Holocaust Testimony Of Edith Millman

Edith Millman, nee Greifinger, was born in 1924 in Bielsko (Bielitz), Poland. Father was an executive for Standard Oil Co. In 1937 the family moved to Warsaw. She was injured during the bombardment of the city in September 1939 when bombs hit the building in which they lived. She describes persecution of Jews which started immediately after the occupation and the horrendous conditions in the Warsaw Ghetto into which they were forced to move in November 1940. While, there she was able to study in small clandestine groups organized by teachers. She worked at the Schultz factory until the end of 1942 when she escaped from the ghetto. With forged papers received from gentiles, she passed as an Aryan and worked as a translator for the German railroad. She stole railroad identification cards, food stamps and coal with which she helped others. She describes fear of being discovered and close escapes. Speaking German and pretending to be an ethnic German helped her to throw off blackmailers. She lost many relatives, describes the deaths of several. After liberation by the Russians in August 1944 she studied medicine in Lublin, Poland and, after war's end, in Marburg/Lahn, Germany, she came to the University of Kentucky in Lexington, KY in December 1947 on a B'nai B'rith Hillel scholarship. Her parents arrived in the U.S. in 1949.