Jacob Hennenberg photographs

Jacob Hennenberg was born in the city of Oswiecim, Poland, in 1924. After the Germans invaded in September of 1939, he and his father walked east to the town on the River San, but returned later to Oswiecim. His father's store was required to have a Jewish Star on the window and all Jews had a curfew. In March 1941 there was an order for the Jewish population to leave. They went to Chrzanow where the Jewish Community assigned them a room. On May 9, 1941 there was a "razzia" (round up). A soldier entered their apartment and ordered Jacob's father to follow him. Jacob, then about 17 offered to take his father's place. He was sent to the Bavarian village of Wiesau and incarcerated in RAB lager -- Reichsautobahn Lager (which became Zwangarbeitslager Wiesau), where the inmates dug the highway. He was sent to a number of other towns to work on the Autobahn before being sent to Klettendorf where he remained until 1943. Next he was sent to Freiberg where there was a selection. He and other able bodied inmates were sent to Waldenburg where he became inmate number 64242. He was also interned in Stuthoff concentration camp. He was liberated from the camp on May 9, 1945.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Original photographer unknown. Copy prints of the images donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum by Jacob Hennenberg in 1989.