Survivor Testimonies

My first testimony was on Richard Billaver. He was first put into camps at the age of 14. He
was never in the ghettos. Richard actually wasn’t in a German camp, although he was very
close to being put in one. He took a train that was supposed to bring him to Warsaw in 1940,
which is where he actually wanted to go because he didn’t know about the concentration
camps. But instead the train went to somewhere in Russia. Richard was in a couple camps
from 1940 to 1945. The first one was a camp in the middle of the woods with just a couple
hundred people. There they worked and cut wood. After that he worked drilling oil then he
worked in fields. The fields were the best situation because there was always plenty of food
they could eat. After the war, in 1945, he was set free and he went back to Poland. Richard’s
brother and father were actually sent to Auschwitz. Richard said that his brother actually
survived Auschwitz. Richard’s brother and dad were separated in Auschwitz though. When
Richard was talking about his brother and father being separated he said, “Two is harder
than one. He was a young boy, but he mentioned to me last year, that it was better for him.”
So his brother felt that since he was alone and young, it helped him survive the camp.
Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDcHu1bveLs&p=1DEE787E7468D11C

My second testimony is on Edith Coliver. She actually wasn’t in a ghetto or a camp. As a

child she was sent to England before the war. Edith went to the camps after they were being
liberated and help out the survivors. She chose to do this because she heard that the
survivors were starved and were really in need and also so she could document some of the
aftermath. She talked about some of the horrific things she saw, “We saw thousands of
bodies being bulldozed into pits.” She actually found out that one of the camps she visited,
Beldian Belsan, is where one of her childhood friends had died. When she talked to
survivors about what happened and how they survived, they didn’t know how they survived,
because it was so horrible.
Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7EjTU4iIII&feature=relmfu