Hersch Wasser collection Kolekcja Hersza Wassera
Extent and Medium
2,454 digital images, PDF
3 DVD-ROMs, 4 3/4 in.
3 microfilm reels, 35 mm
Creator(s)
- Hersz Wasser
Biographical History
Wasser Hersz (Hirsz) (born in 1912 in Suwałki Poland), died in 1980 in Israel) – a lawyer and an economist, a member of the Peasant Movement. During the occupation he was in the Warsaw ghetto where he was a secretary of the Central Committee of Refugees at the Jewish Self-Help. In the secret Ringelblum Archive (ARG, "Oneg Shabat,") he was the First Secretary and one of the closest co-worker of Emanuel Ringelblum. While making the inventory of the materials and lists of authors he practically became the organizer of the Archive.
Archival History
Yivo Institute for Jewish Research
Acquisition
Forms part of the Claims Conference International Holocaust Documentation Archive at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. This archive consists of documentation whose reproduction and/or acquisition was made possible with funding from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
Source of acquisition is the Żydowski Instytut Historyczny im. Emanuela Ringelbluma (ŻIH). The original records are held in the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York, Record Group 225. Hersch Wasser secretly shipped documents from the Ringelblum Archives from communist Poland to France trying to save them that way. Digital copies of documents were made out of microfilms handed over to the Żydowski Instytut Historyczny im. Emanuela Ringelbluma (ŻIH) in Warsaw by YIVO in NY. Digital collection was sent to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, International Archival Programs in 2009 and later transferred to the Musuem Archives.
Scope and Content
The collection consists of diaries, eyewitness accounts, testimonies, essays, official and underground publications, documents from the Jewish councils (Judenrats). The materials pertain to Jewish communities, ghettos, labor camps and to Jews living illegally on the "Aryan side." Materials on the Warsaw Ghetto include a manuscript diary and other notes by Emanuel Ringelblum. Essays by other members of the Oneg Shabat group on topics related to conditions in the ghetto, such as: black market, street trade, smuggling, working, performing arts, child beggars, ghetto folklore, sanitary conditions, mortality, the Jewish police, the Judenrat, self-help orgainizations, child care. Materials on the Warsaw Ghetto uprising in April 1943 include testimonies, reports in the Polish underground press, a communication from the Polish Home Army (Armia Krajowa, AK) to the Jewish Fighters’ Organization (Żydowska Organizacja Bojowa, ŻOB) about support for the uprising. Materials on other communities consist mostly of eyewitness accounts and diaries from Chełm, Ciechanów, Częstochowa, Dąbie, Garbatka, Góra Kalwaria, Gorlice, Kaunas (Kowno), Krośniewice, Kutno, Legionowo, Łódź, Lubicz, Lublin, Lwów, Ostrowiec, Otwock, Piotrków, Płock, Płońsk, Serock, Słonim, Sokolów Podlaski, Torczyn, Vilna. Eyewitness accounts of the early labor camps for Jewish prisoners in Budzyn, Łowicz, Osiedle Osów, Pustków, Tyszowce. A testimony about the first death camp in Chełmno near Łódź.
Conditions Governing Reproduction
Copyright Holder: Yivo Institute for Jewish Research
People
- Ringelblum, Emanuel, 1900-1944.
- Wasser, Hersz, 1912-1981.
- Gutowski, Eliahu, 1900-1943.
Corporate Bodies
- AK-Home Army (Poland)
- Jewish Combat Organization (Poland)
Subjects
- Uprisings.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Poland--Personal narratives.
- Warsaw (Poland)--History--Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, 1943.
- Jewish ghettos--Poland.
- World War, 1939-1945--Jewish resistance--Poland--Warsaw.
Genre
- Testimonies.
- Diaries.
- Document
Copies
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United States Holocaust Memorial Museum holds copies of Holocaust-relevant archives from Yivo Institute for Jewish Research