Collection of Historical Photographs.
Extent and Medium
More than 214,000 photographs; 400 albums and 9000 collections.
Scope and Content
This is the largest collection in the world of historical photographs related to the Holocaust. It documents Jewish life before and during the Holocaust, the life of survivors in the post-war period, but also various activities and ceremonies commemorating the Holocaust all over the world. Searching for keywords such as ‘Belgium’, ‘Brussels’, ‘Antwerp’ etc. yields a result of over 1000 relevant images, from various collections. We find portraits and group photos (scenes of everyday life, Shoah victims, resistance members, partisans, rescuers); pictures of youth movements (i.a. Bar Kochba, Hashomer Hatzair, Hapoel Haivri, Hanoar Hatzioni, Bericia, Jewish scouting groups, Mizrachi, Tikvateinu, Bnei Akiva, Gordonia, Yehuda, …); of assemblies and meetings of Zionist organisations and political parties (Bund, Zeire-Zion); of the hakhsharah centers in Villers-la-Ville, La Ramée and Roncquières; of sport clubs (Maccabi); of students and schools (Tachkemoni, Jesode-Hatora, Kaduri, Y.L. Peretz); of refugees and refugee aid committees; of transit camps for illegal immigrants (in the post-war period, i.a. in Château de Beau Neuf); of charity, social and philanthropic organisations (Menorah, the ‘Centrale’); of children’s homes, orphanages and summer camps (i.a. Villa Altol); of the Jewish Brigade in Antwerp; of various Holocaust monuments and remembrance ceremonies, … We also note many pictures of Belgian collaborators and their organisations, of Flemish Nazi’s and the SS, of the Breendonk camp, …
Finding Aids
The photo collection can be searched via the Digital Collections database at http://collections1.yadvashem.org/.
Process Info
The EHRI project, in cooperation with the National Archives of Belgium, selected Holocaust-relevant archival descriptions from the finding aid G. DESMET & P. FALEK-ALHADEFF, P.-A. TALLIER (dir.), Bronnen voor de geschiedenis van de Joden en het Jodendom in België (19de-20ste eeuw) - Sources pour l'histoire des populations juives et du judaïsme en Belgique (19e-20e siècles), Brussel, Algemeen Rijksarchief, 2015. Please note that this guide focuses on Belgium-related archival materials in the respective descriptions.
Pascale Falek & Gertjan Desmet
This archival description was created in the framework of the cooperation between EHRI and the Yerusha project.
Subjects
- charity
- children
- associations
- collaboration
- political organisations
- migration
- remembrance politics
- hidden children
- schools
- resistance
- religious communities
- reconstruction
- sport
- socialism
- Shoah
- Second World War
- Zionism
- youth movements
- students