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Jane Ulman

Jane Ulman

Survivor: Frank Schiller

In October 1941, Frank Schiller, his parents, brother and grandmother were ordered to report to Prague’s Exhibition Hall.

Survivor: Boris Abel

As Boris Abel — then Berelis Abelski — was being herded from the cattle car that had transported him to Auschwitz, he saw what was happening ahead and quickly tossed the small bag of gold and diamonds he was carrying into a nearby sewer.

Survivor: Idele Stapholtz

The dining room of the Jewish orphanage in Dinslaken, Germany, suddenly went dark. Idele Stapholtz — then Ida Steuer — heard shouting and breaking glass as strange men began hurling tables and chairs through the windows lining the back wall.

Survivor: Helen Freeman

“Yes, Mother, I will not go too far,” Helen Freeman — then Chaja Borenkraut — promised her mother as she left their ghetto apartment in Radom, Poland, on a Thursday afternoon in July 1942. But, suddenly, only a short distance from the apartment, a truck stopped and two SS officers jumped out, grabbing Helen and throwing her into the back of the vehicle.

Survivor: Fred Wolf

At 5 a.m. on Nov. 9, 1938, Manfred (Fred) Wolf was awakened by loud banging on the front door of their home in Merl an der Mosel, Germany.

Survivor: Emil Jacoby

On Saturday evening, March 18, 1944, Emil Jacoby’s father walked him to the train station in Cop, Czechoslovakia. Emil, just 20, had spent an emotional weekend with his family — their last weekend together, though they didn’t know it at the time — and was returning to Budapest.

Survivor: Betty Cohen

During her first night in Birkenau, on May 22, 1944, Betty Cohen — née Beppe (Rebecca) Corper — slid out of her lower bunk and stepped outside to use the toilet.

Survivor: Sarah Leisner

Sarah Leisner — née Kanzer — was digging foxholes in a frozen field in northern Poland on the bitter cold and dark afternoon of Dec. 31, 1944, when she spied several small houses nearby, with smoke rising from the chimneys.

Survivor: Karl Wozniak

One dark November evening in 1938, as 14-year-old Karl Wozniak and his younger brother, Max, left their Cologne apartment for a walk, they saw a fire burning in nearby Horst Wessel Park. They headed toward the flames and spied a group of Nazis standing around the fire. They stayed in the shadows, saying little, and soon returned home.

Survivor: Engelina Billauer

On Oct. 1, 1942, the passenger train carrying 1,000 Jews from Berlin and 250 young Jewish women from Frankfurt-am-Main halted next to a large empty field in Estonia. “Raus, raus” (“Out, out”), SS yelled as they herded the Jews into one line. But they held back 15-year-old Engelina Billauer (née Lowenberg), her older sister, Freidel, and other young women to clean the tracks. When the sisters saw their parents dispatched to a waiting bus, however, they ran and boarded the bus.

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