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Laura G. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-1917) interviewed by Ilana Abramovitch,

Oral History | Fortunoff Collection ID: HVT-1917

Videotape testimony of Laura G., who was born in Michalovce, Czechoslovakia in 1917, one of ten children. She recalls her comfortable, orthodox childhood; moving to Prague in 1937 to learn dressmaking; returning home in 1938; German occupation; antisemitic restrictions; illegally entering Hungary in 1942; staying with relatives in Uz︠h︡horod, Seredne, and Mukacheve; obtaining false papers; living in Budapest as a non-Jew; joining her family in Liptovský Mikuláš; moving to Poruba; hiding with other Jews in bunkers in the Tatra Mountains; raids by Hlinka Guards; relocating to Hrádok; arrest with her family in January 1945; imprisonment in Liptovský Mikuláš; transfer to Sered;̕ seeing her father for the last time; deportation with her mother and sister to Ravensbrück; forced labor for Siemens; her mother's death; transfer with her sister to Bergen-Belsen; assistance from a kind block leader; good relations with non-Jewish prisoners; contracting typhus; liberation by British troops; convalescing with her sister in Malmö and Göteborg, Sweden; learning her father and four sisters had perished; visiting her surviving siblings in Michalovce; emigration to the United States; and marriage to a survivor. Mrs. G. discusses lingering sadness; her guilt that she survived when so many family members were killed; and reluctance to share her story with her children.

Author/Creator
G., Laura, 1917-
Published
New York, N.Y. : A Living Memorial to the Holocaust-Museum of Jewish Heritage, 1991
Interview Date
December 12, 1991.
Locale
Michalovce (Slovakia)
Czechoslovakia
Prague (Czech Republic)
Seredne (Ukraine)
Uz︠h︡horod (Ukraine)
Mukacheve (Ukraine)
Budapest (Hungary)
Liptovský Mikuláš (Slovakia)
Poruba (Slovakia)
Tatra Mountains (Slovakia and Poland)
Hrádok (Slovakia)
Malmö (Sweden)
Göteborg (Sweden)
Language
English
Copies
2 copies: 3/4 in. dub; and 1/2 in. VHS with time coding.
Cite As
Laura G. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-1917). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.