Pola Elbinger
I was born in Nowe Brzesko in a well-to-do home full of love. Many times, memories of my childhood years helped me to endure the difficult years of life. In 1939, when I was seven years old, the Germans invaded Poland. In our little town, persecution of the Jewish population began. Beards of Jews were […]
Emanuel Elbinger
I was born in Kraków. Until September 1942, I lived with my parents, Bernard and Rozalia, née Margules, Elbinger, and sisters, Pola and Lusia, in the town of Nowe Brzesko in the district of Kraków. Before the outbreak of World War II, I had finished the first grade of elementary school. I had to interrupt […]
Jerzy Dołębski
Actually, I don’t know how to begin the account of my life. I truly don’t know when I was born or where. To this day, I do not know my biological parents. I only know that I am, by origin, a Jew. My life story begins on the fifteenth of October, 1944. On that day, […]
Jerzy Cyns
I was born in Kraków, the son of Sabina, née Goldstein, and Julian Cyns. My father was an office employee in the firm Hartwig. Mother was a housewife. In March 1941, we, as well as our relatives, were closed up in the ghetto in Kraków. Until March 1943, during the deportations, I was hidden in […]
Chuwcia Weicher
This is the first time that I am attempting to give an account of my wartime experiences. Time has managed to heal painful wounds, but it has also blurred much in my memory, such as the names of places where I was hiding, as well as the names of people who hid me, and those […]
Krystyna Chudy
I was born in Łódź where I lived before the war. My father, Izaak Chudy, was a lawyer, and my mother, Irena, née Sztyller, a housewife. They both perished in Treblinka in October 1942. My first impression of the war was the prolonged screaming of the sirens which roused me from sleep. I was told […]
Helena Choynowska Alter
To begin with a brief explanation relative to this account, it is being written by an adult but about things seen through the eyes of a six- or seven-year-old child. Therefore, for example, specific concrete dates are missing from it, and the whole consists of individual pictures rather than of a chronological description of events. […]
Krystyna Budnicka
I was born in Warsaw as Hena Kuczer, daughter of Józef-Lejzor and Cyrla, the eighth and youngest child in the family. Six of my siblings had already reached adulthood (four brothers were married; one had two children). Only my brother who was a year and a half older and I were still children. My father […]
Felicja Braun Bryn
Warsaw, Poland, 1942 – My earliest memory is of my mother, running her delicate fingers through my light blond hair. She told me I looked like Shirley Temple. But my mother stopped playing with my hair. She grew ill and didn’t even recognize my face any longer. This story was received by the Association of […]
Marian Bobrzyk
As far as I remember, my family was only Mama, Papa, and me. We lived in Wilno. I do not remember exactly the name of the street. Based on the prewar map of Wilno which I have, I think that it may have been Makowa Street, or near that street, which is in the center […]