Description
Object description
Polish Jewish schoolchild in Aleksandrów Kujawski, Lubraniec and Kutno, Poland, 9/1939-5/1941; inmate in Łódź Ghetto, Poland, 5/1941-9/1943; inmate in Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp, Poland, 9/1943-11/1944; inmate in Pirschkow Labour Camp, Germany, 11/1944-1/1945
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Aleksandrów Kujawski, Poland, 1927-1939: family; relations with non-Jewish children; lack of personal anti-Semitism experienced; character of the town; extended family; reasons for coming to GB after Second World War; religious beliefs; father's encounter with anti-Semitic Pole; education. Recollections of period as schoolchild in Aleksandrów Kujawski, Lubraniec and Kutno, Poland, 9/1939-5/1941: German Air Force bombing of Aleksandrów Kujawski, 1/3/1939; father's arrest and release; move to Lubraniec; impositions of restrictions against Jews; move to Kutno; stay with friends; attitude towards wearing Star of David; sexual attack by Germans in Kutno, 2/1940; arrest of family and imprisonment in disused tobacco factory, 5/1940; reaction to German shooting of Jewish man; father's humiliation by Schultzstaffel (SS); conditions in disused sugar factory; story of how uncle got family work in Lubraniec; fate of father.
REEL 2 Continues: Recollections of period a inmate in Łódź Ghetto, Poland, 1941-1943: removal to ghetto; work in children's hospital; accommodation; deterioration in mother's health; gassing of children from hospital; knitting work; organisation of the ghetto; strike of knitters which led to imprisonment; work assembling aircraft parts; taking soup to mother; last time she saw her mother; difficulties of not being born in Lodz and looking after her mother. Aspects of period as inmate in Auschwitz II-Birknau Concentration Camp, Poland, 9/1943-11/1944: train journey from Lodz Ghetto to camp; reception procedure and selection; confinement to accommodation block and daily routine; reaction to Allied bombing of area; obtaining clothes and food from relative.
REEL 3 Continues: selection by Dr Josef Mengele; reaction to being taken to shower; issue of clothing. Aspects of period as inmate in Pirschkow Labour Camp, Germany, 11/1944-1/1945: removal to camp; improvement in rations; digging anti-tank ditches; contact with male inmate from nearby camp; beating received. Aspects of march away from Pirschkow Labour Camp, 1/1945: carrying sick woman in blankets; collapse into ditch; obtaining lift in military vehicle; escape from column and hiding in barn; arrest by police and return to barn after bombing; second arrest; move into woman's camp. Reflections on Holocaust experience: discovery of nature of Auschwitz Concentration Camp; question of effects of Holocaust on son's health; importance of speaking about experiences to schoolchild; visit to Auschwitz II-Birkenau Concentration Camp; attitude towards Germans.
