- Summary
- Videotape testimony of Maria S., who was born in Łódź, Poland in 1922, one of three children. She recounts her family's affluence; cordial relations with non-Jews; German invasion; ghettoization; her father's former employees smuggling food to them; forced factory labor; her father arranging to smuggle her, her brothers, and mother to relatives in Szydłowiec in 1941 (he was killed later attempting escape); forced transfer to Wierzbnik; incarceration in Starachowiece; slave labor in a munitions factory; receiving food from a civilian worker; sharing it with her mother; a mass killing of escapees; saving her mother and brother from selections (an aunt and uncle were shot); transfer to Auschwitz/Birkenau; smelling burning flesh; hauling stones; a German giving her shoes; transfer with her mother and two aunts to Bergen-Belsen; starvation, lice, and pervasive death; liberation; reunion with one brother (the other did not survive); her mother's convalescence in Switzerland; working in Bergen-Belsen displaced persons camp with Josef Rosensaft and Sam Bloch; UNRRA assistance; returning to Łódź; attending high school and college; assistance from ORT; marriage; the birth of two children; an antisemitic incident; obtaining permission to visit her brother in the United States, provided her husband and daughters remained; and bringing them to the U.S. a year later by obtaining political asylum for them. Ms. S. discusses life in Bergen-Belsen displaced persons camp, including establishing schools, competing political groups, and black marketeering. She shows objects, photographs, documents, publications, and a recording of her poetry.
- Author/Creator
- S., Maria, 1922-
- Published
- New Haven, Conn. : Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, 2003
- Interview Date
- December 5, 2003.
- Locale
- Poland
Łódź
Łódź (Poland)
Szydłowiec (Województwo Mazowieckie, Poland)
Wierzbnik (Starachowice, Poland)
- Cite As
- Maria S. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-4266). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.
- Other Authors/Editors
- Langer, Lawrence L., interviewer.
- Notes
-
Related material: Jacob and Maria Szapszewicz. New York: American Jewish Committee, Oral History Library, 1974. NYPJ Dorst Jewish Division Oral Histories, Box 197 no. 1. 153 pages and 3 soundcassettes.
Related publication: Memories and Dreams: A Holocaust Survivor Remembers. The Poetry of Maria Szapszewicz / Maria Szapszewicz. -- Blue Sky Distribution.
