Advanced Search

Learn About The Holocaust

Special Collections

My Saved Research

Login

Register

Help

Skip to main content

Charlotte J. Holocaust testimony (HVT-252) interviewed by Maryanne Kador and Gabriele Schiff,

Oral History | Fortunoff Collection ID: HVT-252

Videotape testimony of Charlotte J., who was born in Frankfurt am Main in 1908 to a Jewish father and Christian mother, the youngest of four children. She describes being raised in both faiths; a sheltered life prior to the rise of Nazism; termination from her job in 1938 due to anti-Jewish laws; her boss clandestinely bringing her food; being smuggled with a group in 1942 through Graz to Zagreb; being caught; imprisonment in Zagreb, then Graz; release and return to Frankfurt; she and her fiance volunteering to accompany her debilitated father (he was eighty-seven) to Theresienstadt; marriage in Frankfurt on September 15, 1942, the day they were deported; her father's death two weeks later; assignment to the camp administration; her husband's leadership role resulting in his helping many other prisoners; her sister's arrival; sham improvements during the Red Cross visit; her husband obtaining additional food for her when she was pregnant; her daughter's birth in September 1944; her husband's deportation to Auschwitz in October (she never saw him again); liberation; returning to Frankfurt with her daughter and sister in June 1945 to join her brother and other sister; difficult living conditions; and emigration with her daughter to the United States in November 1947, with assistance from the Joint. Ms. J. notes always believing that she would survive. She shows documents and photographs.

Author/Creator
J., Charlotte, 1908-2003
Published
New York, N.Y. : Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies at Yale, 1984
Interview Date
March 10, 1984.
Locale
Germany
Frankfurt am Main (Germany)
Graz (Austria)
Zagreb (Croatia)
Language
English
Copies
5 copies: 3/4 in. master; 3/4 in. dub; Betacam SP restoration master; Betacam SP restoration submaster; and 1/2 in. VHS with time coding.
Cite As
Charlotte J. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-252). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.