Book picks similar to
The Gold Train: The Destruction of the Jews and the Looting of Hungary by Ronald W. Zweig
holocaust
history
non-fiction
ww2
Masquerade: The Incredible True Story of How George Soros' Father Outsmarted the Gestapo
Tivadar Soros - 1965
But when they did arrive, their orders were to put the “Final Solution” into effect with deliberate speed. Soros, a Jewish lawyer in Budapest, secured fake Christian identities for himself, his wife, and his two sons following the German invasion of Hungary on March 19, 1944. In a narrative reminiscent of the great Primo Levi, Soros recounts his experiences with a beguiling humor, deep humanity, and a wisdom that is humbling. Superbly translated by Humphrey Tonkin, Masquerade is a unique account of how one man managed not only to survive but to retain his integrity, compassion, family unity, and humor by “dancing around death.” Like Klemperer’s Diary of the Nazi Years, this very personal, low-key testament of the Holocaust is a gripping depiction of “normal” daily life under the Nazis—told by a man who triumphed by leading an ordinary life under extraordinary and terrifying circumstances.
My Soul is Filled With Joy: A Holocaust Story
Karen Treiger - 2018
It was August 3, 1943, just one day after Sam escaped the Camp during a prisoner uprising. With 870,000 murdered at Treblinka, Sam was one of approximately 65 to survive and live until the end of the war. Esther had been hiding in that patch of forest for a year and was out that morning, looking for mushrooms to eat. They met and after hearing of the prisoner revolt, she took him to the Righteous Gentiles who, at great danger to themselves, hid them in their barn for three days while the Nazis, Ukrainians and Poles scoured the area looking for escapees. Deciding to stay and hide with Esther, they dug a forest pit where they “lived” when it was not freezing. They subsisted in the pit and the barns – hungry, cold, and scared – for another year until they were liberated by the Red Army in July of 1944. This is only one piece of their harrowing story of survival. This book tells the story of Sam and Esther, Holocaust survivors, who lost their entire families because of Hitler’s Final Solution. After four years in Displaced Person’s Camps, they arrived in New York Harbor to build a new life. The author, Karen Treiger, is Sam and Esther’s daughter-in-law, and with in-depth research and a bit of luck was able to find the three surviving children of the Styś families – those Righteous Gentiles who helped Sam and Esther during that dark time. She and her family traveled to Poland to walk in Sam and Esther’s footsteps and to meet the Styś children. It was intensely emotional, and the family heard some of what Sam and Esther lived through from those who helped them survive. Also, with the help of a Polish Priest, she was able to locate and meet a Goldberg cousin they never knew they had. My Soul is Filled with Joy: A Holocaust Story brings to life the horror of the Nazis’ actions and the toll that it exacted on so many Jewish families. This is also a story of hope, love and determination; of a family rediscovering the path taken by their parents to find life and freedom in a new world. Sam and Esther’s story is one of love and the will to live no matter what they had to endure. It reminds us that we are still learning the lessons of the Holocaust. TRIBUTES “Karen has written a powerful and personal account of Sam and Esther Goldberg. This book is a must read for those interested in the greatest crime in the history of mankind.” Chris Webb, Author/Historian, Founder of the Holocaust Historical Society,br> “It is vital that this book—as well as other accounts of the Holocaust— be preserved and disseminated widely to future generations to help prevent anything similar from ever happening again.”Marion Blumenthal Lazan, Holocaust Survivor and Co-Author, Four Perfect Pebbles“One can only bow one’s head, out of an unutterable gratitude, to the author for her contribution to the sacred narrative of our people. I call this book sacred, for (as with all forms of scripture) it tells not only what happened - but how to live in light of the story.”Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, President Emeritus, CLAL: The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership; chairman, the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, 2000-2002. “We are haunted by the question of inexplicable evil. If you want to be inspired in spite of the horrors one human being can do to another human being, read this book.
Three Voices
Nora Sarel - 2018
Now an elderly woman with nothing but her memories to guide her – she embarks on a journey to unravel the truth of her past, once and for all.You have never read a story quite like this. Based on real events, Three Voices illustrates the trauma and relief of a woman escaping the atrocities of the Holocaust, traveling the world and eventually reclaiming her childhood. This incredible tale, pieced together from three unique perspectives, weaves past, present and future into a heart-wrenching experience that will change you.
Watch Lena take her life back
Lena remembers everything from her childhood. She doesn’t know that her whole life is about to be turned upside down as she comes face-to-face with another Lena. A once-in-a-lifetime meeting between the two Lena’s and the town's priest, sends shockwaves that reverberate through the truth that was known to her.
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Remember Your Name
Erik G. LeMoullec - 2014
Medallion. While sitting in traffic heading to her great-grandfather's eighty-fourth birthday party, Hayden asks her dad why her great-grandfather speaks the way he does. What follows is a car ride she will never forget as she learns about his difficult childhood. From living in the Lodz ghetto at age ten to surviving the hells of Auschwitz and a death march from Gorlitz concentration camp at fifteen, Teddy Znamirowski faced unfathomable horrors, narrowly escaping death time and time again. Liberated at sixteen, he took on smuggling as a means to survive. It was not until the Bricha approached him and he became a lead operative - smuggling thousands of refugees across country borders - that he was finally able to begin his life again. Teddy's story is one of survival amidst horrific circumstances. The author does not sensationalize the suffering his grandfather and his family endured, but in this work of narrative nonfiction simply recreates this remarkable man's early life during one of the darkest moments of human history.
The Lone Assassin: The Epic True Story of the Man Who Almost Killed Hitler
Helmut Ortner - 1993
That is, however, until he took it upon himself to attempt to assassinate the Führer, Adolph Hitler. Being a common man who opposed the Nazi regime, Elser took the skills from his craft and worked to assemble his own bomb detonator. Every night, he snuck out to the Munich Beer Hall, where he worked on assembling the bomb that he planned to use to kill Hitler. Hidden in a hollowed-out space near the speaker’s podium, Elser’s bomb went off successfully, killing eight people. Hitler was not one of them. This is the story, scene by scene, of the events that led up to Georg Elser taking justice into his own hands, his attempt to murder the Führer, and what happened after the bomb went off. The Lone Assassin is a powerfully gripping tale that places the reader in the dark days of Munich in 1939, following Elser from the Munich Beer Hall, across the border, and sadly, to the concentration camp where his heroic life ended.
Miss U: Angel of the Underground
Margaret Utinsky - 2014
In addition to her work as a nurse caring for wounded soldiers, Utinsky was instrumental in setting up an underground network to smuggle food, medicine, and money to Allied prisoners-of-war held at Camps O'Donnell and Cabanatuan (many of whom were survivors of the infamous Bataan Death March). Her code-name in the network was "Miss U." However, she was eventually captured by the Japanese and subjected to 32 days of imprisonment and torture at Fort Santiago in Manila. Following her release, and after six weeks in a hospital for treatment of her injuries, she left Manila and returned to the Bataan Peninsula, again serving as a nurse to guerrilla fighters. After American forces regained the Philippines, Utinsky was attached to the U.S. Army's Counter Intelligence Corps to help identify collaborators and those involved in the torture of prisoners. With the end of the war, she returned to the United States, and was awarded the Medal of Freedom in 1946. Margaret Elizabeth Doolin Utinsky (August 26, 1900 – August 30, 1970) was an American nurse who worked with the Filipino resistance movement to provide medicine, food, and other items to aid Allied prisoners of war in the Philippines during World War II. She was recognized in 1946 with the Medal of Freedom for her actions.
The Battered Bastards of Bastogne: The 101st Airborne and the Battle of the Bulge, December 19,1944-January 17,1945
George Koskimaki - 1994
They lived and made this history, and much of it is told in their own words. The material contributed by these men of the 101st Airborne Division, the Armor, Tank Destroyer, Army Air Force , and others is tailored meticulously by the author and placed on the historical framework known to most students of the Battle of the Bulge. Pieces of a nearly 60-year-old jigsaw puzzle come together in this book, when memoirs from one soldier fit with those of another unit or group pursuing the battle from another nearby piece of terrain.
Rembrandt's Shadow
Janet Lee Berg - 2016
Benjamin Katz and his frightened family stand at the train station in occupied Holland, unsure if they would be taken to their freedom—or the death camp. Sylvie, his granddaughter, who was six years old at the time, would later recall the madness as they wondered if their desperate last minute escape would work. When the German officer received the order to allow the escape he said, “I would have much rather been given the order to kill all of you.”Their entire art collection had long made them a prime target of Adolf Hitler and his greedy henchmen. Now they had one big trade—a Rembrandt in exchange for twenty-five lives.Based on a true story, Rembrandt’s Shadow is the story of two women from different generations—each with their own distinct horrific memories—who find themselves at odds when forced to confront the here and now.
World War II Love Stories
Gill Paul - 2014
The atrocities unleashed by the Nazi regime were unprecedented; families were torn apart, millions were murdered, and a cloud of fear cast over the world. But somewhere, love and hope remained ignited. World War II Love Stories tells the unforgettable stories of those couples brought together by war. They are enduring tales of great love, intense passion, and often tragedy, but most of all they are tales that celebrate the human spirit at its time of greatest trial.
The Siege of Budapest: One Hundred Days in World War II
Krisztián Ungváry - 2002
Both Stalin and Hitler demanded victory at all costs, and the cost was extreme: 80,000 Soviet troops, 38,000 German and Hungarian soldiers, and 38,000 Hungarian civilians perished. The book provides the first full account of this shocking battle.“As a military history [The Siege of Budapest] is unrivaled. . . . Magisterial.”—John Lukacs, New York Review of Books“An exceedingly dramatic book, filled with fascinating stories, some of them even humorous, and with heart-rending accounts of suffering, limitless cruelty, and amazing decency.”—István Deák, New Republic"Ungváry has written a dramatic, gripping history of this siege, filling a gap in WWII history."—Choice
One Girl in Auschwitz: A WW2 Jewish Girl's Holocaust Survival True Story
Sara Leibovits - 2020
Holocaust biography
The German Aces Speak II: World War II Through the Eyes of Four More of the Luftwaffe's Most Important Commanders
Colin D. Heaton - 2014
. . what might have been numbing recitations of dogfights are instead vivid descriptions of life as a warrior during World War II.” Indeed, it is this unexpected perspective, brought to life by the authors’ neutrality and thoughtful research, that illuminates a side of war largely hidden from the American public: the experience of the German Luftwaffe pilot. In The German Aces Speak II, Heaton and Lewis paint a picture of the war through the eyes of four more of Germany’s most significant pilots—Johannes Steinhoff, Erich Alfred Hartmann, Guther Rall, and Dieter Hrabak—put together from numerous interviews personally conducted by Heaton from the 1980s through the 2000s. The four ex-Luftwaffe fighter aces bring the past to life as they tell their stories about the war, their battles, their off-duty lives, their lives after the war, and, perhaps most importantly, how they felt about serving under the Nazi leadership of Hermann Göring and Adolf Hitler. Together, the memories of the events captured in The German Aces Speak II continue one of today’s most unique World War II book series, unearthing a facet of the war that has gone widely overlooked for the American public.
A Call to Arms: Mobilizing America for World War II
Maury Klein - 2013
But in 1939, when Hitler's tanks surged across Europe, American war materiel was disastrously scant, and most of it obsolete. President Franklin Roosevelt, frantically trying to ready the nation for war, called for America to build 50,000 airplanes a year. Critics said his goal was not just unachievable, but preposterous.The critics were wrong. By 1945, American factories had turned out a staggering 325,000 aircraft. At the peak of production, huge B-24 bombers were rolling off the assembly line at the rate of one an hour. The Axis powers might have fielded better trained soldiers, tougher tanks, or faster planes, but it could not match American productivity. The United States simply buried its enemies with an industrial output such as the world had never seen. The scale of effort was titanic, and the result historic. It turned the tide of the war, and changed America forever. Small towns in the South and West swelled into cities overnight. Vast numbers of rural workers migrated to urban centers, never to return. Women joined the workforce in unprecedented numbers. War mobilization almost doubled the nation's GDP within four years, ended the Great Depression, and set the United States on the road to the greatest prosperity it had ever known.Until now, this crucial dimension of World War II has never been the subject of a comprehensive history. Maury Klein has delivered a brilliantly textured narrative of epic scope, full of memorable characters—from the canny, ever-improvising FDR, to the captains of industry who overhauled their businesses on the fly, to the real-life Rosie (and Ralph) the Riveters on countless shop floors. A Call to Arms captures when the United States was transformed from a depressed nation, shrinking from global challenges, to a superpower that bestrode the world.
U-Boat 977: The U-Boat that Escaped to Argentina
Heinz Schaeffer - 1952
This epic journey started from Bergen in Norway, where in April 1945 it was temporarily based, and took three and a half months to complete. Because of continuing allied naval activity the commander decided to make the first part of the journey underwater. Before surfacing near the west coast of Africa U-977 had spent a remarkable sixty-six days submerged! It was inevitable that when U-977’s journey and escape to Argentina and its port of Mar del Plata became known it would be the center of rumor and theory. Why did U-977 make this long journey of escape when, for Germany, the war was over? Was it because it was carrying Nazi gold to continue the fight? Were escaping Nazi leaders on board? Was Hitler on board? The stories were many and for years, after the end of WWII, provided material for novelists, film-makers and historians alike. Heinz Schaeffer, the commander of U-977, has written a full account of his earlier career that culminated in this last command. It depicts the grueling aspects of a submariner’s life aboard a vessel that was subjected to the harsh conditions of the seas and oceans. As an experienced commander Schaeffer took part in many of the decisive U-boat operations in the North Sea and Atlantic Ocean. In the final months of the war, and in common with most surviving U-boat commanders, Schaeffer and his crew came under constant attacks from Allied aircraft and surface ships. The final part of U-boat 977 is Schaeffer’s account of the journey to Argentina and ‘lays to rest’ some of the more ‘fanciful’ stories that followed its arrival.
The Long Road to Auschwitz
Anthony Vincent Bruno - 2019
Max is a British Territorial soldier and Zia is a Jewess from the south of France. Zia's grandmother is a wealthy socialite who owns a painting that could embarrass the Nazis. Zia is kidnapped by the Gestapo and Max is hospitalised on the same day. He awakes to find no trace of his beloved who he had planned to marry in England. The Red Cross reported that it was almost certain that Zia was trafficked across the border and delivered to Sachsenhausen Labour Camp at Oranienburg, not far from Berlin on the night of May 26th, 1939. A criminal act, regardless of the forthcoming war. The first warring Germans to step over the border onto French soil did not do so until May 13th, 1940. The Gestapo had kidnapped her 343 days before they attacked France.June 6th, 1944 - four years later, Max is one of 150,000 Allied troops headed towards the Normandy beaches. He has two options - find the woman he could never forget or kill the people responsible for her death. From the very beginning, Berlin had ordered SS Hauptsturmführer Dieter Baumann to deal harshly with their VIP captive but never to kill her. Through three concentration camps, ending in Auschwitz, Zia wishes she had been killed many times over. Traumatized, she has no idea that Max and a few unlikely friends are battling their way through Nazi occupied Europe in a crazy attempt to rescue her. Berlin tries one last ploy to get their hands on her grandmother's painting. Zia's life hangs in the balance when Max meets his own personal nemesis in the guise of an undercover Gestapo officer. This novel explores the dark depths that humans can sink to in times of war. It is for adults only and even then; it is not for readers of a sensitive disposition. Whatever you read in this novel of extraordinary graphic Holocaust content, consider this – it was immeasurably worse, a hundred thousand times so.