Collection context
Summary
- Title:
- Mary Kress oral history interview
- Dates:
- 1983 April 11
- Creators:
- Kress, Mary and Kenyon, Linda
- Abstract:
- This collection comprises one sound disc of an oral history interview with Mary Kress conducted by the Holocaust Media Project at the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors on April 11, 1983.
- Containers:
- Disk: Tauber Holocaust Library Archives
- Extent:
- 0.1 Linear feet comprising one sound disc
- Language:
- Preferred citation:
-
Mary Kress oral history interview - OHP.8571, Tauber Holocaust Library - JFCS Holocaust Center, San Francisco, California
Background
- Scope and content:
-
This collection comprises one sound disc of an oral history interview with Mary Kress. The interview was conducted by Linda Kenyon on behalf of the Holocaust Media Project at the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors on April 11, 1983. Mary Kress is a Holocaust survivor.
The interview describes Ms. Kress's childhood in Częstochowa, Poland; living in the Częstochowa ghetto until 1942; and then hiding in a Polish home in an underground compartment with her family for eighteen months. She describes being found, arrested and imprisoned; transported to Auschwitz in late 1943; and suffering from typhus. Ms. Kress describes working with her aunt and mother making string; being too ill to work; and receiving the assistance of another prisoner which enabled her to continue to work. She describes the terrible treatment she received in Auschwitz; and the death march she endured in January 1945. Ms. Kress describes being transported to unidentified locations with her mother and aunt; learning that the war was over; hiding; working on an abandoned farm; and their liberation by Russian troops. She discusses returning to Poland where they encountered anti-Semitism and traveling to Germany to live in a displaced persons camp until their emigration to the United States in 1949.
- Rules or conventions:
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Indexed terms
- Subjects:
- Antisemitism -- Poland
Death march survivors
Holocaust survivors -- United States
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives
Jewish ghettos -- Poland
Jewish women in the Holocaust
Jews -- Persecutions -- Poland
Refugee camps -- Germany
World War, 1939-1945 -- Jews -- Rescue -- Poland
World War, 1939-1945 -- Liberation -- Poland - Names:
- Auschwitz (Concentration camp).
- Places:
- Czestochowa (Poland) -- History -- 20th century.
Poland -- History -- Occupation, 1939-1945
United States -- Emigration and immigration
About this collection guide
- Date Encoded:
- This finding aid was produced using the Archivists' Toolkit 2012-06-27T10:21-0700
Access and use
- Restrictions:
-
There are no restrictions to access for this collection.
- Terms of access:
-
There are no restrictions to use for this collection.
- Preferred citation:
-
Mary Kress oral history interview - OHP.8571, Tauber Holocaust Library - JFCS Holocaust Center, San Francisco, California
- Location of this collection:
-
JFCS Holocaust Center2245 Post StreetSan Francisco, CA 94115, US
- Contact:
- (415) 449-3717