Charles P. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Charles P., who was born in Olkusz, Poland in 1923. He relates his family's emigration to Palestine, then France in 1926; participating in Hashomer Hatzair; a printer's apprenticeship; German invasion; a futile attempt to join the Resistance in Poitiers; printing Resistance papers in his father's Paris print shop; fleeing to Lyon in 1943; acquiring false papers in Montluel; arrest by the Gestapo; declaring himself a Jew to avoid more torture in Montluc; transfer to Drancy; deportation to Birkenau; slave labor in coal mines in Jawischowitz; relations between prisoners from different countries and with different political affiliations; and transfer to a print shop in Auschwitz. Mr. P. describes the death march in January 1945; two days in open train cars to Mauthausen; working in the print shop; transfer to Melk, then Ebensee in April; liberation by United States troops; prisoners killing kapos; repatriation to Metz via Nuremberg; recuperating for several years; reclaiming his father's print shop in 1949; and marriage in 1954. He notes his reluctance to discuss his experiences and shows photographs and medals.
Extent and Medium
3 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
- P., Charles, -- 1923-
- Jawischowitz (Concentration camp)
Corporate Bodies
- Melk (Concentration camp)
- Ebensee (Concentration camp)
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
- Drancy (Concentration camp)
- Mauthausen (Concentration camp)
- Birkenau (Concentration camp)
- Montluc (Prison : France)
- World Hashomer Hatzair.
Subjects
- False papers.
- Postwar experiences.
- Zionist organizations.
- Resistance.
- Postwar effects.
- Hiding.
- Mutual aid.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Underground movements -- France.
- Forced labor.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Death marches.
- Revenge.
- Concentration camps -- Sociological aspects.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Prisoners and prisons, German.
- Men.
- Video tapes.
- Holocaust survivors.
Places
- Nuremberg (Germany)
- Montluel (France)
- Paris (France)
- Palestine.
- Lyon (France)
- Poitiers (France)
- Metz (France)
- Olkusz (Poland)
- Poland.
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat