Language:
German
Pages:
32 pages :
,
Typescript including photographs and maps.
Year of publication:
1967
Keywords:
Friedman family.
;
Auschwitz (Concentration camps)
;
Christianstadt (Concentration camps)
;
Theresienstadt (Concentration camps)
;
Holocaust.
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)
;
Death marches.
;
World War, 1939-1945.
;
Women authors.
;
Taussig family.
;
Prague (Czech Republic)
;
Autobiographies
;
Biographical sources
;
Memoirs
Abstract:
Hildegard’s 1945 and 1967 memoirs are written as diaries. The 1945 memoir was translated from Czech to German by Heinz Koenig. Hildegard describes her experience of deportation and her life in concentration camps. In December 1941, her family was summoned to the collection point in Prague. However, her sick mother Irma and twin sister Ingeborg were permitted to remain in Prague. Hildegard and her father Karl Taussig were deported on Transport N to Theresienstadt, where they were separated. Hildegard registered for a women's labor group and was sent to the Krivoklat Forest for two months. Difficult circumstances of the Theresienstadt Ghetto. Obtaining contact with her father. On May 18, 1944, Hildegard and her father were deported on Transport Eb to Auschwitz-Birkenau. The horror of the arrival and worrying about her father's fate. The number A-4622 was tattooed on Hildegard’s arm. Dreadful circumstances and constant hunger. Hildegard was selected for slave labor and transported to concentration camp Christianstadt in Niederschlesien, Germany. Difficult parting from her father. Deportation in cattle trains without knowing about their fate. Hard labor under harsh, sickening conditions in a munitions factory.
Abstract:
On February 2/3, 1945, the camp was dissolved and the women were marched in the cold and snow. After four days of exhaustion, Hildegard escaped together with another girl. They found refuge in Birkenstedt, where a woman gave them food and allowed them to stay. German soldiers arrived at the place and took them to the mayor. They were questioned and asked to prove their German citizenship. Using the pseudonym Hilda Lehmann, she invented a story that they were Germans who had fled from the bombed Sudetengau. Again questioning, but this time an SS officer believed them and they could go. They were sent to a factory in Weisswasser. Constant danger of being discovered. Acquaintance with a young woman from her factory. Escape from the approaching Russians. Taking refuge from air raids. Liberation by the Americans in May 1945.
Abstract:
Transcript of the original manuscript by Detlef Lorenz
Abstract:
Footnotes by Detlef Lorenz and Miriam Friedman Morris
Abstract:
Translation from Czech parts by Heinz König
Abstract:
The memoir was written in 1967. Hildegard Taussig describes her experience of deportation and her life in concentration camps. The family Taussig was living in Prague, Czechoslovakia. Hildegard was the third daughter of the chemical engineer Karl Taussig. On December 14th 1941 their lives were torn apart when they were summoned for deportation. Hildegard and her father were sent to Theresienstadt, her mother and her twin sister Ingeborg stayed behind. In Theresienstadt Hildegard was separated from her father. She volunteered for a women's labor group outside of the camp. Harsh circumstances and constant hunger. Reunited with her father in Theresienstadt. Friendship and engagement with the singer Josef Loewy. Distress when the couple was separated and Josef was sent with one of the transports to an unknown fate. News that her mother had died in the meantime. Hildegard fell ill with encephalitis and stayed in quarantine for six weeks. In May 1944 Hildegard and her father Karl Taussig were sent with one of the last transports from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz. Unbearable condition in the cattle trains. Arrival shock in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Separation of her father. Dreadful circumstances of the camp life. Hildegard learned about the fate of her fiance, who was killed with his mother in the gas chambers of Auschwitz. She was selected for slave labor and transferred to the camp Christianstadt in Germany. Hard conditions in the camp. Constant hunger. Work in a ammunition factory. In December 1944 the camp was dissolved and the women were marched in the cold and snow without appropriate clothes and shoes. Unbearable conditions of the march. After five days of exhaustion Hildegard decided she could not go on and escaped in the night. She found refuge at a woman, who gave her food and allowed her to stay. To her dismay Hildegard was confronted by four SS men who also stayed at the place. They took her to the mayor, where she was interrogated.
Abstract:
She told them she was a bombed German citizen. They did not find the Auschwitz number tattooed on her arm due to the tight sleeve of her blouse, so she was set free. She was sent to a factory in Weisswasser. Approaching Russian troops and air raids. Hildegard was sent as a help to a family near Jena. Confrontation with SS men who were living there. Constant danger of being discovered as a Jewish fugitive. In May 1945 liberation by the American army.
Description / Table of Contents:
Photocopy of handwritten manuscript (German original).
Description / Table of Contents:
Transcript (in Digital Archive) has additional materials: photographs, timeline, family history.
Note:
German, English and Czech
URL:
Corrected and annotated digital memoir:
URL:
http://digital.cjh.org/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=807257&custom_att_2=simple_viewer
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