Maintaining and Building Families During the Holocaust

The Family Unit

Yulanda Au
Evelyn Kessler
Osose Oboh
Sarah Peters
 Overview

Introduction

Marie’s story

Hidden children in non-Jewish families

Rita’s story

Retention of the family unit in the camps

Formation of families in the camps

Families in hiding
 Marie’s Story
 Backgrou
nd
 Albi, France- Location of th
e
village that hid her an
Albi d her
family, consequently
saving their
lives

 Post-war life in the fa

mily unit
 Going back to visit her resc
uers
or her second family

 Reflection
s
 Rescuers
 Irena Sendler Hidden
 Rescued 2500 children
 Saved all the names in jars to
Children
retain identities Jewish children who were hidden in non-
 Protestant and Catholic churches’ Jewish families during the Holocaustwar
involvement
 Hid children with families, in
convents and orphanages
 Gave false baptismal papers   
 Christian and Muslim families
throughout Europe individually hid
families
 Emotional and physical repercussions
 Separation anxiety
 Physical and emotional abuse
 Identity Crises
 Religious
 Family
Families in the camps
 Rita’s Story
“Mother, Father, Grandparents, Uncles, Aunts, Cousins, two sister and
two brothers – Bertha, Berl, Ida, and Yankule – did not survive. I miss
them and I cry everyday. They are always in my mind and in my heart.”

“The next morning we were transported back to Riga where I had left
my twin sister. We were so happy to be reunited and from then on, we
were always together.”

“I got very friendly with one girl and she told me her family name was
Hirsch. One of our uncle’s name was Hirsch and was married to our
aunt in Timisora, so to our surprise she and her sister were our uncle’s
nieces. We were very happy to have found some relatives.”

“I can’t forget the Holocaust; to be captured into slavery, to see the

Nazi’s around you with loaded rifles; to get pushed five in a row to
march hungry, cold, and tired with no future, separated from parents,
sisters, and brothers and the rest of the family…nightmares are still
with me.”
 sp o ke n q u ietly,
s
"Eight word
ffterweonrtdlys s , wp i
ot h
keonu tq u ie tly, Retention and
"iEndigih
.E i
tly, g h
w t is
t h o r
utt, simple Retention and
ienmdioftfieornen
e t itgh hat
ewmoordtiso.nY. E n Iwpaasrth
t swhaosrtt,hseimple Loss of Families
moorm
w dse.nYtew th thae t
p a r t
e
e
de from
d from
Loss
“Pe
of Families
meontthw r
e he . ” n I rhaps I am simply je
mmoym alous of
ie W
t hei e
r s
. ”e l, Night h er g
“Perhraep ates Ir arim ghsit m topm
m–yEmo l lyoje uarn lous of
e W i e s e l, Night himer .” greaR– teurth K
righlu ger,
t to
– El i mSoti urnll Alive
him.” – Ruth Kluge
r, Still Alive

t o h e r f a t h e r. H e
ined true beecause
“Liesel rema e
toe her x p l
fa in
t h eedr ,
. H
ld n r oe tm gae t
inoe udt,trausesh e c o ueld
c a n
u oet
s
c Lo u
i es e l r e s h e d , b
“
e w t o
g o
e tmo u tc,ha.sTshheerefxoplain ugh tn hoeyt
choeukldn not w ocrhk. tTra hn p
ersefor o r te, a
s l
h th
e o
c o u ld
is t ewr fo
t oro am u ta kueghhetrhey
hregkne eeonrkmtorarnsp e li k oerlty, to
a l th o
w
r e o
g u
is ltde rh a
f ovre abw
s a c o
to u p
tale
k eo f eyrears
h
“As for me, I w u semsh oerewlika ely
as not thinkin th oaun l dm h ea, b
v ee c
b a
e en
i t ; s hp e
le woaf nyteadrsto
e
d“Aeastfho,rbut I did g about w e r esvheen wtraiesda cou
me, I wan s ontow a n t to o
th ld
a ne r .
m S eh, e
b n
e ceavu s e
s g a s
; s e
h d
e w i
a hth
tn e dimto.
fr
deoamthm , byuftaIthdeid
t b
thinkinge asb ep oaurtated h h i
e m
r ; vsehne tw
e riaed it
sfroom
r. n
Woet wh a
adntatlre a dy s or e
ldm e a
r .inS hw eitn e v
il lu sgi o
a sns ea b
d owuit hhehrim.
mum chy, fbaotrne so m
h e r u c
o u ff
be separearteedd
h a dw a b
it hsohlui mte;lyshneowas veut her
w . W e h adh at o g e th e r S
r ehme a in l d n oo nt h
a ao
b
soasmnuocthth , beotrim
neestoom
lr e a dy s;ut h
beucsheparated.” ffered impe
is
gsdoeluatehly . Inow o iu
l lu s i
– E
waslineoW to g e th e S h e h n
a d in
a b
y m no t
o h
t ehra. ”
v – Ruth
e
ie
t thseetl,imNeigtohb t e sep r; this
s a c rei f
n ic
d e
ind gm d yesaetlhf .fIorwm o uld
– Ruth
– Elie Wiesel, a rated.” imp y m o t h e r . ”
Night
K lu rgi e
f ir
c ,eSd tillyAsleiv
m lfefor m
sa c
Formation
of Families

Marriage Scene
in Schindler’s List

Primo Levi and

Lorenzo Perrone
 Lorenzo Perrone

“..An Italian civilian worker brought me a piece of bread and the

remainder of his ration every day for six months; he gave me a vest
of his, full of patches; he wrote a postcard on my behalf to Italy and
brought me the reply. For all this he neither asked nor accepted
any reward, because he was good and simple and did not think that
one did good for a reward.
…I believe that it was really due to Lorenzo that I am alive today;
and not so much for his material aid, as for his having constantly
reminded me by his presence, by his natural and plain manner of
being good, that there still existed a just world outside our own,
something and someone still pure and whole, not corrupt, not
savage, extraneous to hatred and terror; something difficult to
define, a remote possibility of good, but for which it was worth
surviving.
…But Lorenzo was a man; his humanity was pure and
uncontaminated, he was outside this world of negation. Thanks to
Works Cited
• Children. http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/People/children.htm .
• Decoster, Charlotte (2006). Jewish Hidden Children in Belgium during the Holocaust: A
comparative study of their hiding places at Christian establishments, private families, and
Jewish orphanages. Retrieved from UNT Digital Web site:
http://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc5468/m1/.
• Hidden Children: Quest for Family.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10006127.
• Kaufman, Marie., personal communication, January 13 & 20, 2010.
• Kluger, Ruth. Still Alive: A Holocaust Girlhood Remembered. New York: Feminist Press, 2001
(selections).
• Levi, Primo. Survival in Auschwitz. Touchstone. New York. 1958 .
• Life in the Shadows: Hidden Children and the Holocaust. Retrieved from
http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/hiddenchildren/insideX/.
• Ofer, Dalia. 2005. Family during the Holocaust.
http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/family-during-holocaust.
• Rita’s Memoir. (Holocaust survivor we interviewed provided us with a description of her time
during the war).
• Schindler’s List. Steven Spielberg, 1993.
• Spies, Marcia (Interviewee). Retrieved from USC Shoah Foundation Institute Web site:
http://college.usc.edu/vhi/otv/otv.php.
• Wiesel, Elie. Night. Hill and Wang. New York. 2006.
Works Cited (cont’d)
Images (in order of the slides)

 http://wps.ablongman.com/wps/media/objects/262/268312/art/figures/KISH579.jpg
 http://isurvived.org/Pictures_iSurvived-3/SHOAH-jewish_family.GIF
 http://holocaust-children.tripod.com/2boys.gif
 http://www.tpmconstanta.ro/images/romania-europe-map.jpg
 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/89/Selection_Birkenau_ramp.jpg
 http://archive.sensesofcinema.com/images/27/spielberg/schindlers_list.jpg
 http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/flickers_of_light/img_righteous/Perrone_1.jpg