Frances H. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Frances H., who was born in Opato?w, Poland in 1918, the younger of two sisters, three months after her father's death. She recounts living with an aunt in Zawiercie; her mother's remarriage; visiting her and her half-sister in Sosnowiec where they had moved; her aunt's death; German invasion in September 1939; fleeing with her uncle and cousins to Volodymyr-Volyns?kyi?; returning to her mother in Sosnowiec, then her relatives in Zawiercie; ghettoization; deportation to Auschwitz/Birkenau in 1942; separation with her cousin from her uncle and younger cousin (they were killed); encountering her sister (her mother had been killed); her sister's death shortly thereafter; futile efforts to keep her cousin alive; the pervasive odor of burning flesh; hospitalization; a friend saving her from selection; slave labor in the hospital, then the Union Kommando; Mala Zimetbaum's suicide during her public execution; a death march and train transport to Ravensbru?ck, then Malchow in January 1945; escaping from another death march with a fellow prisoner in Leipzig in April 1945; liberation by United States troops days later; traveling to Brussels with her friend with assistance from the Red Cross; contacting her uncle in the United States; marriage to a survivor from Zawiercie; emigration to the United States in October 1946; her husband waiting for his visa in Paris; visiting him; returning to the U.S.; her daughter's birth; and her husband's arrival in 1949. Ms. H. discusses becoming numb in camp; prisoners helping each other and telling stories; and her gratitude for freedom and her life in the U.S.
Extent and Medium
2 videocassettes
Conditions Governing Access
This testimony is open with permission.
Conditions Governing Reproduction
Copyright has been transferred to the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies. Use of this testimony requires permission of the Fortunoff Video Archive.
Rules and Conventions
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Process Info
compiled by Staff of the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
People
- Zimetbaum, Mala, -- 1918-1944.
- H., Frances, -- 1918-
Corporate Bodies
- Birkenau (Concentration camp)
- Ravensbrück (Concentration camp)
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
- Malchow (Concentration camp)
- International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.
Subjects
- Holocaust survivors.
- Video tapes.
- Women.
- Forced labor.
- Sisters.
- Concentration camp inmates -- Family relationships.
- Concentration camps -- Psychological aspects.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Jewish ghettos.
- Jews -- Poland -- Zawiercie.
- Postwar experiences.
- Hospitals in concentration camps.
- Death marches.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Atrocities.
- Mutual aid.
- Escapes.
Places
- Zawiercie ghetto.
- Leipzig (Germany)
- Sosnowiec (Województwo Śląskie, Poland)
- Paris (France)
- Brussels (Belgium)
- Zawiercie (Poland)
- Poland.
- Volodymyr-Volynsʹkyĭ (Ukraine)
- Opatów (Tarnobrzeg, Poland)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat