Klara M. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Klara M., who was born in Čaňa, Czechoslovakia in 1924, one of six children. She recalls cordial relations with non-Jews; Hungarian occupation; anti-Jewish restrictions; learning to be a seamstress in Košice when she was sixteen; being rounded-up with her family in Čaňa in spring 1944; ghettoization; non-Jewish neighbors bringing them food; declining to hide with a non-Jew, not wanting to leave her family; incarceration in the Košice brickyard; deportation to Auschwitz/Birkenau; separation from her family; transfer to Bergen-Belsen in fall 1944, then to Braunschwieg two months later; slave labor clearing bombing rubble; transfer to a munitions factory, then Beendorf and Eidelstedt; being loaded onto freight cars in May 1945; liberation by the Swedish Red Cross; transport to Denmark, then Malmö and Landskrona, Sweden; repatriation in October; learning one brother had survived; and marriage to a survivor. Mrs. M. discusses the importance of being with cousins and friends to her survival; details of camp life; pervasive memories; observing cannibalism; difficulty believing she survived such circumstances; not sharing her experiences with her children, but often talking with her husband about those times; and the kindness of the Swedes and Danes.
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
- M., Klara, -- 1924-
Corporate Bodies
- Beendorf (Concentration camp)
- Braunschweig (Concentration camp)
- Svenska röda korset.
- Bergen-Belsen (Concentration camp)
- Birkenau (Concentration camp)
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
Subjects
- Postwar experiences.
- Survivor-child relations.
- Cannibalism.
- Hungarian occupation.
- Forced labor.
- Concentration camp inmates -- Family relationships.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Jewish ghettos.
- Women.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Video tapes.
Places
- Eidelstedt (Hamburg, Germany : Concentration camp)
- Denmark.
- Landskrona (Sweden)
- Malmö (Sweden)
- Košice (Slovakia)
- Čaňa (Slovakia)
- Czechoslovakia.
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat