Selma Engel was born Saartje Wijnberg on May 15, 1922, in Groningen. Her parents ran a kosher hotel in Zwolle during the crisis years. Being Jewish, Selma went into hiding during the German occupation. She was rounded up and deported to Sobibor as a penitentiary measure in April 1943. She lived in this extermination camp for six months, working in the sorting barracks and, sometimes, in the woods. ...

Jules Schelvis is driemaal langdurig geïnterviewd. Zijn uitgebreide levensverhaal is in drie delen geslagen. Op 1 juni 1943 wordt Jules Schelvis met zijn vrouw en schoonfamilie vanuit Westerbork op transport gesteld naar Sobibor. Nietsvermoedend neemt hij zijn gitaar mee. Jules verblijft enkele uren in vernietigingskamp Sobibor om daarna in werkkamp Dorohucza turf te steken. Na een kort verblijf in ...

Leida (Aleida) Keesing (geboren Van Tijn) groeit als nakomertje op in een orthodox-joods gezin. Leida vertelt dat ze erg verwend werd. Op haar twaalfde jaar komt zij naast de familie Keesing te wonen. Leida spreekt met grote waardering en liefde over alle leden van het gezin. Op haar zestiende verlooft ze zich met de zoon, Guus. Vader Keesing voorziet al vanaf 1933 dat het mis zal gaan. Hij probeert ...

Thomas Blatt grew up in the Polish village of Izbica, which was used by the Geman Nazis as a transit ghetto for Jews on their way to the extermination camps in Eastern Poland. He was sixteen years old when he arrived at Sobibor with his parents and his brother. All three were immediately sent to the gas chambers, but Thomas himself was selected for forced labour. He had to cut women's hair before they ...

The Nazi Germans used Izbica, the Polish village where Philip Bialowitz was born, as a transitory ghetto for Jews on their way to the destruction camps in Eastern Poland. In Izbica Philip Bialowitz survived a fire squad as a young boy. He was deported to Sobibor in 1943 and selected for forced labour upon arrival. Philip's elder brother, Simkha, took care of him wherever possible. Philip was involved ...

'The Long Shadow of Sobibor' is an interview project representing a unique historical document. The collection comprises open interviews taken by Professor Selma Leydesdorff with 9 survivors of the Sobibor revolt (1943) and 22 next of kin to persons murdered in Sobibor. These unique testimonials are far more than stories about camp life alone. --Stories of lives-- The interviews are the stories of ...

Simcha Bialowitz (1912) grew up in the shtetl of Izbica, a small Jewish community in eastern Poland. The Bialowitz family was observant. Simcha attend the Polish school, which had a few Jewish teachers. In the morning he would be in school, in the afternoon he would work in the local pharmacy and drugstore. When the Germans invaded, Izbica changed into a transitory ghetto. His father was murdered in ...