Nate Leipciger shares testimony with students.

Collection

Survivors and Witnesses: Video Testimony

This collection features powerful accounts of the Holocaust, told by survivors, rescuers, and witnesses, selected from USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive.

Published: March 14, 2016

Last Updated: November 13, 2019

Collection

Language

English — US

Subject

History
Social Studies

Grade

6–12

Genocide
The Holocaust

Overview

This collection features powerful accounts of the Holocaust, told by survivors, rescuers, and witnesses, selected from USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive. The videos are divided into three sections: The Nazis in Power: Voices in Europe, The Holocaust, and After the Holocaust.

See our Teaching with Testimony collection for additional context and guidance on bringing video testimony from this collection into your classroom.

This collection includes:

22 survivor testimony videos

Preparing to Teach

A Note to Teachers

The resources in this collection, like any examination of the Holocaust, include historical descriptions and firsthand accounts that some students may find disturbing and need to be taught with intention and care. See the Preparing to Teach section of the Teaching with Testimony collection for guidance on teaching emotionally challenging content and establishing context for these videos.

Inside this Collection

Video

Edith Reiss, from Bolton, England, describes witnessing antisemitic violence on the streets of Göttingen, Germany, when she was a visitor there in 1939.

Video

Kurt Klein, who emigrated from Walldorf, Germany, to the United States in 1937, recalls how Nazi policies and propaganda affected his life at school.

Video

Alfred Wolf, a Holocaust survivor from Eberbach, Germany, recalls the changes he noticed in Germany after the election of Adolf Hitler.

Video

Vera Gissing, a Holocaust survivor from Czechoslovakia, recalls how her family prepared her for the Kindertransport, a rescue mission that brought thousands of Jewish refugee children to Great Britain.

Video

Ellen Kerry Davis, a Jewish woman originally from Hoof, Germany, describes how her family’s friendships were impacted by Nazi rule.

Video

Holocaust survivor Barbara Fischman Traub describes the reactions of her neighbors as she and her family were marched through their hometown of Sighet, Hungary, to the ghetto during the Holocaust.

Video

Marion Pritchard, a member of the Dutch resistance who hid a Jewish family during the Nazi occupation of Holland, describes what happened when a Dutch Nazi policeman investigated her house.

Video

Holocaust survivor Vera Laska describes her teenage experience as part of the resistance against the Nazis in Czechoslovakia.

Video

Holocaust survivor Esther Bem describes the people in Northern Italy who protected her and her family during World War II.

Video

Holocaust survivor Anna Heilman recalls her part in a revolt at Auschwitz-Birkenau, where she was a prisoner, and describes the aftermath of the revolt.

Video

Holocaust survivor Sol Messinger describes his experiences attempting to emigrate from Germany to Cuba in 1939 aboard the ship the M.S. St. Louis.

Video

Jan Karski, a diplomat and member of the Polish resistance during World War II, describes his experience in the Warsaw Ghetto and his meeting with U.S. President Roosevelt.

Video

Barbara Turkeltaub, a Jewish girl who was hidden by Catholic nuns during the war, describes witnessing a Nazi massacre.

Video

Holocaust survivor Moshe Shamir recalls how he and his family were uprooted when the Nazis invaded and forced to relocate to a ghetto.

Video

Leon Bass, an African-American soldier, describes his experiences entering the Buchenwald concentration camp in April 1945.

Video

Howard Cwick, an American soldier during World War II, recalls a confrontation with a US Army sergeant over antisemitic slurs directed toward a recently liberated concentration camp survivor.

Video

Romana Farrington, whose Jewish parents arranged for her to be raised by a Polish Catholic family during the Holocaust, describes how her wartime experience impacts her identity.

Video

Isaac Levy, a Rabbi who served as a chaplain in the British army during World War II, recalls the challenges he faced trying to assist survivors after the Holocaust.

Video

Isaac Levy, a Rabbi who served as a chaplain in the British army during World War II, recalls the challenges he faced trying to assist survivors after the Holocaust.

Video

Bernhard Storch, a soldier in the Soviet Army during World War II, describes what he saw as he and his fellow soldiers liberated the Majdanek concentration camp in 1944.

Additional Resources

In partnership with USC Shoah Foundation, we created common core aligned activities to teach this material, which you can access on the iWitness Platform. The USC Shoah Foundation also developed guidelines for effective teaching to supplement viewing the videos.

iWitness Platform

Created by USC Shoah Foundation

Using Visual History Testimony in the Classroom

Created by USC Shoah Foundation

Special Thanks

The video testimony in this collection is from the USC Shoah Foundation—The Institute for Visual History and Education.

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Survivors and Witnesses: Video Testimony