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Some of the experiences of people in the archive Experiences Agricultural Labour Algerian Internment Anschluss Arrested Arrow Cross Asked To Leave School Attempted Humiliation Auschwitz Australian Internment Bergen-Belsen Betrayed Boarder British Army British Citizen British Internment Buchenwald Business Seized Canadian Internment Close Family Murdered Concentration Camp Converted To Christianity Dachau Deported Destruction Of Property Dismissed From Job Domestic Service Emigration To Shanghai Emigration to Czechoslovakia Encounter With Hitler Encounter With Nazi Officials False Identity Finding Out Food Forced Labour Forced Soviet Emigration Foster Family Ghetto Incarceration Guben HMT Dunera Helped By Non-Jews Hidden Child Hiding In Plain Sight Hiding Valuables Hitler Youth Homesick Hostel In Hiding Isle Of Man Internment Jewish Festivals Jewish House Kindertransport Kindertransport To Belgium Kitchener Camp Liberation Majdanek Near Escape Nerves of Steel Never Finding Out Nicholas Winton Kindertransport No Longer Allowed Pets Not Allowed To Use Swimming Pools Not Allowed To Visit Cinemas Not Remembering November Pogrom / Kristallnacht Polenaktion Pre-war Camp Prisoner Of War Quirk Of Fate Ravensbrück Recovery Red Cross Letters Refugee Life Reprisals Resistance Reunited Saved By Rabbi Schonfeld Siege of Budapest Slave Labourer Song Staying With Strangers Suicide Swedish Recuperation Telling The Story The AJR Torah Destroyed War Work Yellow Star

See all memories and survivor stories 924: The Babies Not Sent To Auschwitz Jacques Weisser BEM I have absolutely no memory of any kind whatsoever about the war other than what I have been told... 925: Finding Something Good In Everything Ursula Gilbert My father always used to find something good in everything. He'd say: ‘Things are not so bad. We'll get through it.’ Until the very last day... 926: Dressing Up As A Gestapo Officer Betty Bloom The Gestapo were coming to arrest a Jewish baby in an orphanage. So my sister dressed up as a German officer and demanded this child... 927: The Wonderful Thing Ruth Rogoff My father was a courier for getting people out of Germany & over the border into Czechoslovakia, illegally. One day he was betrayed... 928: Goodness Kindness & Helpfulness Susan Pollack OBE I never exchanged a word with anyone. I was on my own, withdrawn within myself. If you'd been found talking to someone, you'd have been shot... 929: Fending For Myself Aged 9 Stephen Nagy I contracted scarlet fever. You had to go to an isolation hospital for six weeks. The fascist Hungarians took over. So, I was stuck in hospital... 930: Reunion After 22 Years In Siberia Dorothy Bohm My sister was one when I left. 22 years later I saw her again. We had no language in common. No memories in common, no childhood. Nothing... 931: Let Down Too Many Times Ruth Barnett MBE My mother appeared out of nowhere. Which was how I experienced it: the grown-ups made arrangements & then I was told... 932: A Cigarette For An Iron Cross Harry Weinberger A very young lieutenant in charge of us told me that the British Army will fight to the last alien, to the last foreign soldier... 933: Interned In Algeria Erna Klein One Arabic sentence helped a lot. It meant: ‘Are you drunk or whatever is the matter with you?’ That helped me out of a few difficult situations... 934: The Safest Place For Jews On Earth Kurt Wick Unfortunately, quite a few Jewish leaders said, ‘It's not a good country for you. Lots of crime, lots of opium, drugs, criminality... 935: Starting To Speak Mala Tribich MBE Talking about my experiences was a very gradual process. Before no one was talking & no one asked... 936: Why It's Necessary To Talk & Write Selma van de Perre I didn’t speak at all the first 30 years! To anyone or anything or myself. It was in 1975 with the opening of the Ravensbrück Memorial... 937: Eichmann Asking For Chopped Liver Fred Barschak On Saturday: elderly Jews scrubbing the pavements & marvellous shouts of ‘At last, Hitler’s found work for the Jews!' 938: Some Kind Of Darkness Eva Evans MBE I wanted to be a writer. But I never felt that I could write in English the way I could have done in German. So that was the end of that... 939: How To Bake A Stuffed Pike Fred Barschak The building still exists. Right next to the Prater, the great playground. But when I went back 25 years later I was disappointed... 940: Bringing The Alarm Clock Hanna Hemingway There's a reel in here [points to her head]. I can’t get it out of my mind. It's there. I just wish somebody would erase it... 941: Sharing The Sandwiches Henry Wuga MBE Ingrid & I got married on December 26 1944. In the middle of the war. We were in love & there was nothing to wait for. We were 20... 942: Father's New Woman John Hajdu MBE In each flat it was about 20 of us squeezed in. The area was guarded by the Arrow Cross Party: fascist & brutal. Hardly any food... 943: The Legless Side Of The Bed Laszlo Roman I was always told I mustn’t pee by the side of the road because someone might see that I am circumcised... 944: Cat Piddle In My Beer Rudolph Sabor It strengthened my belief: this cannot be forever. A cultured people like the Germans, would wake up any day. Total delusion... 945: Dad's Blood-Drenched Shirt Bea Green MBE I believe trying to protect your children by not telling them everything is a terrible thing. Because it makes them imagine things worse than reality... 946: Being Stateless Is An Advantage Benno Stern My father, by a great stroke of fortune, was made stateless by Poland because he’d fled the country. It worked to our advantage... 947: The End Of The Gallery Tom Heinemann My grandmother ran the gallery very successfully. Then she got arrested on some trumped up currency charges & put into prison... 948: Not Remembering My Emotions Hella Pick CBE I can still see myself arriving at Liverpool Street Station. But I can’t remember much about the journey. Just a blank. It’s shocking... 949: Liberation of Bergen-Belsen Susan Pollack OBE We were not human beings anymore. We were reduced to being animals - maybe more. That’s how it was. We were just – no feelings... 950: Liberation of Majdanek Rose Lebor At liberation I was four. All the executions, the beatings that they had to watch. My mother could never bring herself to tell me... 951: Passover in Lviv Lili Pohlmann MBE My mother and us two children went every Passover to Lviv to my grandparents, her parents, which was lovely... 952: Interned On My 16th Birthday John Goldsmith In 1940, on my 16th birthday, I was writing an English essay & looking through the window & I saw a policeman... 953: Slave Labour In Ravensbrück Selma van de Perre They transported us to Ravensbrück. Terrible. Screaming, shouting, dogs & whips. The dogs had the same clothes as the soldiers... 954: Arriving In Auschwitz Judith Steinberg We were put in a big school hall, we were all sitting on the floor with a rucksack. They said we are going to go to work... 955: 28 People Hiding In The Loft Rivka Reich We thought going to Auschwitz would be just hard labour. But my father was different. He thought we must escape... 956: Getting To Grips With It Gerti Baruch On Sundays in Vienna my father used to take me to Café Siller, along the Promenade. He used to read the paper... 957: How To Hide In Vienna Father Francis Wahle Letter-writing was timetabled: once a week. But from 1942 onwards there were no letters in reply because my parents went underground... 958: Discovering I Was Jewish John Dobai My parents thought that by changing their religion, it might produce some sort of saving, at least for me. But they were wrong... 959: The Invasion Of Hungary George Donath It was a Sunday. We went to my grandparents for lunch as usual. All of a sudden we see these black Mercedes drawing up in front... 960: The Awful Heydrich Reprisals Frank Bright Two Gestapo men came to our flat & asked where was I at the time. My mother had been indoors. I had just arrived from school... 961: Having My Revenge Willy Field I was a refugee from Nazi oppression. I wanted to have my revenge & I had my revenge. That was a wonderful feeling... 962: Speaking German With An English Accent Charles Danson I'd been the wireless operator for quite some time, so I said to my comrade ‘Let’s change over now’... 963: Experiencing Antisemitism Stella Shinder I had a little umbrella with red stripes. A little schoolmate of mine said, 'Is that the blood of German babies that the Jews are killing?' 964: The Next Thing Is We Were Gone Ruth Edwards I was on the train and saw my father crying. That made me cry. My mother said, perhaps she doesn't want to go. I said, yes, I do want to go... 965: Wounded Animals On The Farm Walter Kammerling It’s that type of work that put me off gardening. When you go on a cold, wet January & you get a big bag & are told to pick up... 966: I Thought You Were A Nazi Bea Green MBE There were two girls who often turned up with their Hitler Youth uniform. I stayed clear of them. One of them found me after the war... 967: Fitting In Hella Pick CBE The other pupils must have known I was a refugee. I became a Girl Guide & we were performing something & I was an African chief... 968: How To Talk Without Crying Ida Skubiejska Everybody was killed in Auschwitz: my parents, my sister, all my uncles, aunts & cousins. Absolutely everybody except my other sister & my cousin... 969: No One In My Situation Lia Lesser In 1939, my father married again in Prague. His wife was called Ola & she was a seamstress. When she came out of Auschwitz she got in touch... 970: Mother's Death At Our Liberation Mirjam Finkelstein By January 1945 there were rumours. People got quite excited. There was a wooden table, we had to walk past the camp doctor... 971: Equalising What Happened Dr Charlotte Feldman They used to demonstrate in the street below us. They used to shout, ‘Jews to Palestine!’ I had a very happy childhood... 972: Discovering My Brother Was Alive Mala Tribich MBE One day I got a letter from my brother Ben. We were in this stately home with all its beauty, I opened it, I read it & was so excited... 973: The Puzzle & The Blanks Jacques Weisser BEM I should've delved more into it, asking questions. But most of the time after the war I wasn't with my father... 974: How To Recover Susan Pollack OBE It took a long time for me to strengthen my own needs. I made a friend & she made a very big, deep impression on me. A shared nightmare... 975: Life In A Siberian Labour Camp Izak Wiesenfeld We were taken by lorries into the forest, to a huge barrack. The first speech: “You will never get out of here, here you will die..." 976: Coming To England Alone Aged 5 Hannah Wurzburger It's a bottomless pit. So absolutely appalling. Children are so vulnerable. Especially when they're separated from their family... 977: The Cruel Guardian Maria Ault My first guardians were fine. But when we were evacuated we stayed with a very, very, very, very bad person who used to hit us... 978: Hitler On The Loudspeakers Simon Jochnowitz I remember Hitler on all the loudspeakers everywhere. You couldn’t escape it. I remember being in bed & saying “Oh I can’t sleep, I can't sleep... 979: Sitting Through That Bronia Snow My parents always discussed everything. But not a word was spoken about my going to England. So I found myself one fine day... 980: Getting Streetwise Margot Harris When we were packing for England, the Gestapo came & went through all the cutlery drawers & took the silver cutlery & this & that... 981: 4th of the 4th, 1944 Jack Cynamon My first recollection is aeroplanes in the sky in Brussels. One morning the sky was full of aeroplanes. There must have been 60... 982: Not Dwelling On Things Gerta Regensburger I have no feelings & not many memories. I’m not a very retrospective person. It always amazes me that so many people remember... 983: The Struggle To Stay Alive Helen Aronson BEM We were taken to a disused prison. People were crying & hungry, not knowing anything. In the morning, Chaim Rumkowski came... 984: The Attack On Our School Albert Lester I was playing with a little car in the common room when there was this huge commotion, children were running, screaming... 985: Black Heart Outside The Flat Miriam Freedman It's difficult. Children feel very protected. Everything goes well. Then all of a sudden you see terrible things, like people disappearing... 986: The End of Łódź Ghetto Helen Aronson BEM In 1944, the ghetto was closed, everybody sent to camps. But the Germans decided: there's still some money to be made... 987: Father's Deportation Betty Bloom Unfortunately, at 6am, there was a knock on the door & two Gestapo officers marched in & arrested my father... 988: Getting Up From The Dust Ivor Perl BEM I was only 12 when I was taken to Auschwitz. I feel very, very hurt that I haven’t got many memories of my family... 989: Buying Sauerkraut & Soap Eva Mendelsson When you're a child, when nasty things happen, you remember. It makes a tremendous impression, even if you don’t quite understand... 990: The Shock Marianne Summerfield BEM My father was asked to report to Nazi headquarters. Stupidly, although my mother told him not to, he just walked into it... 991: My Ransacked School Ruth Jackson For the Nazis, you didn’t have to do anything wrong, you just had to be Jewish. On the day before Kristallnacht, the Nazi Youth went round... 992: Chickenpox Bridget Newman I was stuck. Then one day, the doorbell rang: a Gestapo. He came in, he was really rather nice. He had white hair & a big, white moustache... 993: Jews Not Welcome Ruth Jackson One thing stands out in my mind. I went shopping with my mother & saw a man in front of me with a swastika burnt into his skull... 994: Grass Snakes At The Beacon Lilly Lampert All I know: I wanted to come to England to be with my sister Gertie. I didn't know I wasn't going to see my parents again... 995: Father's Shop Harry Bibring BEM It was perfectly OK to try & obtain Jewish property by purchasing it at a peppercorn price... 996: How To Hide In Berlin Hans Danziger My father had nerves of steel. Before the war, Jews were obliged to put ‘Israel’ in front of their names. My father refused... 997: My Mother & Father Trude Silman MBE My mother is a question mark. I know she survived ‘til 1944 because we used to get the odd occasional 25-word Red Cross letter, but then it stopped... 998: Red Oaks Boarding School Ruth Jackson I was led upstairs to an empty dormitory & told that the very end bed was mine & I should have a bath & come down to tea. I felt miserable... 999: The Caretaker & His Daughter Miriam Freedman At night time, the caretaker used to bring us food. We sat there, never able to talk, no toys or books or anything. Things becoming all the time worse... 1000: Idzia Mala Tribich MBE Rumours started circulating that there's going to be a deportation. So people were in panic, trying to find ways of saving themselves... Memories Click each memory square to read the full long extract.

A list of the people whose testimony & survivor stories are featured on the site Albert Lester 984: The Attack On Our School Bea Green MBE 945: Dad's Blood-Drenched Shirt 966: I Thought You Were A Nazi Benno Stern 946: Being Stateless Is An Advantage Betty Bloom 926: Dressing Up As A Gestapo Officer 987: Father's Deportation Bridget Newman 992: Chickenpox Bronia Snow 979: Sitting Through That Charles Danson 962: Speaking German With An English Accent Dorothy Bohm 930: Reunion After 22 Years In Siberia Dr Charlotte Feldman 971: Equalising What Happened Erna Klein 933: Interned In Algeria Eva Evans MBE 938: Some Kind Of Darkness Eva Mendelsson 989: Buying Sauerkraut & Soap Father Francis Wahle 957: How To Hide In Vienna Frank Bright 960: The Awful Heydrich Reprisals Fred Barschak 937: Eichmann Asking For Chopped Liver 939: How To Bake A Stuffed Pike George Donath 959: The Invasion Of Hungary Gerta Regensburger 982: Not Dwelling On Things Gerti Baruch 956: Getting To Grips With It Hanna Hemingway 940: Bringing The Alarm Clock Hannah Wurzburger 976: Coming To England Alone Aged 5 Hans Danziger 996: How To Hide In Berlin Harry Bibring BEM 995: Father's Shop Harry Weinberger 932: A Cigarette For An Iron Cross Helen Aronson BEM 983: The Struggle To Stay Alive 986: The End of Łódź Ghetto Hella Pick CBE 948: Not Remembering My Emotions 967: Fitting In Henry Wuga MBE 941: Sharing The Sandwiches Ida Skubiejska 968: How To Talk Without Crying Ivor Perl BEM 988: Getting Up From The Dust Izak Wiesenfeld 975: Life In A Siberian Labour Camp Jack Cynamon 981: 4th of the 4th, 1944 Jacques Weisser BEM 924: The Babies Not Sent To Auschwitz 973: The Puzzle & The Blanks John Dobai 958: Discovering I Was Jewish John Goldsmith 952: Interned On My 16th Birthday John Hajdu MBE 942: Father's New Woman Judith Steinberg 954: Arriving In Auschwitz Kurt Wick 934: The Safest Place For Jews On Earth Laszlo Roman 943: The Legless Side Of The Bed Lia Lesser 969: No One In My Situation Lili Pohlmann MBE 951: Passover in Lviv Lilly Lampert 994: Grass Snakes At The Beacon Mala Tribich MBE 935: Starting To Speak 972: Discovering My Brother Was Alive 1000: Idzia Margot Harris 980: Getting Streetwise Maria Ault 977: The Cruel Guardian Marianne Summerfield BEM 990: The Shock Miriam Freedman 985: Black Heart Outside The Flat 999: The Caretaker & His Daughter Mirjam Finkelstein 970: Mother's Death At Our Liberation Rivka Reich 955: 28 People Hiding In The Loft Rose Lebor 950: Liberation of Majdanek Rudolph Sabor 944: Cat Piddle In My Beer Ruth Barnett MBE 931: Let Down Too Many Times Ruth Edwards 964: The Next Thing Is We Were Gone Ruth Jackson 991: My Ransacked School 993: Jews Not Welcome 998: Red Oaks Boarding School Ruth Rogoff 927: The Wonderful Thing Selma van de Perre 936: Why It's Necessary To Talk & Write 953: Slave Labour In Ravensbrück Simon Jochnowitz 978: Hitler On The Loudspeakers Stella Shinder 963: Experiencing Antisemitism Stephen Nagy 929: Fending For Myself Aged 9 Susan Pollack OBE 928: Goodness Kindness & Helpfulness 949: Liberation of Bergen-Belsen 974: How To Recover Tom Heinemann 947: The End Of The Gallery Trude Silman MBE 997: My Mother & Father Ursula Gilbert 925: Finding Something Good In Everything Walter Kammerling 965: Wounded Animals On The Farm Willy Field 961: Having My Revenge People

See survivor stories arranged by country: Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, England, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, Switzerland, Ukraine... Algeria Australia Austria Belgium Canada China Czechoslovakia England France Germany Greece Hungary Isle of Man Italy Lithuania Netherlands Northern Ireland Palestine Poland Scotland Soviet Union Spain Sweden Switzerland USA Yugoslavia Countries All country and place names reflect pre-1945 designations Algeria Ben Chicao Mostaganem Oran Sidi Bel Abbès Australia Hay Austria Vienna Belgium Antwerp Ardennes Brussels Virton Canada Montreal Toronto Trois-Rivières China Shanghai Czechoslovakia Bratislava Karlovy Vary Nitra Prague England Banstead Barrow-in-Furness Bognor Regis Bury St Edmunds Croydon Airport Cumberland Hotel Essex Grasmere Harrow Huyton Ilfracombe Letchworth Liverpool Liverpool Street Station London Macclesfield Manchester Melton Mowbray Rusthall The Leys School, Cambridge Thetford West Sussex France Grenoble La Bourboule Marseilles Normandy Coast Pyrenees Germany Bergen-Belsen Berlin Breslau Buchenwald Chemnitz Düsseldorf Eberswalde Essen Esslingen Fulda Guben Hamburg Hamelin Kassel Lüneburg Heath Munich Offenburg Ravensbrück Uckermark Zwickau Greece Thessaloniki Hungary Budakalász Budapest Makó Oradea Paks Rákospalota Szeged Ujpest Isle of Man Isle of Man Italy Cassino Naples Lithuania Memel Netherlands Amsterdam Arnhem Northern Ireland Gorman's Farm Palestine Haifa Poland Auschwitz Częstochowa Krakow Lviv Majdanek Marysin Piotrków Trybunalski Łódź Scotland Abbotsford House Carnoustie Glasgow Greenock Soviet Union Novosibirsk Siberia Spain Cadiz Pyrenees Sweden Ribbingelund Sweden Switzerland Kreuzlingen Lucerne St Gallen USA Ellis Island New York Yugoslavia Zagreb Places Memory Map

Lithuania Memel Memories 930: Reunion After 22 Years In Siberia Dorothy Bohm My sister was one when I left. 22 years later I saw her again. We had no language in common. No memories in common, no childhood. Nothing... Previous Location Next Location

1939: Erna Klein, born in Oels, is working as a nanny in Algiers. During my stay in Algeria I was interned three times, because of my nationality. The first time was immediately after the outbreak of war, I was sent to Sidi Bel Abbès, where the Foreign Legion was. I was the only woman interned there. A few men of German & Austrian nationality were there too. Quite a few Italians. I was put into the hall, on a sack with straw & watched over by an Arab Tireurs soldier with a bayonet. I asked the French officer could I please have the key to lock myself in. He was kind enough to give me the key. After a few days I caught gastroenteritis & the porters were so very, very kind, they asked the French officers could they give me a room in their flat & a bed, & look after me, & that was granted. After I got better I was sent back to Mostaganem. The second time I was interned for three months high up in the Atlas mountains in a place, a very small place called Ben Chicao. An ancient orphanage. There were people from Germany, Italy, Austria, Poland, Russia. I was given the infirmary to look after & looked after the sick people. There were mothers with babies there & I had to distribute the milk, to the babies. They kept pigs outside & a sow had lots of piglets & couldn’t feed them all so I had to bring them the leftover milk accompanied by a soldier carrying bayonet. He wanted to be fresh. Fortunately, before in Mostaganem, a Spanish lady had taught me a smattering of Arabic. So when this Tireur was not very respectful one Arabic sentence I had learned helped me a lot. It meant: ‘Are you drunk or whatever is the matter with you?’ That helped me out of a few difficult situations. Therefore it’s a sentence I won’t forget. I was in Ben Chicao when the Germans took over Paris. The Germans there heard the radio & knew & they celebrated & it was all very sad. There were a few Jewish girls as well. They did not live in Algeria. One of them was arrested because she was in the troupe of Mistinguette, a famous French dancer. They came from South America, their ship landed in Algiers & she was arrested. There were a few entertainers. We all slept in the same dormitory so as not to be with the Germans who were antisemitic. Then I was liberated again. The last time, I was arrested & brought to a hotel in Oran by the American army with some Italians & Germans again of course but that was pretty wonderful. Because for years we had been cut off from France & there was scarcely anything to eat in Algeria except for grapes & melons & figs. But while we were interned by the Americans we had proper food, even chocolate! I showed them some letters I got from my parents from England. So they told me that I could go. But I still had to go back to Mostaganem which was a very long way away from Oran & again I was arrested & had no money. But fortunately we were arrested in a hotel where we had to sleep three in a bed, I said ‘How am I going to go to Mostaganem?’ There was an Arab wholesaler of vegetables who had come with his lorry to buy his wholesale vegetables in Oran. He said ‘I’ll give you a lift back on my lorry.’ So I got back to where I had my home. There was a typhoid epidemic. I joined the Free French Army as a nurse. It was 1944. I felt I was alive & ought to do something for France. Had I been a man I would have gone into the Foreign Legion, but that wasn’t open to me. 933: Interned In Algeria Erna Klein Credits & tags Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Previous Memory Next Memory ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Previous Memory Next Memory 933: Interned In Algeria ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Erna Klein Read Full Text Previous Memory Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Next Memory ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Edited from Erna Klein's interview with Dr Rosalyn Livshin for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, March 2003 • Learn More → Erna Klein Algerian Internment Food Liberation Nerves of Steel Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Algeria See Locations Full Text 1939: Erna Klein, born in Oels, is working as a nanny in Algiers. During my stay in Algeria I was interned three times, because of my nationality. The first time was immediately after the outbreak of war, I was sent to Sidi Bel Abbès, where the Foreign Legion was. I was the only woman interned there. A few men of German & Austrian nationality were there too. Quite a few Italians. I was put into the hall, on a sack with straw & watched over by an Arab Tireurs soldier with a bayonet. I asked the French officer could I please have the key to lock myself in. He was kind enough to give me the key. After a few days I caught gastroenteritis & the porters were so very, very kind, they asked the French officers could they give me a room in their flat & a bed, & look after me, & that was granted. After I got better I was sent back to Mostaganem. The second time I was interned for three months high up in the Atlas mountains in a place, a very small place called Ben Chicao. An ancient orphanage. There were people from Germany, Italy, Austria, Poland, Russia. I was given the infirmary to look after & looked after the sick people. There were mothers with babies there & I had to distribute the milk, to the babies. They kept pigs outside & a sow had lots of piglets & couldn’t feed them all so I had to bring them the leftover milk accompanied by a soldier carrying bayonet. He wanted to be fresh. Fortunately, before in Mostaganem, a Spanish lady had taught me a smattering of Arabic. So when this Tireur was not very respectful one Arabic sentence I had learned helped me a lot. It meant: ‘Are you drunk or whatever is the matter with you?’ That helped me out of a few difficult situations. Therefore it’s a sentence I won’t forget. I was in Ben Chicao when the Germans took over Paris. The Germans there heard the radio & knew & they celebrated & it was all very sad. There were a few Jewish girls as well. They did not live in Algeria. One of them was arrested because she was in the troupe of Mistinguette, a famous French dancer. They came from South America, their ship landed in Algiers & she was arrested. There were a few entertainers. We all slept in the same dormitory so as not to be with the Germans who were antisemitic. Then I was liberated again. The last time, I was arrested & brought to a hotel in Oran by the American army with some Italians & Germans again of course but that was pretty wonderful. Because for years we had been cut off from France & there was scarcely anything to eat in Algeria except for grapes & melons & figs. But while we were interned by the Americans we had proper food, even chocolate! I showed them some letters I got from my parents from England. So they told me that I could go. But I still had to go back to Mostaganem which was a very long way away from Oran & again I was arrested & had no money. But fortunately we were arrested in a hotel where we had to sleep three in a bed, I said ‘How am I going to go to Mostaganem?’ There was an Arab wholesaler of vegetables who had come with his lorry to buy his wholesale vegetables in Oran. He said ‘I’ll give you a lift back on my lorry.’ So I got back to where I had my home. There was a typhoid epidemic. I joined the Free French Army as a nurse. It was 1944. I felt I was alive & ought to do something for France. Had I been a man I would have gone into the Foreign Legion, but that wasn’t open to me. 933: Interned In Algeria Erna Klein Edited from Erna Klein's interview with Dr Rosalyn Livshin for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, March 2003 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

Thessaloniki, 1941: Hanna Hemingway and her family, British citizens, are held in Pavlo Mila prison: I remember everything about being taken prisoner. There's a reel in here [points to her head]. I can’t get it out of my mind. It's there. I just wish somebody would erase it. I remember the good things, I remember the bad things, because wherever you go you can find a laugh. The Germans gave us injections. Why I have no idea. Because we were British we had to have a certain amount of care? I have no idea. Then came the day. My father came with two soldiers guarding him. He told my godmother to say goodbye to me. He told me to take off my Star of David bracelet & a little Star of David around my neck & these earrings, which she had bought me. But she wouldn't take my earrings. That’s why I kept them. A soldier told my mother ‘take all you papers or anything of value, you are not coming back’. He did us a service. Without that British passport we wouldn’t have… So my mother took that & an alarm clock. She must have been absolutely demented. Passport you can understand but why an alarm clock? We had a good laugh over the alarm clock over the years. It was a Greek prison for very hardened criminals. They opened the door & we were thrown into this room. Six young children & my mother, pieces of straw on the floor. Filthy. We just sat there petrified. A hell of a lot women walking around looking at us. In the corner: one small barred window & this cauldron which was used as a toilet. I will remember the stench to this dying day. The only food we had was a piece of bread once a day. They let the women go round in a circle while they watched dinner being served. Somebody would tip a sack of potatoes with mud and everything, a sack of carrots, and within a matter of minutes we each had a carrot & a potato. It just doesn’t bear thinking about. My godmother, god bless her, contacted the English consulate in Greece & said ‘there was this English family held in…blabla’. He came from the consulate. Luckily my father had his passport. They took us out of this filth, put us in a shower, we needed it, we reeked. My mum took as much of the lice she could out of us. She'd be up night after night, wiping the lice off our faces so that we could sleep & she couldn’t. She used to sleep as much as she could during the day. For the first time we saw clean straw. We were put into this room. A long room, less people in it . We were bathed, well showered, we were scrubbed, the skin was sore…they weren’t very gentle. We thought we were in heaven because we could lie down & just go to sleep, it was clean. After three days we got a Red Cross parcel. I'd like to say ‘thank you’ to the Red Cross: those parcels saved our lives. We used to get one a month. My mum didn’t smoke, she didn’t drink tea. Bella used to weasel her way around & get us bits of food in exchange for the things we didn’t want. For 3½ years we did that. My mother used to tell us stories; she used to sing to us, that’s all we could do. Go to the window…I stopped going to the window actually. There were dustbins & a boy was caught scavenging in there. In front of our window there was a big tree. They took him up. They stretched his arms & legs round this tree. He screamed. Screams you don’t forget. They left him all night. They cut him down the morning after but of course he died. But the horror of that boy's death is…I just wish I could forget it, but I can’t. 940: Bringing The Alarm Clock Hanna Hemingway Credits & tags Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Previous Memory Next Memory ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Previous Memory Next Memory 940: Bringing The Alarm Clock ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Hanna Hemingway Read Full Text Previous Memory Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Next Memory ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Edited from Hanna Hemingway's interview with Dr Rosalyn Livshin for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, January 2025 • Learn More → Hanna Hemingway Arrested British Citizen Food Not Remembering Prisoner Of War Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Greece See Locations Full Text Thessaloniki, 1941: Hanna Hemingway and her family, British citizens, are held in Pavlo Mila prison: I remember everything about being taken prisoner. There's a reel in here [points to her head]. I can’t get it out of my mind. It's there. I just wish somebody would erase it. I remember the good things, I remember the bad things, because wherever you go you can find a laugh. The Germans gave us injections. Why I have no idea. Because we were British we had to have a certain amount of care? I have no idea. Then came the day. My father came with two soldiers guarding him. He told my godmother to say goodbye to me. He told me to take off my Star of David bracelet & a little Star of David around my neck & these earrings, which she had bought me. But she wouldn't take my earrings. That’s why I kept them. A soldier told my mother ‘take all you papers or anything of value, you are not coming back’. He did us a service. Without that British passport we wouldn’t have… So my mother took that & an alarm clock. She must have been absolutely demented. Passport you can understand but why an alarm clock? We had a good laugh over the alarm clock over the years. It was a Greek prison for very hardened criminals. They opened the door & we were thrown into this room. Six young children & my mother, pieces of straw on the floor. Filthy. We just sat there petrified. A hell of a lot women walking around looking at us. In the corner: one small barred window & this cauldron which was used as a toilet. I will remember the stench to this dying day. The only food we had was a piece of bread once a day. They let the women go round in a circle while they watched dinner being served. Somebody would tip a sack of potatoes with mud and everything, a sack of carrots, and within a matter of minutes we each had a carrot & a potato. It just doesn’t bear thinking about. My godmother, god bless her, contacted the English consulate in Greece & said ‘there was this English family held in…blabla’. He came from the consulate. Luckily my father had his passport. They took us out of this filth, put us in a shower, we needed it, we reeked. My mum took as much of the lice she could out of us. She'd be up night after night, wiping the lice off our faces so that we could sleep & she couldn’t. She used to sleep as much as she could during the day. For the first time we saw clean straw. We were put into this room. A long room, less people in it . We were bathed, well showered, we were scrubbed, the skin was sore…they weren’t very gentle. We thought we were in heaven because we could lie down & just go to sleep, it was clean. After three days we got a Red Cross parcel. I'd like to say ‘thank you’ to the Red Cross: those parcels saved our lives. We used to get one a month. My mum didn’t smoke, she didn’t drink tea. Bella used to weasel her way around & get us bits of food in exchange for the things we didn’t want. For 3½ years we did that. My mother used to tell us stories; she used to sing to us, that’s all we could do. Go to the window…I stopped going to the window actually. There were dustbins & a boy was caught scavenging in there. In front of our window there was a big tree. They took him up. They stretched his arms & legs round this tree. He screamed. Screams you don’t forget. They left him all night. They cut him down the morning after but of course he died. But the horror of that boy's death is…I just wish I could forget it, but I can’t. 940: Bringing The Alarm Clock Hanna Hemingway Edited from Hanna Hemingway's interview with Dr Rosalyn Livshin for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, January 2025 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

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