Oral history interview with Heddy Spitz

Oral History | Accession Number: 1989.228.54 | RG Number: RG-50.060.0054

Heddy Spitz, born in 1920 in Munkacs, Czechoslovakia (Mukacheve, Ukraine), describes her family’s business running a grocery, a dance hall, and a restaurant; being driven out of their homes with 30,000 other Jews to a ghetto area for three weeks in May 1943; being sent to Auschwitz, where her mother and two of her sisters were immediately gassed; marching with her sisters to the East where they were able to separate themselves from Nazi marchers by hiding in a barn; being saved by Russian workers who allowed them to stay in their homes and because they had no numbers on their arms and could speak Russian; working in the fields until the Russians liberated them; registering in Germany to go to the United States after the war; opening a business in Phoenix, AZ; and having four children.

Some video files begin with 10-60 seconds of color bars.

Interviewee: Heddy Spitz
Date: interview: 1988 January 03
Language: English
Extent: 1 videocassette (VHS) : sound, color ; 1/2 in..

Expand all

Special Collection: The Jeff and Toby Herr Oral History Archive
Topical Term: Death march survivors.
Death marches.
Escapes.
Holocaust survivors--United States.
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Personal narratives.
Jewish ghettos--Ukraine.
Jewish refugees--Germany.
Jewish women in the Holocaust.
Jews--Persecutions--Ukraine.
Jews--Ukraine--Mukacheve.
Sisters.
Women concentration camp inmates.
World War, 1939-1945--Deportations from Ukraine.
Women--Personal narratives.
Geographic Name: Leipzig (Germany)
Mukacheve (Ukraine)
Oświęcim (Poland)
Phoenix (Ariz.)
United States--Emigration and immigration.
Personal Name: Spitz, Heddy, 1920-
Corporate Name: Auschwitz (Concentration camp)
Holder of Originals: Phoenix Holocaust Survivors Association
Legal Status: Permanent Collection
Provenance: The interview with Heddy Spitz was conducted on January 3, 1988, by the Phoenix Holocaust Survivors' Association in affiliation with the Cline Library of Northern Arizona University as part of a project to document the testimonies of Holocaust survivors in the Phoenix, AZ, area. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum received a copy of the interview in 1989.
Conditions on Access: There are no known restrictions on access to this material.
Conditions on Use: No restrictions on use
: Record last modified: 2023-11-16 08:09:51
This page: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn512540

Also in Phoenix Holocaust Survivors Association oral history collection

Oral histories conducted by the Phoenix Holocaust Survivors Association

Date: 1987-1992

Oral history interview with Ella Adler

Oral History

Ella Adler, born in 1924 in Krakow, Poland, discusses her childhood; the beginning of the war; life in the ghetto; life in various concentration camps, including Auschwitz-Birkenau; life in labor camps; liberation; returning home; and her immigration to the United States.

Oral history interview with Harry Adler

Oral History

Harry Adler, born in 1924 in Berlin, Germany, discusses his childhood; moving with his family in 1932 to Paris, France; attending school in France; moving with his family to Poland in 1938; his return to Paris, where he lived with a friend’s family; his parents’ return to Paris after the Germans invaded France; immigrating to the United States; settling in the Bronx, NY; graduating in 1942; joining the army in 1942; military training; being assigned to the V Corps Headquarters in the 1st Army; going to England; arriving in Normandy, France one day after D-Day; going to Germany; being in Weimar when he heard about Buchenwald concentration camp; visiting Buchenwald the day after it was liberated; going to Berchtesgaden, Germany; returning to New York in November 1945; going into the fur business with his father and attending New York University at night; getting married in 1951; his work in the US and abroad; moving to Phoenix, AZ; and his children.

Oral history interview with Esther Bash

Oral History

Esther Bash born in 1928 in Czechoslovakia, discusses her childhood experiences; the Hungarian occupation; being sent to live in a ghetto; life in Auschwitz and other work camps; liberation; and her immigration to the United States.

Oral history interview with Joseph Bash

Oral History

Oral history interview with Anna Been

Oral History

Oral history interview with Aaron Bendetson

Oral History

Oral history interview with Erna Bindelglas

Oral History

Erna Bindelglas (née Stopper), born on November 13, 1930 in Amsterdam, Holland, discusses her childhood experiences; life in German occupied Holland; life in the underground system; the experiences of her mother and sisters in Bergen-Belsen; liberation; moving to Israel; and immigrating to the United States.

Oral history interview with Fred Blau

Oral History

Fred Blau, born in Vienna, Austria, discusses his family’s background in Vienna; his childhood experiences; life in Vienna following Hitler's invasion; the deportations of Jews from Austria; leaving Vienna and relocating to Switzerland; and his immigration to the United States.

Oral history interview with Marsha Botwinik

Oral History

Oral history interview with Solomon Cukier

Oral History

Solomon Cukier, born in Warsaw, Poland, discusses his parents and siblings; his childhood experiences; the beginning of the war; being forced to live in the Warsaw ghetto; getting married in 1941 (his wife lived in the non-Jewish part of Warsaw); the deportation of his parents to Treblinka; being sent to work in Sedziszow, Poland; his experiences in work camps; being sent to Buchenwald concentration camp; liberation; living in displaced persons camps in Germany from 1946 to 1949; his children; immigrating to the United States; and his life in the US.

Oral history interview with Joseph Dattner

Oral History

Joseph Dattner, born in Austrian-controlled Żywiec, Poland in 1907, discusses the fate of his seven brothers and one sister; his father, who was a tailor; moving to Lvov (L'viv, Ukraine) when World War II began; working with his hands and sleeping in parks at night in Lvov; being put to work by the German Army to collect papers and bottles for no pay; leaving Lvov when the Ukrainian police came after him; fleeing to Warsaw, Poland, where he and his future wife Gerda purchased false Aryan identity papers; bribing police in Warsaw with a piece of fabric after they discovered that they were Jewish; being picked up by Gestapo officers but talking his designated murderer out of killing him; trying to enter the Lvov ghetto through a small hole but being caught and bribing the Gestapo officer with his rucksack; supporting Gerda and their child Barbara through various tailoring jobs; having a close call with his landlady once when one of his brothers arrived at their apartment; having his daughter baptized and inviting Jews pretending to be Aryans; and Gerda’s early death because she smoked so much out of stress during the war.

Oral history interview with Meyer Dragon

Oral History

Meyer Dragon discusses his family; his childhood experiences; moving with his family to Warsaw, Poland; working for the Jewish Committee in Warsaw; the German occupation; life in the Warsaw ghetto; escaping from the ghetto; his life in other ghettos before being sent to Auschwitz; being sent to other camps including Flossenbürg, Buchenwald, and Theresienstadt; liberation; and immigrating to the United States.

Oral history interview with Sally Dragon

Oral History

Oral history interview with Rae Freisinger

Oral History

Oral history interview with Anna Geslewitz

Oral History

Anna Geslewitz (née Charoltte Gersten), born on September 17, 1923 in Lwow, Poland (now L’viv, Ukraine), discusses her childhood experiences; the Russian occupation of her town; the German occupation in 1941; life in a ghetto; working in tailoring shop for the army in the ghetto; escaping from the ghetto with her sister; registering to go to Germany for work; passing as Christians; never seeing her father again; traveling through Krakow, Poland and going to an employment agency in Regnitz, Poland; working in homes while her sister worked on a farm; being taken to dig ditches in a forced labor camp; working in an office because she could speak German; being liberated by the Russians; going east to Jarosław, Poland; finding her sister and moving to a town on the Baltic Sea; opening a store; continuing to pass as Christian; going to West Germany; getting married in 1948; immigrating to the United States in 1950; living in Brooklyn (NY), Pennsylvania, and Newark (NJ); her feelings on antisemitism; and her current views on American Judaism.

Oral history interview with Daniel Geslewitz

Oral History

Daniel Geslewitz (né Gedoliah Geslewitz), born on August 14, 1924, in Lódz, Poland, discusses his siblings and parents; his childhood; the beginning of the war when he was 15 years old; the restrictions placed on Jews; life in the Lódz ghetto; starvation in the ghetto; his father’s death from starvation; the deportations; being deported with his family to Auschwitz in August 1944; the murder of his family except for himself and his three brothers because they were chosen for work; conditions in the camp, including the meager food and beatings; being sent after a week to Germany to do forced labor as a metalworker in camp Braunschweig; working in a village in a small factory that was making parts for trucks; being marched to the main camp; his brother Myer’s death from being forced to drink overly salted soup; being transported to Ravensbrück concentration camp; being sent to camp Wöbbelin, where they were liberated by American troops; recuperating in a German house with his brothers for many weeks; staying in a German town in the British zone for five years; immigrating to the United States in 1950; his life in the US; living in New York, NY and Phoenix, AZ; and his thoughts on Germans and Poles.

Oral history interview with Adele Goldberg

Oral History

Adele Goldberg, born in July 1921, discusses her childhood experiences; life in Lódz, Poland; her father’s diabetes; her father going into a diabetic coma and dying on December 31, 1939; life in the Lódz ghetto; being forced to work in German factory in Lódz; being deported with her mother to Auschwitz in 1944; the train journey with her mother; being separated from her mother when they arrived at the camp; working in a munitions factory; being sent to work in numerous camps; liberation; finding her brother in Italy; getting married; visiting Israel; and her immigration to the United States.

Oral history interview with Hyman Goldberg

Oral History

Oral history interview with Irving Goldstein

Oral History

Oral history interview with Helen Handler

Oral History

Helen Handler discusses her childhood experiences in Hungary; life in the ghetto; being deported to Auschwitz; the train journey and arriving at the camp; being sent to Stutthof concentration camp; seeing numerous dead bodies in the camp; being sent on a forced march; being liberated by Russian soldiers; recuperating in a Polish hospital and then a hospital in Budapest, Hungary; going to Prague, Czech Republic and then France; having tuberculosis; going to tuberculosis hospitals in France and Switzerland; her four-year recovery from bone tuberculosis; receiving assistance from various Jewish organizations; immigrating to Canada; getting married; her son; getting divorced from her husband; immigrating to the United States; and giving talks about her experiences during the war.

Oral history interview with Sam Hilton

Oral History

Sam Hilton, born on September 23, 1929 in Warsaw, Poland, discusses his childhood experiences; his mother’s death when he was 5 years old; his father’s remarriage; the bombardment of Warsaw and the German occupation; being forced to live in the Warsaw ghetto; conditions in the ghetto; the birth of his sister in 1942; deportations from the ghetto; the song in the ghetto about Treblinka; hiding in a basement bunker during one round up; the loss of his stepmother and sister; the ghetto uprising in 1943; being deported to Majdanek with his father; the selection process and lying about his age (he claimed to be 16 when he was only 12); being in Majdanek for three weeks; being sent to Buchenwald in June 1944; being sent to a work camp in November 1944; the liquidation of the camp in March 1945; being sent on a march; going to Theresienstadt; liberation; going to Prague, Czech Republic; going to Rotterdam, Netherlands and then Windermere, England to recuperate; going to Los Angeles, CA; and studying accounting at UCLA.