- Summary
- Videotape testimony of Renée V., who was born in Brussels, Belgium in 1913. She recalls her secular childhood; her avowed atheism despite her Jewish ancestry; participating in anti-fascist activities; marriage; German invasion; briefly fleeing to France; returning to Brussels; arranging hiding places for her parents and husband's parents; continuing to teach; quitting to devote full time to the Resistance; arrest with her husband in July 1943; incarceration in St. Gilles; torture during interrogations; transfer to Vught via Cologne; slave labor for Philips; sabotaging the work; deportation to Auschwitz/Birkenau in June 1944; briefly seeing her husband; transfer to Langenbielau; slave labor for Telefunken; a death march in January 1945; staying briefly in several camps; liberation by the Red Cross near Hamburg in April; recuperating in Sweden; returning to Brussels; and reunion with her husband and parents. Mrs. V. notes some prisoners stole from each other and others shared; relations between national and political groups in camps; her high morale because she believed she was incarcerated for her Resistance activities, not simply because she was a Jew; reluctance to discuss her experiences, thinking no one would believe her; and eventually sharing some of her story with her son and students.
- Author/Creator
- V., Renée, 1913-
- Published
- Brussels, Belgium : Fondation Auschwitz, 1993
- Interview Date
- July 7, 1993.
- Locale
- Belgium
Brussels (Belgium)
France
Cologne (Germany)
Hamburg (Germany)
Sweden
- Cite As
- Renée V. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-3001). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.
- Other Authors/Editors
- Majérus, Pascal, interviewer.
Welner, Bellina, interviewer.
- Notes
-
This testimony is in French.
