Watch the clips of testimony from Eva Burns and Anneliese Nossbaum who share their experiences as children who survived the ghetto. After surviving the Holocaust, they moved to Havertown and Jenkintown, respectively.
About the Interviewees
Eva Burns (née Gerstl), daughter of Paul and Francis, was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia on December 15, 1924. Eva had one brother, Gerhard. In November 1942, the family was deported to Theresienstadt, a camp-ghetto in Czechoslovakia. Eva was there for almost two years, until she was deported to the Auschwitz camp-complex in Nazi occupied Poland. In February 1945, Eva was deported from Auschwitz to Christianstadt, a concentration camp in Germany. During a death march from Christianstadt, Eva was able to escape. She hid in Reichenberg, in the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia, and hid there for two months. She was liberated by the Soviet Armed Forces in May 1945. Eva was the only member of her immediate family to survive the Holocaust. After the war, Eva lived in Prague, where she met and married Max Burns in 1947. The couple immigrated to the United States in 1948, and they eventually settled in Havertown, Pennsylvania. They had three children, and at the time of this interview, they had one granddaughter. This interview was conducted on May 12, 1997, in Havertown, Pennsylvania.
Anneliese Nossbaum (née Winterberg), daughter of Siegfried and Irmgard, was born on January 8, 1929, in Guben, Germany. In 1932, the family moved to Bonn, Germany, where Siegfried was employed as a cantor. In 1941, the family was forced to move to a monastery complex in Bonn that the Nazis had confiscated from the nuns who lived there. In July 1942, Anneliese and her parents were deported to Theresienstadt, a camp-ghetto in Czechoslovakia. In October 1944, they were deported to the Auschwitz camp complex in Nazi-occupied Poland. Anneliese and Irmgard were later deported to Freiberg, a labor camp in Germany, and to Mauthausen, a concentration camp in Austria. They were liberated at Mauthausen in May 1945; Irmgard died from tuberculosis in December 1945. After living and working at a displaced persons’ camp for over a year, Anneliese immigrated to the United States. She married Martin Nossbaum in 1953, and they had two children and two grandchildren. This interview took place on November 12, 1996, in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania. Anneliese also gave testimony to USC Shoah Foundation’s Countering Antisemitism Through Testimony (CATT) program on March 9, 2017.