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Goldberg, Peter - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn60297
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
00:59:33
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
00:59:33
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Peter Goldberg was born on May 12, 1919 in Paberze, a village approximately 20 km from Vilnius, Lithuania (Vilna, Poland), where he and his nine siblings were raised in an orthodox Jewish home. The Russian Army occupied Vilnius in 1939 until the Germans took over in 1941. Peter recalls the many restrictions placed on Jews, including the wearing of yellow stars, forced labour, and the establishment of the Jewish ghetto. Peter and his wife had to stay in the ghetto for about seven months. They remained there, often in hiding, until it was liquidated by the German Gestapo. Then, for ten months, they paid to live in a Polish house approximately 10 km from the Ghetto. Peter was taken to do forced labour as a coal digger in Bielawaka ? concentration camp. Once the camp was liquidated, he and his wife had to return to the ghetto in Vilnius for a second time until it closed in 1943. They spent about eight months in the Vilnius HKP-562 concentration camp where Peter was forced to work as a mechanic. The Germans liquidated the camp in July 1944. After liberation by the Russian Army, he and his wife returned home. He knew that most of his family had been killed immediately upon arrival in the ghetto in Vilnius (Vilna). After the war, Peter worked as a baker and a stock keeper of food for the Russian Army. When the borders opened in 1957, Peter, his wife and their daughter immigrated to Poland. They lived there until December 1958 when they decided to immigrate to Canada, as Peter’s sister was living in Montreal. Once here, Peter worked as a butcher and manager of a meat store.
Accession No.
WTH-050
Name Access
Goldberg, Peter
Places
Paberze, Lithuania (Poland), Lithuania (Poland), Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Goldberg, Peter - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/kd0CWEt_Qrc
Less detail

Feist, Ursula - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn60304
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:41:00
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:41:00
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Ursula Feist (née Erber) was born on June 2, 1921 in Berlin, Germany. Before Hitler, Ursula, her parents and sister, Brigitta, lived in a comfortable economic status. Ursula had a good educational background. Her father was very observant and Ursula discusses how she might have turned out more observant in her life today, had she not been forced by her father to go to synagogue. With the rise of Nazism, Ursula describes living in perpetual fear from 1933 until 1939. Beginning in 1934, the family experienced financial hardship and Ursula went to a commercial college to learn how to type and take short hand. She found employment at an Italian agency from March until November 1938 -- Kristallnacht. Ursula describes Kristallnacht as the most horrible thing: she remembers coming down in the morning and seeing windows smashed and synagogues burning. By the beginning of 1939, many Jews were leaving Germany. Ursula obtained tickets to Shanghai from the Italian agency for her parents and sister. For herself, she made arrangements to go to England to stay with a longtime pen pal. On May 19, 1939, two weeks before her eighteenth birthday she got onto a children's transport to England. Her parents left for Shanghai in June 1939. She remembers the SS coming on the train and emptying out suitcases to find anything of value. In England, Ursula stayed with the Wicker family near Chester in North England. The family treated Ursula like one of their own. She had to adjust to a life where she did not have to worry. Ursula went to Birmingham and trained as a nurse. In May 1940, she was interned at a woman’s camp on the Isle of Man for one year. The British government had no way of knowing who was a Nazi sympathizer so they interned everybody. While in the camp, she met a woman from Munich who was the aunt of her future husband, David. Ursula worked as a waitress in the Cumberland Hotel and David came and asked her if he could take her to the theatre. Later she got a monitoring service job at the BBC. She listened to Hitler's speeches and had to translate and transcribe them. She and David married in 1943. David wanted to join the Commandos when he learnt that his mother was killed but instead he got into the intelligence corps and then the pioneer corps. Their first son, Anthony, was born in London in 1948. By this time, communication with Ursula’s parents had stopped. They had been living under Japanese control in Shanghai and under terrible circumstances. After the war they immigrated to Minneapolis, United States. Her father had angina and died. Later, her mother and sister moved to New York. Life in post-war England was difficult due to very high taxes. In 1951, Ursula and David came to Canada in search of employment. They did not go to the United States because they were afraid that their son would be drafted. Their second son, Daniel was born in Montreal in 1954. Ursula worked in the Neurological Hospital and then the Royal Victoria Hospital as an administrative assistant to the chief of surgery. Her children are both married and she has two grandchildren from each son. Ursula talks about the fact that she is still homesick for London; they visit very often and have very close friends there. She has also been back to Berlin several times.
Accession No.
WTH-267
Name Access
Feist, Ursula
Places
Berlin, Germany, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Feist, Ursula - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/oAO-Kk5yy_8
Less detail

Dawang, Elie - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn60321
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
03:55:00
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
03:55:00
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
French
Notes
Elie Dawang was born on January 4, 1934 in Paris, France, to Lithuanian parents. Elie has good memories of his early childhood, being raised by loving and well-off parents. In May 1940, the Dawangs left Paris for a small village near the Spanish border. Despite the great danger, they went back to Paris to liquidate the business of Feivish, Elie’s father. The three of them were arrested in September 1941 and while Feivish managed to get Elie out of prison, he couldn’t do anything to save himself or his wife. They were both sentenced and sent to jail for possessing false papers. They both ended up in Auschwitz, but Elie’s mother was gassed upon arrival whereas Feivish survived the war. Meanwhile, Elie was being taken care of by a Jewish woman. Elie and his caretaker almost got arrested during the roundup of Vel d’Hiv but managed to hide. After a few months hiding in the suburbs of Paris, they moved to the country where they stayed until liberation. When Paris was liberated, they moved back there and Elie returned to school. He reunited with his father in May 1945. They moved to Canada in 1951 with Elie’s stepmother. Elie describes the process to immigrate, his first impressions of Montreal and Canada and his involvement in Holocaust education.
Accession No.
WTH-482
Name Access
Dawang, Elie
Places
Paris, France, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Dawang, Elie - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/f95UEOppbHE
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Seltzer, Martin - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67757
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:26:32
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:26:32
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Martin Seltzer was born Mordechai (Motke) Penczna in Klimontów, Poland on February 2, 1917 to an observant Jewish family. At the onset of the war, Martin had three older sisters who were married, a younger brother and a younger sister. Neither his parents nor any of his sisters survived the Holocaust. The Germans came into Klimontów ten days after the September 1st occupation of Poland. A Judenrat was established, all Jews were ordered to wear an armband with the yellow star, and the Germans began requisitioning resources every second week. The family business was taken over by a Volksdeutch - they could still live in their home, however. In 1940 all Jews from surrounding villages were ordered into the center of Klimontów. In 1942, the Jews in Klimontów received a deportation order. Martin's father asked a Polish farmer, a friend of his, to hide Martin until the war ended. It was understood that he would be compensated for this. One morning the town was full of Ukrainian police - people started to run, Martin included. The Ukrainians were shooting at the fleeing Jews - many of them were killed, but Martin was lucky to make it out of the city unharmed. The rest of his family went together to Auschwitz and were murdered there. Martin hid in a forest until night fell, and then made his way to the farmhouse, where he hid in the stable as arranged. He stayed on the farm for over two years; he would go to the forest if the Germans were near - the farmer's wife was very frightened of being caught hiding a Jew. Martin tells a story about almost being caught in a cellar trying to dig up his family's hidden valuables. In 1944 the Russian army advanced into Klimontów - when Martin heard this, he left his hiding place and went into the city. He took over his family's flour mill and employed some other Jewish survivors; the Russians requisitioned him to make flour to feed the Russian army. After four or five months he was warned by a Russian Jewish soldier that they were moving on and that he should leave the city. Martin wasn't feeling well - he went to Lodz to see a doctor (there were none in Klimontów). He was operated on for appendicitis, and when he left the hospital he learned that the Armia Krajowa had come into his hometown at night and killed all the Jewish survivors living there. He learned that his cousin was living nearby in Opatów; he knew that the AK were active all over Poland and that she was at risk as well. He took the train there and convinced her to leave with him; they lived together in Lodz for about six months. They got in contact with the Bricha, who smuggled them into Czechoslovakia by bribing Russians. From there they crossed into Austria and lived in Linz for a few months in a Jewish refugee camp - it was after May 1945 - the war was already over. Martin and his cousin went to Stuttgart and lived there until 1947. She got in contact with her brother in Canada - he wanted to bring her over but she insisted that Martin had to come as well. The immigration laws at the time dictated that only parents, children and siblings could be sponsored from DP camps, not cousins. Martin took the name of his cousin's brother who had died the previous year in order to immigrate to Canada. Once in Canada, he kept the Seltzer name out of fear that he would be suspected of being a Russian spy in the age of McCarthyism. He arrived in Canada in November 1947 and began to work as a custom peddler. He married and had two children; he has one grandson. He decided to make his testimony because of his age and to counter Holocaust denial.
Accession No.
WTH-031
Name Access
Seltzer, Martin
Places
Klimontów, Poland, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Seltzer, Martin - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/tWyZyDo8RmI
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Reinitz, George - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67758
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:07:04
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:07:04
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
George Reinitz was born April 16, 1932 in Szikszo, Hungary. He and his younger sister Marie were raised in a working class religious home. George had a Jewish education until grade five when he attended a secular school. With the German invasion of Hungary in 1944, all the borders had been closed off and antisemitic restrictions were in place. By April 1944, rumours of deportations were spreading. George’s family was taken to the police station with whatever belongings they could gather. The following day, April 20, 1944, they were taken by train to a deportation centre in Kosice, Slovakia (Kassa, Hungary). Within two months, they were taken to Auschwitz on a three-day train ride in cattle cars holding approximately 70-75 people per box car. During selections upon arrival at Auschwitz, George said goodbye to his mother and sister, whom he never saw again. In another selection, George wanted to remain with his father, so at age 12, he stayed in the adult line by saying that he was 18. He and his father received a number tattooed on their arm; they were told they were lucky to have this number as opposed to burning in fire. Determined to survive, George made three friends that helped each other out whenever possible. In the camps, George worked in the stockrooms, washing and fixing pitchforks and shovels. After contracting pneumonia, George was taken by his father to the emergency hospital in Auschwitz. That was the last time George saw his father who had been shot on a death march. A day or two later, George met a Jewish doctor named Greunwald from Kusheta; he helped his patients to get on their feet, giving them extra food. The doctor gave George injections raising his fever so that he could stay in the hospital longer. In January 1945, they were liberated by the Russians. George was taken to a DP camp in Katonitz where he stayed for a month. He was then taken to another camp in Chernivtsi, Ukraine (Chernowitz, USSR). This delay was to make sure that they were not political prisoners. The war ended on May 8, 1945. George was taken by train to Slutzk, Belarus (USSR) where he remained until December. Papers were soon cleared and George was put on a train to Budapest, Hungary. At age 13, he found an uncle who took him in. George enrolled into school. His uncle left and George was again on his own; he found his cousin who was ten years older and who took care of George as if he were his own son. George was later transferred to an orphanage where he had better chances of survival. The orphans tried to get into Palestine but it was difficult to get in. In 1948, Israel was reclaimed and George found a way to get out of Budapest through a Canadian Jewish agency that helped him get to Montreal. They found him a foster home with 35 other kids and a social worker. At the age of 16, George had various trades and lived on his own. He got a job with a furniture company and after seven years of work, he left into his own business and became the employer of over 200 employees. He never left to live in Israel. He married a Canadian Jewish woman. They have children and grandchildren.
Accession No.
WTH-032
Name Access
Reinitz, George
Places
Szikszó , Hungary, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Reinitz, George - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/rccgrOFLAJ4
Less detail

Kotkowsky, Charles - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67759
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:09:37
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:09:37
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Charles Kotkowsky was born in Piotrkow Trybunalski, Poland on August 8, 1920. He says that he encountered significant antisemitism growing up. After the German invasion in September 1939, he was made to wear an armband identifying him as Jewish and became afraid to go outside. A ghetto was constructed almost immediately in Piotrkow Trybunalski. Charles worked in a glass factory and was in communication with a Jewish Resistance group. In 1942, he and his brother Shlomo were taken to a nearby labour camp. In November 1944, they were again transferred, first to the HASAG Pelzery, near Cz?stochowa, Poland, and then to Buchenwald in January 1945, where Charles was tormented and humiliated by being forced to strip naked in the freezing cold. Charles was taken on a death march to Floeszberg - a subdivision of Buchenwald - in Febuary 1945. The camp was incomplete, and Charles had to help in its construction. In April the camp was evacuated and the prisoners were placed on a train headed for Czechoslovakia. Along with seven other people, including his brother, Charles jumped off the train and successfully escaped. The group was hidden by sympathetic Czechoslovaks in Plzen, Czech Republic (Czechoslovakia). They were there hiding in a barn when they were liberated by the American Army on May 8, 1945. After the war, Charles mentioned that he was invited to what he described as a “séance,” where he witnessed captured S.S. men being beaten - one of whom was killed. His brother contracted tuberculosis and needed to be moved to a hospital in another town. Unfortunately, Charles could not stay with him in Czechoslovakia for long. He soon moved to a series of DP camps in Italy, working in a doctor’s office. In 1951, he was refused entry into the United States, but was accepted into Canada, arriving there that same year.
Accession No.
WTH-068
Name Access
Kotkowsky, Charles
Places
Piotrkow Trybunalski, Poland, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Kotkowsky, Charles - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/8hmNmz1HpGo
Less detail

Frost, Jacob - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67760
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:40:49
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:40:49
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Jacob Frost was born on November 15, 1909 in Gera, Germany. He worked in a carpet factory after finishing Volksschule (primary education) and graduating from a non-Jewish high school. As soon as the Nuremberg laws were passed, he and his family were well aware of the dangers of the Nazis. By 1934, they had begun the process of trying to emigrate. Jacob witnessed Kristallnacht and was rounded up and taken to Buchenwald. He calls the experience at Buchenwald a “concentration” camp rather than an “internment” camp. He witnessed many brutalities, including a well-respected man of the community “losing his marbles” and a doctor tending this man’s self-inflicted wounds. Jacob spent five weeks at Buchenwald and could return to Gera as long as he had proof of papers to emigrate. With the advice and help of several kind gentiles along the way, Jacob made the voyage to Israel. He traveled by boat via Vienna to Salina, Romania, arriving in Israel in 1940. He immigrated to Canada in 1950.
Accession No.
WTH-075
Name Access
Frost, Jacob
Places
Gera, Germany, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Frost, Jacob - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/I_Tyt93j1Kc
Less detail

Penney, Lea - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67761
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:29:10
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:29:10
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Lea Penney (née Prilutzky) was born on February 17, 1922 in Berlin, Germany. Her parents were of Ukrainian origin and had immigrated to Germany during the pogroms in Russia. Her father worked for a large insurance company. Lea describes her father as "ultra-orthodox," and accordingly family life was very observant. They did not live in a particularly Jewish part of Berlin and Lea began by going to a German public school. It was only later that she joined a Jewish school. The day Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor, Lea remembers the tremendous fear and excitement that entered into the lives of her family and the Jewish community. In her own family, the situation was never discussed because her father wanted to shelter his children as much as possible. About every six months, new antisemitic restrictions were enforced. Because of these laws, her father eventually lost his job as an insurance salesman laws and began to deliver coal instead. The family had to move to a smaller and cheaper apartment. It was then that Lea felt the poverty and hunger which began to dominate family life. Rumours about concentration camps began to circulate within the community. Lea was part of a Jewish group that was training youths to go to Palestine and work on a Kibbutz. On November 9, 1938, the day of Kristallnacht, she was taking part in a preparatory camp near Hamburg, when everyone was told by the monitors to be quiet and turn off the lights. The next day the youths found out what had happened in the rest of Germany. As she discovered later, the Jewish Association had paid the Nazis to protect the children. In February 1939, at 17 years old, Lea was brought to Palestine by the organization. There she lived on Kibbutz for two years until 1941. Even though work was very hard, she felt a great sense of relief at the freedom she had there. In the beginning, she was still able to write and receive letters to her family in Germany. Later on all communication ceased. She describes that there was a great amount of pressure for young people in Palestine to join the British army. After having worked cleaning and ironing for some time, she decided to do so, and eventually became an English, German, and typing teacher in the army. She was stationed in Egypt and during the last years of the war was contacted by the Red Cross to send financial assistance to her mother, who had been found in Paris. As she later found out, her father had made it to Paris too, after hiding for some time in Germany. From a Paris labour camp, however, he was eventually deported to Auschwitz, where he perished. All her siblings had been able to leave Germany, some to England, others to Palestine. Lea met her husband in the army and they married in Cairo in 1946. The couple moved to England where they stayed until 1953. Her husband was a civil servant, and received a job offer in Geneva, where they lived from 1953 to 1965. After staying a year in Germany, they eventually moved to Montreal in 1969, where they have lived ever since. Lea and her husband have two sons and one daughter.
Accession No.
WTH-081
Name Access
Penney, Lea
Places
Berlin, Germany, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Penney, Lea - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/f7PVB7qCr50
Less detail

Schryver, Samuel - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67762
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
02:32:52
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
02:32:52
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Sam Schryver was born on May 7, 1922 in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Sam describes pre-war Amsterdam as the “most beautiful Jewish area ... so warm ... [the] most beautiful place to live for a Jew ... this is gone and will never, never come back." Sam went to public school, but also attended religious school where he learned Hebrew. He had a traditional Jewish upbringing.His father was on a committee to help clothe the poor; and the entire family belonged to various synagogues and Jewish organizations. Most of the Jews in Amsterdam were concentrated in the centre of the city. Sam explains that he never experienced any antisemitism growing up and that many of his close friends were non-Jews. The Germans entered Amsterdam in May 1940. The Dutch Nazis began to organize more openly. One night 150 Dutch Nazis approached the Jewish quarter of the city. They were met, however, by 1 500 Dutch gentiles who came to defend the Jews. One Dutch Nazi was killed in the skirmish. As a reprisal, the German Nazis rounded up 400 Jewish boys and took them to concentration camps, either Mauthausen or Buchenwald. The Jewish neighbourhood was demarcated and all Dutch, Jews and non-Jews, had to register with the Nazis. Sam was able to get a job at a hospital, allowing him to be exempted from work camp. In September/October 1942, his father was taken to a concentration camp. Sam joined the resistance - he obtained false I.D. and ration cards for fugitives. During the great raid of May 1943 the Germans emptied all the hospitals and senior's homes - all patients (including his mother) and hospital employees were thrown into trucks to be taken to concentration camps. Sam managed to survive the great raid by going into hiding in The Hague. He spent 18 months in an attic until he was discovered and taken to a gestapo jail, "The Orange Hotel," where he was held from January 22 to February 2, 1945. He was then taken to Westerbork concentration camp. At Westerbork he worked in a factory that recycled batteries. He escaped and was picked up by the Orange Brigade - the allies thought Westerbork was a German army camp and was going to bomb it. Due to Sam's intervention, they delayed the bombing and sent a reconnaissance mission which confirmed his report that this was actually a concentration camp. The Canadian forces liberated Westerbork. Sam immediately joined the armed forces and volunteered to guard the German soldiers. He was relieved of his duties on June 22, 1945. He returned to Amsterdam where he joined a Zionist organization. Sam found out his parents had both been killed in Sobibor. One sister survived. Then he travelled the country looking for "Hidden Children,” preparing them for Aliyah. He did this until the State of Israel was proclaimed in 1948. He went into the textile industry and got his B.A. in Holland. In 1954, Sam immigrated to Canada because he had been liberated by Canadian forces. He did not want to create a family after seeing what had happened to his parents. His girlfriend was persuasive, however, and they have been married for 42 years.
Accession No.
WTH-124-1
Name Access
Schryver, Samuel
Places
Amsterdam, Netherlands, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Schryver, Samuel - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/TlyPQlTpN2g
Less detail

Guter, Ernest - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67763
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:09:12
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:09:12
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Ernest Guter was born on April 7, 1917 in Toru?, Poland (Thorn, Germany). A year after his birth, his parents moved to Berlin then back to their hometown, Stolp. At a young age, Ernest joined the Maccabees and travelled across Germany preparing for the Jewish Youth Aliyah. In January 1938, he went to Berlin and became a social worker apprentice. One year later, he was transferred to the German Jewish Congress as a social worker. Ernest was in Berlin during Kristallnacht. A man helped him hide with other Jewish men in a store for several days, until it was calmer. Ernest stayed hidden in Berlin until he managed to get a visa to the United Kingdom. On the day that the German army entered Czechoslovakia, Ernest left for Great Britain. While working for the Rothschild’s, Ernest attended night-school at the College of Southampton, attempting to obtain a social science diploma. In 1940, all males with German passports living in England were interned. Ernest was originally interned in London, and then spent eight weeks interned on the Isle of Man. He was offered the choice of either staying on the Isle of Man for the duration of the war or going to either Canada or Australia. He chose Canada by chance and was sent to the Sherbrooke internment camp. Hymie Grover, a knitting-mill operator got Ernest out of the internment camp. He attended McGill University and graduated in 1945. He married a Jewish Canadian woman and has three children.
Accession No.
WTH-132
Name Access
Guter, Ernest
Places
Toru? (Thorn), Poland (Germany), Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Guter, Ernest - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ponlj5fYRdI
Less detail

Kutscher, Jean - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67764
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:31:06
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:31:06
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
French
Notes
Jean Kutscher was born on January 24th, 1926 in Paris to Romanian parents. His parents had fled Romania because of antisemitism. Jean and his siblings attended a laic school and grew up in a secular home. In France, Jean and his relatives didn’t experience antisemitism before 1939. However, they knew what was going on in Germany, thanks to the news shown before movies in theatres. As a French citizen (not as a Jew), Jean was shocked by Germany invading France. At that point, several anti-Jewish laws were enacted. Jean and his siblings started to understand what it was to be Jewish. Although it was compulsory, Jean and his older brother decided not to wear the yellow star. Later on, Jews were frequently rounded up from the street. First, Jean’s father was sent to Drancy in 1941, and then his brother was arrested on the street and sent to Drancy. They were both taken to Germany to a destination unknown to their relatives. Jean’s girlfriend, who was a Gentile, helped the family and provided them with food. On September 23rd, 1942, French policemen arrested Jean, one of his brothers, his sister and his mother. At the police station, adults and children were separated. Jean lied about his age, enabling him to stay with his younger brother and sister. It was the last time they saw their mother. Jean’s sister was housed by the family of a friend while Jean and his brother left Paris. They planned to go to Lyon where one of their aunts lived. They managed to cross the line of demarcation by themselves, without a guide. Unfortunately, they couldn’t stay in their aunt’s apartment, and therefore joined the “Compagnons de France.” Jean couldn’t stand it so he returned to Paris without his brother. Jean worked as a salesman in a Parisian department store. One day, policemen came to the store and told the young men working there that they had to come back the next day with some personal belongings. They were to be sent to Germany to work in exchange for the liberation of French POW’s. This mandatory service was called “Le Service du Travail Obligatoire” (STO). The police specified that if the men did not obey, the store directors and their families would be sent to Germany. Jean was taken to Germany and worked on a barge for one year. He was treated well and people trusted him. When Jean first saw the Allies in March 1945, he was hiding in a bunker near Duisburg. He was liberated by Canadians and served as an interpreter between Canadians and Germans for one month. Upon his arrival in Paris in 1945, Jean discovered the existence of concentration and death camps. As a result, Jean enrolled in the army to go to Germany but his superiors refused to send him there. Instead, Jean was sent to Morocco in April of 1945, and later to Indochina. He returned to Paris in 1947. He married his girlfriend in 1949. Jean and his wife immigrated to Montreal where they discovered a Jewish life like they had never seen before. Since his mother’s arrest, Jean has never stopped feeling traumatized and guilty.
Accession No.
WTH-149
Name Access
Kutscher, Jean
Places
Paris, France, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Kutscher, Jean - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/DBPicl1NsVA
Less detail

Yaros, Esther - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67765
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
00:57:38
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
00:57:38
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Ester Yaros was born on January 23, 1932 in Brussels, Belgium. She grew up in a non-religious home but felt Jewish anyway. When Germans started bombarding Belgium, the family decided to flee to France, thinking that it wouldn’t yet be invaded by the Nazis. When they saw German trucks coming to France, they returned to Brussels. Several antisemitic laws were enacted; Esther couldn’t attend school anymore for instance. In 1942, her parents sent her to live with farmers in the outskirts of Brussels. They visited her every Sunday until one day they didn’t show up. She learned that they had been denounced and that they died in Auschwitz. A woman from Solidarité Juive came to hide her in a convent. She got a new name, Alice Raymonders. One day, she told a friend she was Jewish. The priest had to call her a liar in front of everyone to save her and everybody’s life. The living conditions were so poor that lots of children became sick, including Esther who was sent to a hospital in Brussels. She was then sent to another convent, in Sugny, where she stayed until 1944. At that point, the entire convent ran towards Brussels, fleeing the front. After the war, Esther was taken to the orphanage Les Hirondelles in Brussels. She stayed there until a man came to propose that the orphans immigrate to Palestine. Esther and her friends refused and immigrated to Canada instead. Esther arrived in Winnipeg in 1947 and later settled in Montreal in 1950.
Accession No.
WTH-166
Name Access
Yaros, Esther
Places
Brussels, Belgium, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Yaros, Esther - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/OgmNpswR7B8
Less detail

Meisels, Ron - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67766
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:53:20
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:53:20
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Ron was born on June 7, 1935 in Budapest, Hungary, an only child. While his father's religious background was very orthodox, his mother's family was less religious. This led to tensions in the marriage, and they divorced in 1938. Ron's mother began a relationship with another man, Mor Makover, who later became Ron's stepfather. Ron still went to synagogue and had Sabbath dinners with his father's family every Friday night. He attended a neighbourhood Jewish elementary school, where he learnt to speak Hungarian and Hebrew. Ron remembers the day when German troops invaded Hungary and the fear that entered into his family's life from then on. Soon they were forced to wear the yellow Star of David. As Ron's father was a Polish citizen, his mother had become Polish too, and was now forced apply for residence documents. On May 1, 1944, she was arrested while waiting at the Polish embassy. She was taken into an old rabbinical college, where many Jews were held before being deported to Auschwitz and Dachau. After about two months, Raoul Wallenberg arrived at the college and, setting up a chair and table, proceeded to hand out Swedish passports to the captives. Ron's mother asked for additional passports for Ron and his father. Having been made Swedish citizens, they were now permitted to leave, and Ron's mother came home again. Soon after, in August 1944, Ron and his mother were moved into a designated "Swedish house," which was only for Swedish citizens. By this time Ron's stepfather, Mor, had been taken to a forced labour camp. Ron's mother took great risks to bring him food several times a week, passing as a Hungarian gentile by not wearing the yellow star. One time, when she went to bring him food as usual, she found out that he had been put on a train for deportation. Rushing to the train station, she found Wallenberg standing on the platform in front of the train. At her request, Wallenberg told the officials that there was a Swedish citizen on the train, and Ron's father's name was called out. Mor recognized it, and was able to pass as his mother's ex-husband. He was taken off the train and reunited with Ron and his mother. Only four inmates were to survive that particular deportation. By December 1944, all Jewish residents, irrespective of their Swedish nationalities, were ordered to line up in front of their houses and were sent to the ghetto. Ron thinks that by this time Wallenberg had lost some of his influence and was not able to stop the ghettoization of the Swedish citizens. By sneaking away from the line, Mor managed to save Ron's mother's wedding ring, which he was later able to trade in for a sack off flour. During their stay in the ghetto, there was heavy bombing of the houses and their own building was hit, completely destroying their living quarters on the top floor. A falling cross beam injured Ron and his mother. After having been treated at the hospital they were forced to move into the basement, which was extremely filthy and unhygienic. In January 1945, the Russian troops arrived and the ghetto was liberated. Mor found a cart, and took Ron and his mother back to their old apartment. A Christian woman had moved in, and Mor had to threaten that he would denounce her as a Nazi sympathizer before she finally moved out voluntarily. Mor and Ron's mother finally married in August 1945. After some years in Hungary under Communism, the family decided to leave in 1954. In order to save a man who had been selling arms to Israel from Hungary, as a cover-up, the Israeli government issued passports to Polish Jews in Hungary. Ron's family was among the lucky ones and was able to leave to Vienna and then Lim, Austria. There they waited for papers to enter the United States or Canada. Ron remembers being extensively questioned by the CIA on their lives in Communist Hungary. Finally their papers for Canada arrived and the family emigrated in November 1954.
Accession No.
WTH-183
Name Access
Meisels, Ron
Places
Budapest, Hungary, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Meisels, Ron - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/EudnIwlrhoI
Less detail

Cieply, Isak - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67767
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
02:26:32
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
02:26:32
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Isak Cieply was born on February 1, 1924 in Starachowice, Poland. He had five siblings and the family was very poor. In the fall of 1939, soon after the German invasion, the Jews of Starachowice were ordered to move into the ghetto. Isak was selected to work in a steel factory and his work pass protected him from round-ups. At the beginning of 1943 he was sent to the Bugaj camp to work in a supplies warehouse. In the summer of 1944 the camp was liquidated after rumours of the approach of the Soviet army had spread. The prisoners were taken to Auschwitz. Isak was sent to work in an electric supplies warehouse in Buna/Auschwitz III. There he met a German soldier who proposed a deal that Isak accepted. Isak was to supply this soldier with electric materials and, in return, he would get a loaf of bread every day. In January 1945 Isak was sent on a death march to the Flossenbürg concentration camp. Sometime later he was sent on another death march but succeeded to escape with some fellow prisoners. They eventually met American soldiers. After liberation Isak worked as the chief supplier of the Pfarrkirchen and Eggenfelden DP camps. He immigrated to Canada in 1948 and married the late Regina Cieply who was also a survivor. They had four children and several grandchildren, among them Jamie Benizri.
Accession No.
WTH-213
Name Access
Cieply, Isak
Places
Wierzbnik Starachowice, Poland, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Cieply, Isak - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/eIbnIGm8Rg8
Less detail

Zimmerman, Michael - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67768
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
04:08:09
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
04:08:09
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Michael (Moses) Zimmerman was born on October 2, 1907 in Warsaw, Poland (Russia), to modern orthodox Jewish parents. The family was wealthy and had a live-in governess who was Jewish. From 1915 to 1918 the family lived in Moscow. Moses remembers the Kerensky revolution in March 1917 as peaceful. The Bolshevik revolution in October, however, was bloody -- the family was terrified and hid in the basement of their house in the city's centre. Moses describes the regime of terror -- his father's property was confiscated, his customers were murdered, bread rations were only available for the children. The Zimmerman’s returned to Poland in 1918 -- Russian soldiers smuggled them across the border. Moses had been schooled by a private tutor for eight years; he had no contact with Polish children. He attended gymnasium and then Polish university. Moses wanted to be an engineer and was accepted to a polytechnic college, graduating in 1933. He began working at a German firm in 1934. In August 1939 all men over the age of 21 had to go to the army for two years. They rejected Moses -- no officer would be called Moses. On September 6-7, 1939, at night, Moses left Warsaw with 200,000 other men. They were sure that the Allies would destroy Germany quickly. On September 17, Moses arrived in Lvov to meet his girlfriend, Elizabeth. Moses and his sister were taken to Russia by cattle car. He lived in barracks and worked cutting trees. Moses escaped with another couple to Kazan. The men were captured at the train station and interrogated by the KGB. In November 1940, Moses was sent to a Gulag for three years for attempting to escape from the camp. He worked in the forests in the middle of winter, marching 6 km to work without proper clothing or adequate meals. In June 1941 Moses was transferred to an electrical plant on the Arctic Ocean, near Finland, to work as an engineer. When the war was declared Moses moved to the Urals above the Arctic Circle. The Polish government-in-exile, in London, charged the Russians with organizing a Polish army to fight alongside Russia. Moses went to Poland and was examined -- Jews were rejected because they were "too weak" to fight. American Jewish organizations were told of this unofficial policy and they protested until a second army commission was appointed. Moses lied about having to support a family and was exempted from military service. The Soviets were being evacuated from Moscow and Leningrad -- Moses took the train with them to an area near Iran. They arrived in central Asia and Moses worked in the cotton fields. He travelled to a Polish help organization; later returning as their representative, he opened a school for peasant children and orphans. The Russians soon replaced the Poles and Moses was without work. In 1944 he was forced to take Russian citizenship; however, he managed to retain his Polish Jewish identity. After liberation on May 8, 1945, Moses married a Polish woman. They returned to Poland by train, arriving in Shamash to intense hostility on the part of the Polish population. A few weeks later the Kielce pogrom was perpetrated upon the Jewish population and the Zimmermans traveled to Breslau. Moses' parents and two sisters had been deported from the Warsaw ghetto and murdered in Treblinka in 1943. In late October 1946 Moses and his wife paid off border guards to escape out of Poland through Czechoslovakia -- Moses was thrilled to leave Poland as he hated it vehemently. They stayed in a DP camp in Salzburg, Austria. Moses approached JIAS and created a vocational school in an old brewery. The Zimmermans had a baby in 1948. The following year they applied to immigrate to Canada, arriving on June 24, 1950. Moses changed his name to Michael upon arrival to Canada. He applied for a job out of the newspaper and began working for Canadian Industrial Ltd. From 1953 to 1972 Michael worked for the CNR as an engineer and as a translator of Soviet research. He accepted a contract in 1971 and has been consulting for nine years with the USSR for the Canadian government and several private corporations. Michael discusses several his trips to the Soviet Union -- this work, and the red carpet treatment he receives from the Soviets, gives him deep satisfaction. Michael's son publishes technical manuals for a living.
Accession No.
WTH-243
Name Access
Zimmerman, Michael
Places
Warsaw, Poland (Russia), Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Zimmerman, Michael - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/AmvpEcay9pc
Less detail

Heller, Anita - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67769
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:36:39
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:36:39
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Anita was born on April 26, 1926 in Karlsruhe, Germany. She came from a relatively well-off family. Her father, a German businessman, served as an officer in the German Army during WWI. He attended the 1912 Olympic Games as a member of the German Soccer Team. Her mother came from Warsaw. When she was two, the family moved to Berlin to live in a villa with servants. Anita attended a small private girl school from 1932 to 1937. She wasn't really aware of her Jewish roots before 1933. But her life changed the very day Hitler came to power. As anti-Jewish laws tightened, Anita felt a little bit more excluded every day. In 1935, her brother was sent to Scotland where he attended Kurt Hahn's school. In the summer of 1937, her parents took the decision to move to Engelberg, a small town near Luzern, Switzerland. The family left Berlin, leaving everything behind them. Anita was sent to a convent school in Luzern. Although they were able to get an American visa, the family decided to move to France in 1938. Being of Alsatian descent, they were eligible for French citizenship, which drove them to settle down in Paris where they led an undisturbed life until the war broke out. Her father was interned in a camp because he came to be viewed as an enemy alien. Eventually, in May 1940 the whole family succeeded in obtaining a Canadian visa and left Paris for Montreal. Anita didn't really enjoy her first years in Montreal as she experienced strong antisemitism on one side and on the other side was rejected by fellow Jews because of her German Citizenship. In 1947, she graduated from McGill University. She got married one year later and had two children.
Accession No.
WTH-291
Name Access
Heller, Anita
Places
Karlsruhe, Germany, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Heller, Anita - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/g46CQOiRFjY
Less detail

Veisfeld, Issie - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67770
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:10:25
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:10:25
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Issie Veisfeld was born on July 10, 1928 in Iasi, Romania. He recalled a history of significant antisemitism while growing up, stating that Romanians would physically assault Jews to entertain themselves. He gives a vivid description of the Iasi Pogrom, which took place on June 27, 1941, describing how Romanian authorities rounded up Jews, executed on mass, had those who survived bury the dead, and then transported them to Transnistria. However, Issie explains that his father, who was an upholsterer for the Romanian Army, was warned by a Turkish officer about the forthcoming Pogrom, allowing him and Issie to hide in their attic when the roundup was occurring. His father’s job and connections were also the reasons that they were not deported from Iasi during the War. Unfortunately, while both his mother and sister survived the War, his father was killed during an Allied bombing run over Iasi in 1944, weeks before the war ended in Romania. Iasi was liberated by the Red Army in August 1944, after which Issie states Romanians and Ukrainians who had collaborated with the Germans were executed. He decided to leave Romania when former collaborationists and fascists started joining and gaining influence in the Communist Party. The government would not let him leave without paying a bribe, so he left illegally by sneaking out in 1947 with his mother and sister, traveling through several European cities before finally leaving for Canada in 1948.
Accession No.
WTH-305
Name Access
VEISFELD, Issie
Places
Iasi, Romania, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Veisfeld, Issie - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/Z1kEvO5AbiU
Less detail

Schichter, Sara - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67771
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:55:21
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:55:21
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Sara Schichter (née Kaminski) was born on January 8, 1925 in a small Polish town called Bedzin, near Sosnowiec. She and her eight brothers were raised in a traditional Jewish. Three of her brothers died before 1924. At the outbreak of the war, the family had relocated to Hasselt, Belgium, where Sara attended elementary school and learned Flemish. In May 1940, the family fled to northern France but was caught up in the fighting in Dunkirk and Calais. They returned to Belgium in October 1940, and spent the rest of the war hiding in four separate houses all in the vicinity of Brussels. Sara lost her mother and three of her brothers who had been deported to Auschwitz. In May 1951, Sara immigrated to Canada, settling in Montreal where she became a teacher. Notably, Sara kept a diary during the war and she refers to it during the interview. Ms. Schichter passed away on May 19, 2013.
Accession No.
WTH-326
Name Access
Schichter, Sara
Places
Bedzin, Poland, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Schichter, Sara - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/0sBGFgcWpNU
Less detail

Pitluk, Zulema (Zlatka) - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67772
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
00:36:33
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
00:36:33
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
Yiddish
Notes
Pitluk, Zulema (Zlatka) was born on September 23, 1924 in Pruzana , Belarus (Poland).
Accession No.
WTH-327
Name Access
Pitluk, Zulema (Zlatka)
Places
Pruzana , Belarus (Poland), Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Pitluk, Zulema (Zlatka) - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/AjhenOmDhpA
Less detail

Strauss, Edgar - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.cjhn.ca/link/cjhn67773
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:41:49
Collection
WITNESS TO HISTORY COLLECTION (MHMC-02)
Description Level
Item
Material Type
moving images
Physical Description
01:41:49
Creator
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre
Language
English
Notes
Edgar Strauss was born on June 11, 1909 in Ludwigshafen, Germany, to a Conservative Jewish family. He was unable to complete law studies because of antisemitic laws and was dismissed from the Civil Service due to the Weiderherstellung des Berufbeamtentums (Nazi reorganization of the Civil Service to eliminate Jews). In November 1938, Edgar experienced Kristallnacht and was interned at Dachau concentration camp. After his release one month later, he went to Luxembourg but returned for fear of reprisals against his father. Edgar obtained a passport and visa and on August 15, 1939 he left for the United Kingdom where he worked in a machine shop. His father was deported to Gurs; he survived the war in that camp because he was in the hospital when deportations to Auschwitz took place. In June 1940, after Dunkirk, Edgar was interned by the British as an enemy alien. He was sent to the Isle of Man and from there to Trois Rivières, Québec; New Brunswick; and Ile -Aux- Noix, Québec, respectively. In 1942, the Canadian government began to release internees to work. Edgar settled in Montreal.
Accession No.
WTH-349
Name Access
STRAUSS, Edgar
Places
Ludwigshafen, Germany, Europe
Archival / Genealogical
Archival Descriptions
Repository
Montreal Holocaust Museum
Images
YouTube

Strauss, Edgar - Oral History of a Holocaust Survivor

https://www.youtube.com/embed/gPse2kymZs4
Less detail

87 records – page 1 of 5.