Overview
- Summary
- Videotape testimony of Rena R., who was born in Kraków, Poland in 1917. She recounts her family's affluence and orthodoxy; her mother's death; her father's remarriage; marriage in 1936; her daughter's birth in 1937; anti-Jewish boycotts; one sister's emigration to Palestine; vacationing in Zakopane in summer 1939; German invasion; returning to Kraków; moving to a village; her sister and mother-in-law joining her; a policeman warning them of a deportation; hiding in a barn for three weeks; walking to the Kraków ghetto; hiding her daughter with her maid; slave labor in a uniform factory; deportation to Płaszów in March 1943; her husband's visits; public hangings; hospitalization; transfer with her sister to Auschwitz in 1944; liquidation of the Zigeunerlager (Gypsy Lager); transfer two months later to Lichtwerden; slave labor in a textile factory; starvation; liberation by Soviet troops in May 1945; walking to Kraków; learning her husband, daughter, siblings and father had been killed; marriage in 1946; her son's birth; emigration to Sweden, Montréal, then the United States; and her second husband's suicide. She discusses dehumanization in the camps; recurring nightmares, and not sharing her story with her children.
- Published
- Cleveland, Ohio : National Council of Jewish Women, Holocaust Archive Project, 1985
- Interview Date
- January 14, 1985.
- Locale
- Poland
Kraków
Kraków (Poland)
Zakopane (Poland)
Sweden
Montréal (Québec) - Cite As
- Rena R. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-521). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.
Physical Details
- Language
- English
- Copies
- 4 copies: 3/4 in. dub; Betacam SP restoration master; Betacam SP restoration submaster; and 1/2 in. VHS with time coding.
- Physical Description
- 1 videorecording (1 hr., 23 min.) : col
Keywords & Subjects
- Subjects (Local Yale)
- Antisemitism Prewar.
Hiding.
Aid by non-Jews.
Hospitals in concentration camps.
Husband Death.
Postwar experiences.
Postwar effects. - Subjects
- Holocaust survivors. Video tapes. Women. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Personal narratives. World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, Jewish. Jewish ghettos. Jews--Poland--Kraków. Forced labor. Husband and wife. Children--Death. World War, 1939-1945--Atrocities. Sisters. Concentration camps--Psychological aspects. Nightmares. Poland. Kraków (Poland) Zakopane (Poland) Sweden. Montréal (Québec) Oral histories (document genres) R., Rena,--1917- Płaszów (Concentration camp) Auschwitz (Concentration camp) Birkenau (Concentration camp)
Administrative Notes
- Holder of Originals
-
Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
- Special Collection
-
Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies
- Link to Yale University Library Catalog:
- http://hdl.handle.net/10079/bibid/4293928
- Record last modified:
- 2018-06-04 13:28:00
- This page:
- https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/hvt4293928
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