Oral history interview with Steven J. Fenves

Oral History | Digitized | Accession Number: 2014.428.3 | RG Number: RG-50.822.0003

Overview

Interview Summary: Steven Fenves, born on June 6, 1931 in Szabadka, Yugoslavia (now Subotica, Serbia), describes his family, including his older sister Estera; his father Lajos, who was the manager of a publishing house and a newspaper; his mother Claire Gereb, who was a graphic artist; having a very conventional, affluent childhood; his governess Fräulein Schmidt; the importance his parents placed on speaking “Hochdeutsch” (“high German”); speaking Hungarian at home and German with his governess; the economic differences between the Jews in the community; attending a state school called the Queen Mary School (it was informally referred to as the Jewish school); having a few Gentile friends but being mostly friends with Jews; antisemitism in Yugoslavia; his lack of awareness of antisemitism until April 1941 when Germany attacked Yugoslavia; his father’s expulsion from his job; being one of the nine Jews allowed to attend higher education; experiencing antisemitism in the classroom; the financial difficulties experienced by his family; the German occupation of Hungary in 1944; his parents’ decision not to leave; the requisitioning of rooms in their house for Hungarian soldiers; the deportation of his father and most of the town’s intelligentsia; being forced to leave their home and move into the ghetto; being jeered at by their non-Jewish neighbors as they left; the looting of their home after they left; turning 13 years old in the ghetto and not having a bar mitzvah; being in the ghetto for two weeks and working at a machine shop outside the ghetto; hearing about the Normandy invasion on a hidden radio at the machine shop; being sent to a camp in Bácsalmás, Hungary for a week before being transferred to Auschwitz; the six day train journey to Auschwitz; the terror they experienced upon arriving at Auschwitz; being separated by gender and never seeing his mother again; his sister’s fate (she remained in Auschwitz for some time and then sent to Bergen-Belsen, where she was liberated in 1945); going to the boys’ barracks in Compound C, where he stayed for four months; daily life in the camp; witnessing many deaths; being selected as an interpreter for the kapos in the camp; the extermination of many Roma in August 1944; working with a Polish kapo; being an interpreter for the German foreman and camp commander; the black market and the resistance in the camp; being part of a roof repair detail and being able to visit with his sister; managing to buy a sweater and scarf for his sister before she was sent to Bergen-Belsen; the communication between the resistance inside and outside the camp; being smuggled out of the camp with the help of the Polish kapos; arriving in Niederorschel; his work and sabotage efforts in the camp; being sent on a death march in April 1945 to Buchenwald and the deaths of prisoners along the way; being herded into a small camp in Berlstedt; arriving in Buchenwald; the Americans arriving in Buchenwald soon after; his convalescence; his decision over where to go after liberation; his search for surviving family members; finding his aunt in Budapest, Hungary; going home and reuniting with his sister and father; his father’s death on February 6, 1946; returning to school; life under the communists; leaving with his sister in 1947 and going to Paris, France; going to the United States three years later; being drafted into the army; qualifying for the GI Bill and earning his doctorate; becoming active in a survivor organization in Pittsburgh, PA; and his thoughts on Germany and antisemitism in Europe.
Interviewee: Steven J. Fenves Ph.D.
Interviewer: Hannes Ravic
Date: interview: 2014
Credit Line: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Hannes Ravic for BILD TV

Physical Details

Language: English
Extent: 1 digital file : MPEG-4.

Rights & Restrictions

Conditions on Access: There are no known restrictions on access to this material.
Conditions on Use: Restrictions on use. BILD TV retains copyright. Copy and use requests must be submitted to BILD TV.
Copyright Holder: Bild TV

Keywords & Subjects

Topical Term: Antisemitism in higher education--Yugoslavia. Antisemitism--Yugoslavia. Black market--Poland--Oswiecim. Bribery. Child concentration camp inmates. Concentration camp inmates--Selection process. Croats--Crimes against. Death march survivors. Death marches--Germany. Hanging--Poland. Holocaust survivors--United States. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Yugoslavia--Personal narratives. Jewish children in the Holocaust--Personal narratives. Jewish ghettos--Serbia--Subotica (Subotica) Jews--Legal status, laws, etc.--Yugoslavia. Jews--Persecutions--Yugoslavia. Jews--Serbia--Subotica (Subotica) Kapos. Roll calls. Serbs--Crimes against. Soldiers--Billeting--Serbia--Subotica (Subotica) Translators. World War, 1939-1945--Concentration camps--Hungary--Bácsalmás. World War, 1939-1945--Concentration camps--Liberation. World War, 1939-1945--Deportations from Yugoslavia. World War, 1939-1945--Songs and music. World War, 1939-1945--Underground movements--Poland--Oswiecim. Men--Personal narratives.
Geographic Name: Bácsalmás (Hungary) Berlstedt (Germany) Hungary--Armed Forces--Yugoslavia. Niederorschel (Germany) Oświęcim (Poland) Paris (France) Pittsburgh (Pa.) Subotica (Subotica, Serbia) United States--Emigration and immigration. Yugoslavia--History--Axis occupation, 1941-1945.
Personal Name: Fenves, Steven J. (Steven Joseph)
Corporate Name: Auschwitz (Concentration camp) Bácsalmás (Concentration camp) Buchenwald (Concentration camp) Niederorschel (Concentration camp)

Administrative Notes

Holder of Originals: Bild TV
Legal Status: Permanent Collection
Provenance: Hannes Ravic, on behalf of BILD TV, donated the oral history interview with Steven J. Fenves to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum on October 14, 2014. The interview was conducted in 2014 by Hannes Ravic for BILD TV's production on the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz concentration camp.
Funding Note: The cataloging of this oral history interview has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
Special Collection: The Jeff and Toby Herr Oral History Archive

Record last modified:: 2023-11-16 09:32:50
This page:: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn100930

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