; repairing roads in Schwarzenborn after Kristallnacht; attending a Jewish trade school in Frankfurt; and factory work from 1940 to October 1941 in Frankfurt. He describes joining his family in Kassel when they received notice of deportation in November 1941; their transport to Ri?ga; his transfer to Salaspils; brutal beatings and killings of prisoners; work as a carpenter; repairing SS officers...

  4. Sibylle H. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Sibylle H., a non-Jew, who was born in Berlin, Germany in 1920. She recalls living in a wealthy area with Jewish families; moving to Wannsee at age eleven; her family's anti-Hitler sentiments; her father's death in 1933; her only Jewish classmate's emigration to England; attending the 1936 Olympics; her mother's death; working as a hospital nurse; and dismay when her friend (her guardian's daughter) was pleased by the Kristallnacht destruction. Mrs. H. recounts a former mental hospital where the patients disappeared; rumors of their suspicious deaths; marriage in 1941...

  5. Musya V. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Musya V., who was born in Brat?s?lav, Ukraine in 1927. She recalls finishing seventh grade; German invasion; Romanians organizing local police; the murder of Jewish hostages and others at the Bug River; ghettoization; forced labor; arrival of Jews from Bukovina and Bessarabia; shootings of many during transfer to Pechora; transfer to a camp in Brat?s?lav; escaping with aid from a Russian girl; the girl's father hiding her (he helped many Jews); her parents hiding nearby; being caught while visiting them; their incarceration in Pechora; and liberation by Soviet troops....

  6. Aaron S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Aaron S., who was born in De?blin, Poland in 1921. He recalls his family's relative affluence; attending public school and cheder; pervasive antisemitism; German invasion; fleeing with his family to Ryki, then a village; returning to De?blin; ghettoization; forced labor at the airport; moving into the adjacent work camp with his brother; deportation of two uncles and an aunt (he never saw them again); the arrival of Slovak Jews; arranging for his parents and sister to join him; his father's death from a beating in November 1942; the role of prisoners in running the ca...

  7. Herbert L. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Herbert L., who was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1917. He relates growing up in Vienna; working in Zli?n after graduating from the School of Electric Engineering; German invasion; eighteen months of slave labor; transfer to Terezi?n in March 1941; avoiding deportation by joining the Jewish police and designing furniture; his depression caused by observing the deprivations of the women and children, deportations, and typhus; artificial improvement of conditions during a Red Cross visit; and transfer to Auschwitz on October 3, 1944. Mr. L. describes witnessing a Ge...

  8. Lilly R. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Lilly R., who was born in Ostrava, Czechoslovakia in 1924. She remembers a happy childhood; German occupation; antisemitic restrictions; living on a hachsharah (training farm) in Brno; her father and brother being rounded-up; returning to Ostrava; her father and brother returning; traveling to Prague to obtain documents for her father; studying at a Jewish school in Prague; returning to Ostrava; deportation to Theresienstadt; working in the gardens; smuggling food to her family; deportation to Auschwitz-Birkenau with camp officials including Fredy Hirsch (her parents ...

  9. Fay S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Fay S., who was born in Zwolen?, Poland in 1919, the oldest of five children. She recalls her family's affluence; antisemitic violence; marriage in 1937; moving to Radom; her son's birth; German invasion; moving to Zwolen? to avoid bombings; staying with a non-Jewish farmer; returning to Radom; ghettoization; living outside the ghetto due to her husband's job; rumors that children and women were to be relocated; paying a non-Jew to take her son; visiting him frequently; slave labor in a munitions factory; learning her mother had brought her son to Zwolen? (she never s...

  10. George Z. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of George Z., who was born in Katowice, Poland in 1933, an only child, and raised in Będzin. He recounts living with his parents and grandparents; their affluence; German invasion in 1939; fleeing to Kielce; returning home about a week later; finding their apartment ransacked; staying home while the adults worked; forced relocation; ghettoization in Kamionka; hiding with others during round-ups; his father purchasing false papers; escaping with his parents and grandparents to Budapest; his mother dyeing his hair blond; German invasion in March 1944; escaping to Bratisla...

  11. Edith K. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Edith K., who was born in Kupno, Poland in 1929, the oldest of three children. She recounts her family's affluence; attending school in Kolbuszowa; her brother's death from illness; German invasion in 1939; eviction from their home; forced relocation to Głógow Małopolski; ghettoization weeks later; her father's former Polish employee smuggling her out of the ghetto; her parents and sister joining her at his home; leaving to hide in the forest, fearing exposure; relatives joining them; being attacked by partisans; separation from her sister and her aunt's family who w...

  12. Ernest S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Ernest S., who was born in Gherla, Romania in 1925, the youngest of five children. He recounts his family moving to Cluj in 1932; one brother's emigration to Palestine; Hungarian occupation; working on the family dairy farm; German occupation in spring 1944; ghettoization; deportation with his parents and two siblings to Auschwitz; separation from his family upon arrival (he never saw them again); assignment to the Zigeunerlager (Gypsy Lager), then transfer to another barrack; learning of the gas chambers; transfer two weeks later to Hirschberg; slave labor in Phrix W...

  13. Dezider L. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Dezider L., who was born in Prešov, Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1912, one of three children. He recalls attending local Slovak and Jewish schools, then an academy in Košice; helping in his father's store; his leadership role in Maccabi; Slovak independence resulting in anti-Jewish violence by the Hlinka guard; deportation to Auschwitz/Birkenau via Žilina and Lublin in 1942; volunteering as a carpenter; a severe infection; a Greek fellow-prisoner obtaining medication and bandages which saved his life; praying with others on Yom Kippur; a death march to Mauthausen i...

  14. Howard F. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Howard F., who was born in Kaiserslautern, Germany, in 1910. Mr. F. speaks of his childhood in a "typical German-Jewish, upper-middle-class family"; his father's friendship with department store magnate David May; regarding his best friend's anti-Semitic remarks as a fact of life; difficulties seeking membership in a local club; attending Nazi rallies to learn the identities of regional party leaders; attending Munich University, where he represented Jews in the student parliament; returning to his parents' home in Saarbru?cken after graduation; and leaving his first ...

  15. Felicja N. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Felicja N., who was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1924. She recalls attending public schools; celebrating Jewish holidays; few antisemitic incidents; frequent visits to family in Bia?ystok; German invasion; moving to Bia?ystok in the Soviet zone; German invasion; a mass killing which included her father and uncle; ghettoization; harsh working conditions and overcrowding; efforts of the Judenrat to ease conditions; round-ups and mass killings; receiving food from Polish friends; escaping to her friends; returning due to reluctance to leave her mother; a final escape with a...

  16. Robert F. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Robert F., who was born in Orşova, Romania in 1914, the younger of two brothers. He recounts his family's secularism; his father's career in a mineral oil factory; home-schooling until he was thirteen, including tutoring by a rabbi; attending high school in Timișoara; the family's move to Bucharest; completing high school; working in his father's factory; attending university in Vienna with his brother; antisemitic violence; completing university in Prague; moving with his family to Podbrezová in 1936, then to Dubova, where his father managed an oil refinery; milit...

  17. Rudolph G. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Rudolph G., who was born in Libau (now Liepa?ja), Latvia in 1918. He recalls his religious upbringing; his father's death when Mr. G. was thirteen; repairing watches in his family's jewelry store; and apprenticeship to a local watchmaker. Mr. G. describes the Soviet occupation; German invasion in June 1941; bombing of Libau; anti-Jewish measures; deportations; round-ups; mass shootings, which included his brother; transport of his mother and sister to Ri?ga (he never heard from them again); and repairing watches for the German army. He tells of Jews forced to destroy ...

  18. Joseph H. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Joseph H., who was born in Boryslav, Poland (presently Ukraine) in 1921, the youngest of three children. He recounts his brother's death before his own birth; his family's orthodoxy; attending cheder; participating in Zionist groups; brief German invasion; Soviet occupation; German invasion in 1941; hiding his family during Ukrainian anti-Jewish violence and killings; ghettoization; hiding his parents during round-ups (he and his sister had jobs which exempted them from deportation); his later deportation to Janowska; escape with assistance from the camp underground; ...

  19. Anna W. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Anna W., a Romani, who was born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, one of five children. She recounts her father's work in a traveling theater; her family's move to Leipzig; expulsion from school in 1937 or 1938 due to laws against Romanies; forced labor at about age thirteen; deportation with her family to Auschwitz in 1942; the humiliation of having to undress in front of many people of both genders; transfer to Birkenau; transfer two years later to Ravensbru?ck; surgical sterilization; transfer to Schlieben; forced labor in a munitions factory; transfer to Oldenburg, t...