Both Itka Zygmuntowicz and Suzy Ressler were deported to Auschwitz. Listen as they share their experiences of deportation and life in a concentration camp. Both survivors immigrated to Philadelphia after World War II.
About the Interviewees
Itka Zygmuntowicz was born in Ciechanów, Poland on April 15, 1926, to an orthodox Jewish family. At the age of fifteen, in October 1941, she and her family were placed in a temporary ghetto in the castle at Ciechanów before being transferred to the Nowe Miasto ghetto. In 1942, Itka was deported by cattle car to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Later, she was forced on a death march towards Ravensbrück concentration camp. In April 1945, she was part of a special prisoner exchange with the Swedish Red Cross known as the “White Busses” transport. As the only survivor in her immediate family, Itka restarted her life in Sweden where she met her husband, Rachmil. In 1953 Itka and Rachmil immigrated to the United States where she was interviewed in Philadelphia, PA on March 3, 1996.
Suzy Ressler (née Edith Suzanne Czitrom), daughter of Dezsö and Elizabeth was born on November 19, 1927, in Oradea, Romania. When Suzy was in high school, in 1940, Oradea came under Hungarian occupation. In March 1944, Nazi Germany occupied Hungary, including Oradea. Suzy and her family had to live in the Oradea ghetto, however, the family’s house was located in the ghetto. When the Oradea ghetto was liquidated in June 1944, the family was deported to the Auschwitz camp complex in Nazi-occupied Poland. That August, Suzy was transferred to Stutthof, a concentration camp in Germany, where she remained until a death march in the winter of 1944 – 1945. After being liberated by the Soviet Army, Suzy returned to Oradea, where she married Emmerick Ressler. The couple lived in Austria, where their daughter Katherine was born. The family immigrated to the United States and settled in the Philadelphia area; they had four grandchildren. Suzy’s mother and brother survived the Holocaust. This interview took place on November 13, 2013, in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania.