Read reflections and testimonies written by Holocaust survivors in their own words.
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Brothers
November 1, 2017
Three years ago, I had a life-changing experience: I met a brother I never knew I had. His name is Arn Chorn Pond.
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The Unspeakable
November 1, 2017
At first, the Nazi occupation of Belgium did not seem so troubling to us because the German authorities didn’t start persecuting Jews until October 1940, almost six months after the invasion began on May 10, 1940. In addition, anti-Jewish laws were introduced gradually to avoid alarming the Jewish population, which might have provoked disobedience among Jews and opposition from Belgian authorities. The German leaders also wanted to avoid raising Belgian public opinion against them as happened during World War I.
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On Becoming an American
November 1, 2017
One bright spring day in 1956, my parents and I nervously faced a federal judge sitting in his private office in downtown Seattle, Washington. We were seated across from him at his desk. During the previous several months, the three of us had spent many hours studying a booklet in preparation for this day. The booklet contained questions and answers about the Constitution of the United States, the structure of the federal government, and some of the major historical events of this country. After asking us each several questions, easier ones for my parents, harder ones for me, the judge informed us with a very large smile that we had passed the test; he was ready to swear us in as naturalized citizens of the United States of America.
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Decamping France
November 1, 2017
During the invasion of Morocco and Algeria in Operation Torch, undertaken by the Allied Forces on the eighth of November 1942, German troops overran the unoccupied zone of France directly. The Nazi military finally and openly occupied the whole of metropolitan France in 1942 because of this new threat from the Allied invasion of North Africa. I found the sound of the Nazi boots marching on the Canebière terrifying, perhaps because the footwear worn by the German infantry were probably Knobelbecher, what are sometimes called jackboots. The standard version of the Knobelbecher in World War II had a leather sole with hobnails and a horseshoe heel.
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Money
November 1, 2017
I was about 14 years old, and my mom still made all my clothes. The war had been over for 11 years, but the stores still did not have a good selection, and money was very tight. I was not upset because Mom always asked what I wanted. She designed and made the clothes; they were always pretty and made me happy. Mom found remnant pieces of good fabric in nice colors. I loved the color blue.
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Refugees
November 1, 2017
It is 1946 in the Robert Taylor Displaced Persons camp (DP camp, later known also as Delayed Pilgrims camp). I am five years old. I share one room in a wooden barracks with my Dziadzio and Babcia. It is winter. Snowflakes float gently to land on icy-cold mud. Babcia has bundled me in every warm garment she can locate, whether it fits or not. I wear two pairs of Dziadzio’s socks on my hands. They cover my arms to the shoulders as well as my fingers. I sport a pair of someone’s leggings rolled up several times. My feet are bundled in rags. A knitted wool cap kept in place by a heavy babushka completes this outfit.
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Bosnia, 2016
November 1, 2017
In the summer of 2016, I went to Bosnia. I have been interested in Sarajevo for a long time.
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Where Are You, Tola?
November 1, 2017
I last held you when you were six months old and I was almost three. It was March 1943, a time of war, Nazis, and unthinkable persecution of our people. To give you, my sister, a chance to live, Dziadzio changed your name from “Tola Weinstock,” a Jew, to “Antonina Nowicka,” a Catholic. You were fair-haired, with our father’s blue eyes, so you could easily pass as a Catholic Polish child. He took you to Dr. Groer’s Catholic orphanage and paid them to keep you safe.
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My Dziadzio’s Legs. Lager, Late 1947
November 1, 2017
In late 1947, my grandpa (dziadzio), step-grandmother (babcia), and six-and-a-half-year-old I (Jula) lived in Tyler Displaced Persons camp (DP camp) in Wegscheid, near Linz, Austria. Tyler DP camp, also known as Wegscheid I DP camp, was the largest and most primitive DP camp in Austria. It was considered temporary shelter for people emigrating to other places. Each family was assigned one room in the camp (lager) composed of weathered, splintery, wooden barracks. On the right side of the lager and a bit away from the barracks were outdoor wooden shacks with toilets all attached in a row. Water was available from two outside spigots. We lived in barrack 13, near one of the spigots. I do not remember our room number nor the total number of rooms in our barrack.
