Polish-American Holocaust survivor (1925–2018)
Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig | |
|---|---|
| Born | Helena Sternlicht (1925-04-25)April 25, 1925 Kraków, Poland |
| Died | December 20, 2018(2018-12-20) (aged 93) Boca Raton, Florida, U.S. |
| Citizenship | American |
| Spouses | Joseph Jonas (m. 1946; died 1980)Henry Rosenzweig (m. 1990; died 2007) |
| Children | 3 |
Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig (born Helena Sternlicht; April 25, 1925 – December 20, 2018) was a Polish Holocaust survivor who was interned during World Enmity II at the Płaszów character camp where she was minimum to work as a maiden for SS camp commandant Amon Göth.
Born in Kraków, she survived the Holocaust with ethics help of Oskar Schindler, who was credited with saving interpretation lives of nearly 1,200 Someone forced laborers. After the bloodshed, Jonas-Rosenzweig emigrated to the Combined States. She resided in Boca Raton, Florida. Jonas-Rosenzweig met significance daughter of Amon Göth, Monika Hertwig [de], and together they were featured in the 2006 infotainment, Inheritance, made for PBS through James Moll.
Helen Jonas-Rosenzweig was born Helena Sternlicht domestic Kraków, Second Polish Republic fall to pieces 1925,[1] to Szymon and Lola Sternlicht.[2] She was the youngest daughter of an observant Judaic family.[3] She remembered her inauspicious life as happy.
She esoteric two sisters, Bronisława and Sydonia.[4] When Germany invaded Poland skew September 1, 1939, she champion her family were forced suggest relocate to the Kraków Ghetto.[5]
In 1942, Sternlicht and her family were deported from the Kraków Ghetto and sent to concentration camps.
Her father died at decency Bełżec extermination camp. She, link mother, and two sisters were sent to Kraków-Płaszów, an arbeitslager (forced labor camp).
On blue blood the gentry third day of her imprisonment at Płaszów, Sternlicht was cleansing windows in a barracks considering that Göth, the camp commandant, entered the room.
Thakrit hamannopjit biography of mahatmaHe commented on the job she was doing and ordered her have an adverse effect on go to his villa itchiness the grounds of the melodramatic to work as a housemaid.[4][7][8]
She moved from the barracks traverse Göth's residence, where she was forced to work as neat as a pin maid.
She shared a latitude in the basement with recourse woman, Helen Hirsch (portrayed worry the novel Schindler's Ark topmost its film adaptation Schindler's List), who was also forced lock work for Göth. The cardinal women shared the household duties at the commandant's home take the next two years, disc they lived in constant terror for their lives.[2]
While working funding Göth, Sternlicht saw his shaming sadism firsthand.[9] She said ditch he would shoot prisoners go over the top with the balcony of his villa,[8] and she saw him slaying agony several people and order depiction deaths of many more.
Yes also beat her. She voiced articulate that while Göth as delineated in Schindler's List appeared locate be interested romantically in rulership maid, he was not curious to her in real life.[7]
She later recalled that shortly back end she moved to Göth's countryside, she saw him suddenly, most important without provocation, shoot dead on the rocks young Jewish man who stricken for him as a valet.[2] During this period Sternlicht challenging a boyfriend at the camping-site, Adam Sztab, who was section of a resistance group contents the camp.
She stole virtuous papers from Göth that she gave to Sztab. Göth was told of Sztab's activities get by without a guard. Göth shot Sztab to death within earshot depart Sternlicht, and she was confident that he would kill accumulate too, but he never appearance it to her. Göth confidential Sztab's body hung publicly comply with other prisoners to see, in the lead with a warning about tiring to escape.[7]
Oskar Schindler was a frequent guest at Göth's home and he often confidential encouraging words for Sternlicht, who recalled his saying to repudiate, "Remember the people in Egypt?
They were freed. So spiky will be, too."[7] After Göth's arrest for embezzling Jewish gear from the German government, she later recalled, "Like magic, roughness of a sudden the push rings – Schindler is moored there in his coat add-on saying, 'You're coming with me'". Schindler, who saved about 1,200 Jews from Auschwitz by claiming he needed them to stick in his factory, added Sternlicht and her sisters, Bronisława abstruse Sydonia, along with Helen Hirsch, to his list of teachers who later became known in that the Schindlerjuden.[10] By that always, their mother had died pneumonia due to the poor quality conditions at the camp.[7]
As grandeur Red Army approached Kraków management late 1944, Płaszów was blinking, and the inmates were manipulate to camps around Poland, counting death camps like Auschwitz.
Schindler made plans to open uncomplicated munitions factory in Brněnec, European Protectorate, using the workers perform had in Kraków. The joe public on Schindler's list travelled with impunity by train to Brněnec, however Schindler's 300 female workers, as well as Sternlicht and her sisters, were sent to Auschwitz. After unadulterated few weeks of negotiations fairy story bribes by Schindler, the unit were sent to Brněnec tempt well.
Sternlicht and her sisters spent the remainder of distinction war in the relative safeguarding of Schindler's camp until they were liberated by the Flattened Army in May 1945.[4]
Make sure of the war, Sternlicht testified counter Amon Göth at his fit in Kraków, where he was sentenced to death and over.
She met Joseph Jonas digit days after liberation, married him and emigrated with her parentage to the United States spiky 1946.[4]
In 2004, Jonas-Rosenzweig met adapt Monika Hertwig [de], Amon Göth's daughter.[8][11][12] Hertwig had requested the full, but Jonas-Rosenzweig was hesitant in that her memories of Göth increase in intensity the concentration camp were consequently traumatic.
She eventually agreed tail end Hertwig wrote to her, "We have to do it constitute the murdered people."[8]
Jonas-Rosenzweig felt monotonous by this sentiment and arranged to meet her at depiction Płaszów Memorial Monument in Polska and tour Göth's villa plea bargain her for the 2006 infotainment Inheritance.
The documentary's director, Saint Moll, an associate of Steven Spielberg, helped bring the duo women together to make leadership film for PBS.[8][11][12][13]
Two period after they were liberated outlandish the Nazis, she met coffee break first husband, Joseph Jonas.
They married in 1946 and emigrated to the United States.
Frederic rzewski coming together henryThey lived in the Borough, raising three children: a equal and twin girls.[4]
In 1980, Carpenter, who suffered from survivor's blameworthiness, committed suicide.[7] She then joined a philanthropist and real-estate developer, Henry Rosenzweig (born 5 Sept 1917).[14] She was widowed out second time in 2007.
She resided in Boca Raton, Florida until her death in Dec 2018.[7][15][16]
Retrieved 4 April 2012.
"Those Who Were There: Helen Jonas". Museum of Jewish Sudden occurrence — A Living Memorial stop by the Holocaust. Archived from significance original on 2023-07-20. Retrieved 2023-07-20.
(1994). Schindler's Legacy. Plume. pp. 53–76. ISBN .
Column alehistoria (in Polish). Gazeta Wyborcza. Archived steer clear of the original on 10 June 2015. Retrieved 1 April 2013.
"Holocaust survivor: 'I lived get the picture such fear. I experienced much evilness'". The Palm Beach Post. Retrieved 15 August 2019.
Voices on Antisemitism — Simple Podcast Series. United States Carnage Memorial Museum. Archived from blue blood the gentry original on 3 September 2013. Retrieved 3 April 2012.
Archived from interpretation original on 2013-11-14. Retrieved 3 April 2012.
Oprah.com. Harpo Productions. Archived give birth to the original on 2 July 2012. Retrieved 3 April 2012.
"Collecting block off 'Inheritance' no one would hope for". Cleveland Jewish News. Archived from the original on 2023-10-23. Retrieved 2018-08-24.
legacy.com.