Description
Object description
Czechoslovakian Jewish schoolchild in Prague, Czechoslovakia, 3/1939-10/1942; inmate of Theresienstadt Concentration Camp, Czechoslovakia, 10/1942-10/1944, Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp and Fürstengrube Subcamp, Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp, Poland, 10/1944-1/1945 and Nordhausen Subcamp, Mittelbau-Dora Concentration Camp, Germany, 1/1945-4/1945
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Prague, Czechoslovakia, 1928-1939: family circumstances; education. Recollections of German occupation of Czechoslovakia, 3/1939-10/1942: reasons why all family did not leave Czechoslovakia, 3/1939; effect on education, 3/1939; start of German transports of Jews; behaviour of Germans towards Jews on streets; food situation; avoiding German round ups; effect on character of Jewish community; mother's role in family.
REEL 2 Continues: use of shops; abortive attempt of family to emigrate to United States of America via Cuba; level of knowledge of Holocaust; work equipping Jews sent on transports; listening to British Broadcasting Corporation and its effect on morale; question of how Nazi power was sapped by popular resistance illustrated by story of he was selected as servant by camp commandant SS Haptscharfuhrer Otto Moll of Fürstengrube Subcamp, Auschwitz Concentration Camp. Recollections of period as inmate in Theresienstadt Concentration Camp, Czechoslovakia, 10/1942-10/1944: transport to camp, 10/1942; reception; role as gardener; foraging for food.
REEL 3 Continues: mother Alice Frank's contracting of tubercolosis and his substituting himself for her on transport to Auschwitz Concentration Camp; character of camp; degree of social activity; possessions; techniques employed to survive. Aspects of period as inmate in Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp, 10/1944: train journey to camp, 10/1944; reception at camp; preserving high boots on arrival; method of coping with cold. Aspects of period as inmate at Fürstengrube, Subcamp, Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp, Poland, 10/1944-1/1945: allocation to camp; aid from Polish mining supervisor; character of mine. Recollections of journey from Fürstengrube Subcamp, Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp, Poland to Nordhausen Subcamp, Mittelbau-Dora Concentration Camp, Germany via Gleiwitz, 1/1945: trek to Gleiwitz; character of train journey to Nordhausen Subcamp; food thrown to prisoners by Czech civilians.
REEL 4 Continues: problems of obtaining water on journey; character of march; loss of his toes from frost-bite. Recollections of period as inmate in Nordhausen Subcamp, Mittelbau-Dora Concentration Camp, Germany,
1/1945-4/1945: treatment in hospital; role as interpreter and quartermaster; danger of Allied air attacks; leaning medicine; liberation by Allied troops, 11/4/1945; question of revenge after liberation. Aspects of period in Czechoslovakia, 5/1945-9/1945: return to Prague, 5/1945; making contact with survivors of family; treatment on return. Aspects of period as refugee in GB, 1945: arrival in 'The Boys' orphan transport, 9/1945.
REEL 5 Continues: move to camp in Windermere, 9/1945; problems of continuing education; prior recollection of operations on toes at Nordhausen Subcamp, Mittelbau-Dora Concentration Camp. Aspects of period as orthopaedic surgeon in GB: start of career; adapting to British life; supporting father Rudolf Frank psychologically; incidents of discrimination against him.
REEL 6 Continues: adapting to British culture. Question of passive resistance in concentration camps. Aspects of period as inmate in Fürstengrube, Subcamp, Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp, Poland, 10/1944-1/1945: composition of camp inmates; question of threat from inmates; question of being only survivor in his transport from camp at end of Second World War.