Oral history interview with Kazimierz Smolen

Oral History | Digitized | Accession Number: 2017.295.17 | RG Number: RG-50.957.0016

Overview

Interviewee: Smoleń, Kazmierz
Interviewer: Andrew Nagorski
Date: interview: 1994 November 07
Credit Line: Permanent Collection. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Gift of Andrew Nagorski

Physical Details

Language: Polish
Extent: 1 sound cassette.

Rights & Restrictions

Conditions on Access: There are no known restrictions on access to this material.
Conditions on Use: No restrictions on use

Keywords & Subjects

Topical Term: Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Poland--Personal narratives. World War, 1939-1945--Prisoners and prisons, Polish.
Geographic Name: Oświęcim (Poland)
Personal Name: Smolen, Kazimierz.

Administrative Notes

Legal Status: Permanent Collection
Provenance: Andrew Nagorski donated the interview with Kazimierz Smolen to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2016. Nagorski recorded the interview for the Newsweek cover story "The Last Days of Auschwitz" (January 15, 1995).
Special Collection: The Jeff and Toby Herr Oral History Archive

Record last modified:: 2024-04-24 13:57:39
This page:: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn562400

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Also in Andrew Nagorski collection

Materials related to research conducted by Nagorski into topics related to the history of the Holocaust and World War II. Includes the extended draft of an article about Auschwitz written by Nagorski, 1995, and published version of same as it appeared in Newsweek, 16 January 1995, sound recordings of interviews of historical eyewitnesses, historians, and others interviewed by Nagorski during his career at Newsweek, and while writing his books “Hitlerland” and “The Nazi Hunters,” transcripts of interviews, and other related research (and other) materials.

Andrew Nagorski papers

Document

Collection consists of transcripts of interviews conducted by Nagorski, primarily in preparation for a cover story on the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, written for publication in Newsweek magazine in January 1995. The collection consists of a typescript of the full version of the article; the shortened, public version as it appeared in Newsweek; and transcripts of related interviews that Nagorski conducted in the years following this article. In addition to interviews with Polish and Russian former prisoners of Auschwitz, mostly conducted in the early 1990s, the collection of transcripts also includes interviews with German president Richard von Weizsäcker; Manfred Rommel, the son of General Erwin Rommel; and Niklas Frank, the son of Hans Frank, the Nazi administrator of occupied Poland who was tried and executed by the Allies at the International Criminal Tribunal in Nuremberg.

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Albert Grinholtz, born on December 4, 1920 in Opoczno, Poland, discusses his family’s move to Paris, France in 1922 (he went with his father first and then his mother and little brother arrived later); being summoned along with his younger brother to register at the commissariat de police on May 14, 1941; being taken to the Gare d’Austerlitz and sent to Pithiviers, where he stayed for 13 months; being deported on June 25, 1942 to Auschwitz-Birkenau by cattle car, while his parents remained behind in Paris; the conditions of deportation and arrival in Birkenau; how the camp was not yet completed and the men were housed in the women’s barracks; the daily routine, brutality, and construction work brigade; being selected as one of 22 barbers to shave daily both the Germans and prisoners, about 450 men a day, and this work providing him with a bit more food; working on the construction of an Olympic pool in Birkenau, which was used for Nazi propaganda; his work cutting fuelwood for the mines nearby; the situation in January 1945 as the Germans began their retreat and the evacuation and murder of Jewish prisoners; hiding in the kitchen, unseen in the chaos, and being liberated later; being evacuated to Marseille, France on June 18, 1945; going to Budapest, Hungary and Bucharest, Romania, where he was taken care of by the Joint; and returning to Paris.