Holocaust Survivors

The Holocaust was a very dark time in world history. This is believed to have started around 1935 and possibly earlier, as a result of the Nuremberg Race Laws. The war was waged by Adolf Hitler against the Jewish people, in an attempt to create a 'clean race', according to his own speeches and statements. Over the entire period, more than 5-6 million Jews were killed at the hands of Nazis. Amidst all this chaos and killing, there were still survivors. Today, many of the survivors have passed on, but their stories are still out there for anyone who wants to learn more about this harrowing experience.
 
Holocaust survivors that are alive today are mostly children of the Holocaust. Some were teens or young adults at the time, but most of the older survivors are no longer alive. Any Jewish peoples in Central or Eastern Europe that were under German control became targets for this huge 'cleansing', stripping them of their rights, property, and human decency. These people were first required to bear stars on their clothing to identify themselves, and were eventually shipped off to ghettos and concentration camps where overwork, disease, or starvation killed many. The rest were killed by shooting or in the infamous gas chambers.
 
The survivors of the Holocaust consider themselves to be very lucky to have survived such a huge event that left few people behind. These people were hidden, assimilated into non-Jewish culture (provided they could pass), or managed to escape from the concentration camps somehow. In 1948, there were about 140,000 survivors that came to America after a new immigration law was passed by congress. This happened, of course, after some 930 Jewish people were turned away in 1939 as a result of the depression and high unemployment rates that discouraged immigration.
 
The exact number of Holocaust survivors may never be known simply because they never all came forward. For now, there are a few who are still willing to share their stories of survival, their experiences under the Third Reich, and their harrowing losses of family and friends throughout the entirety of the Holocaust. Some of the best-known survivors of the Holocaust include Alexander Kimmel, Alicia Appleman-Jurman, Benjamin Jacobs, Charlotte Guthmann Opfermann and Ann Levy.
 
There are dozens more, including camp survivors and anonymous people who wish to share their stories without revealing their identities. Some come from camps, others from hiding, and even more from refugee escapes. All of them have a valuable piece of history to share.