Archival Descriptions

Displaying items 4,021 to 4,040 of 4,487
Language of Description: English
Holding Institution: Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
  1. Israel Z. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Israel Z., who was born in S?omniki, Poland in 1922, the youngest of four children and only son. He recalls his family's affluence; their Hasidic orthodoxy; attending public school and cheder; antisemitic harassment; attending high school in Krako?w; German invasion; arrest with his father; transfer to Miecho?w; execution of his father and another man; burying them; returning home; his mother and sisters hiding with non-Jews, obtaining false papers, and living as non-Jews; deportation to Bierzano?w; death losing meaning for him; mass killings as reprisals for escape a...

  2. Philip P. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Phillip P., who was born in approximately 1922 and served in the United States Army. He recounts military draft in 1942; deployment to England in 1943; arrival on Omaha Beach on D-Day; crossing through France into Germany; the Battle of the Bulge; liberating Leipzig, and a nearby camp; emaciated prisoners; many corpses; and moving south. He notes that prior to this, he had been skeptical when hearing about concentration camps, but realizing for what he had been fighting having liberated a camp. He shows photographs.

  3. Irving F. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Irving F., who was born in Stepangorodok, Poland in 1915. He recalls his youth in an observant family; attending yeshiva in Baranowicze in 1932; returning there later to marry and live; the birth of a child in 1940; and a decrease in antisemitic acts after the Soviet occupation. He describes the German invasion; imposition of anti-Jewish measures; ghettoization and formation of the Judenrat; forced labor for Organisation Todt; and the disappearance of some 6,000 Jews in a March 1942 Aktion. Mr. F. tells of constructing hideouts for use during round-ups; the killing of...

  4. Ilsa C. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Ilsa C., who was born in Hamm, Germany in 1916 and raised in Geilenkirchen. She recounts a large, extended family, their strong German identity; cordial relations with non-Jews until Hitler came to power; attending Catholic school; studying in Aachen and Berlin; official hiding of overt antisemitism during the 1936 Olympics; meeting her future husband in Cologne; obtaining papers to emigrate to the United States; returning home for a few months; going to the railroad station with her family during Kristallnacht; traveling to Cologne; visiting her parents in Aachen (th...

  5. Sophie K. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Sophie K., who was born in Bursztyn, Poland (presently Ukraine), the second youngest of seven children. She recounts her mother's death when she was three; her father's death shortly before German invasion; forced labor; transfer to Bukachevtsy; her siblings and their families being deported or killed; transfer to Rohatyn; escaping by swimming across a river; a Polish couple informing her there were Jews in the woods; finding a man she knew (he was killed soon after), then her cousin; digging and living in a bunker; receiving food from a nearby farmer; liberation by S...

  6. Gertrud B. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Gertrud B., a Romani. She recalls childhood in Prussia, then Danzig; arrest and incarceration in a camp; deportation by cattle car to Auschwitz at age fifteen; the trauma of being tattooed; becoming ill; nine weeks in the infirmary; her sister feigning an injury to join her; being thrown on a pile of corpses; her sister retrieving and nursing her; her father playing music for the barrack elder; transfer to Flossenbürg after two years, then Graslitz; forced labor in a munitions factory; severe punishments and beatings (she shows her scars); liberation by United States...

  7. Hadassah C. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Hadassah C., who was born in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 1939, the daughter of Polish immigrants. She recounts her maternal grandparents' emigration to Palestine in 1933; German invasion; being hidden with a family in Hengelo; her parents' clandestine visits; her mother determining she was being neglected; transfer to another family; attending church (she had not been told she was Jewish); a parade at liberation; her foster parents' fondness for her resulting in their reluctance to return her; returning to her parents; learning she was a Jew; her sister's birth in 1946;...

  8. Lothar R. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Lothar R., who was born in Berlin, Germany in 1926. He recalls being shunned by non-Jewish children; the family move to Cernăuti in 1933; Soviet occupation; expropriation of their business; German invasion; ghettoization; a forced march to Mărculești, then Yampolʹ; a mass shooting by Romanian soldiers; living in the Bershadʹ ghetto from 1941 to 1944; his mother and father disappearing; moving with his sister to the Balta ghetto; forced labor; receiving food from a German soldier; surviving an execution by feigning death; hiding with his sister in an outhouse; their...

  9. Bernard R. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Rabbi Bernard R., who was born in Ti?a?chiv, Czechoslovakia (presently Ukraine) in 1924. He recalls his rabbinic family; attending yeshiva, then teaching there; Hungarian occupation; his father's deportation to Romania; hiding with his mother; briefly moving to Mukacheve; returning home when deportations started; moving to Oradea (Grosswardein); tutoring at a yeshiva; obtaining false papers to avoid deportation; German occupation in 1944; a futile attempt to enter Romania; building bunkers; ghettoization; working outside of the ghetto; brief detention; hiding in a bun...

  10. Harry C. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Harry C., who was born in Poland in 1896, the youngest of three children. He recalls attending cheder in Sosnowiec; his older sisters' marriages; his parents' deaths; working in textiles; marriage; German invasion; his wife's deportation to Auschwitz; his deportation to Auschwitz; transfer to Blechhammer; slave labor "digging and chopping"; public hangings; Allied bombings; hospitalization; liberation by Soviet troops; traveling to Katowice, then Sosnowiec; a month later leaving for Wroc?aw, then Munich; living in Fo?hrenwald displaced persons camp from 1945 to 1949; ...

  11. Suzanne R. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Suzanne R., who was born in Hungary in 1924. Mrs. R. describes prewar life in the large Jewish community of Debrecen; the gradual encroachment of antisemitism, which reached its peak after the German occupation in 1944; the formation and liquidation of the Debrecen ghetto; and her deportation, with her family, to Auschwitz. She tells of her arrival at Auschwitz; the physical and psychological conditions there, where she worked in the kitchens; a brief reunion with her father; and her selection, with several female relatives, for the labor camp in Allendorf. In Allendo...

  12. Ralph W. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Ralph W., who was born in ?o?dz?, Poland in 1924. He recalls economic hardships when his father lost his job in 1935; living in a Jewish neighborhood; German invasion in 1939; two German soldiers severely beating his father; ghettoization; his parents' deportation to Chelmno in 1941 (he never saw them again); obtaining a privileged job as a factory cook with assistance from a family friend; transfer to factory labor in March 1944; volunteering for deportation in someone's place for extra food and clothing; transfer to Cze?stochowa; slave labor building a HASAG factory...

  13. Abraham O. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Abraham O., who was born in Bia?ystok, Poland, in 1914. He describes the German occupation of Bia?ystok; the ghettoization of Bia?ystok and the round-ups of Jews that began several weeks later; building bunkers to hide from the Germans; and the routine Aktions and selections that characterized life in the ghetto. He discusses the liquidation of the ghetto, when he and his family went into hiding in a bunker; the formation of a small ghetto around the bunker; and the development of community life within this ghetto despite the difficult conditions. Mr. O. also relates ...

  14. Tibor G. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Tibor G., who was born in Ardud, Romania in 1928, one of four children. He recounts attending Romanian school; Hungarian occupation; attending Hungarian school; his father's draft into a Hungarian slave labor battalion; his release; ghettoization in Satu Mare; deportation to Auschwitz; separation with his father from his family upon arrival; slave labor with his father in Buna/Monowitz; a kapo giving him a privileged job and extra food that he shared with his father; public hangings; separation from his father; evacuation to Buchenwald in January 1945; receiving food ...

  15. Shmuel G. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Shmuel G., who was born in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia (presently Slovakia) in 1923, one of two children. He recalls attending a Jewish school, then a Slovak grammar and high school; joining Hashomer Hatzair; swimming competitively; anti-Jewish laws under the Slovak Republic; his sister's emigration to England; his father's death; forced labor in Ivanka pri Dunaji; visiting his mother weekly; incarceration in Sered; learning his mother was in hiding (she was deported in 1944 and killed); working in Štrbské Pleso; escaping; Hashomer contacts providing him with false p...

  16. Abraham H. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Abraham H., who was born in approximately 1925 and grew up in Skhidnyt︠s︡i︠a︡, Poland (presently Ukraine), the younger of two brothers. He recounts attending public and religious schools; antisemitic harassment by Poles and Ukranians; attending gymnasium in Drohobycz; participating in a Zionist youth group; Soviet occupation in 1939; German invasion in June 1941; his father fleeing; hiding with his mother and brother to avoid anti-Jewish violence; joining relatives in Boryslav; round-ups and mass killings; ghettoization; forced labor; sexual harassment by a German; Ba...

  17. Miriam S. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Miriam S., who was born in Homel?, Belarus in 1921. She describes the family moves to Vies?intos and Paneve?z?ys; attending university in Kaunas; antisemitic incidents; Soviet occupation; German invasion; being hidden by a non-Jew during Lithuanian killings of Jews; ghettoization; slave labor digging ditches; avoiding a large selection in October 1941; learning of mass killings in the Ninth Fort; marriage; her husband trading their possessions for food outside the ghetto; a round-up of children; escaping with her husband; being hidden with a group of Jews by a farmer ...

  18. Vera K. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Vera K., a twin, who was born in Tornala, Czechoslovakia. She recalls their affluence; hiding with non-Jews and in the forest for two years following the German occupation; arrest and incarceration in Sered ?in 1943 with her parents and sister; transport to Birkenau; separation from her parents (she never saw her father again); selection for twin experiments by Josef Mengele; frequently seeking and finding her mother; witnessing women giving birth and the immediate murder of the babies; living in the Czech family camp, women's camp, Zigeunerlager (Gypsy Lager), and th...

  19. Peter M. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Peter M., who was born in Cherkasy, Ukraine in 1917. He recalls family observances of Jewish holidays; attending Jewish school; working with his father as a carpenter after 1933; enlisting in the Soviet army in 1939; two years of communications training in Russia; military actions in Belarus in 1941; defending Z︠H︡lobin for a month; retreating; fleeing with a friend; returning home in October; learning his parents were evacuated and his brother drafted (he never saw them again) from a Ukrainian neighbor who provided food and helped him escape; living in Novoye Zhittya...

  20. Ada V. Holocaust testimony

    Videotape testimony of Ada V., who was born in 1929 in Warsaw, Poland, the only child in an affluent home. She recounts attending a Jewish school; frequent, pleasant visits to her mother's family in Paris; German invasion; Germans beating her father; his escape to Czyżew in the Soviet zone; being smuggled with her mother to join him; attending a Soviet school; participating in Komsomol; her father enlisting in the Soviet military (they never saw him again); German invasion; ghettoization; her mother paying smugglers to bring them to the Warsaw ghetto; she, her mother, and grandmother obtai...