Finding Survivors' Stories
This section includes information about personal narratives of Holocaust survivors--such as memoirs, autobiographies, and oral histories --in the Library's collection. These narratives may be in print, or audio or video format, published individually or in compilations, including oral histories from the American Jewish Committee Oral History Collection; books by and about survivors; yizkor books; periodicals from displaced persons (DP) camps; and personal papers. We have also included links to websites with Holocaust survivor testimony.
Use NYPL's research catalog to find personal narratives of Holocaust survivors.
Suggested Subject Headings:
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives
World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives
World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish
Holocaust survivors -- Personal narratives
Click "refine research" to narrow your results by format, language, subject, and date.
Find oral history interviews with Holocaust survivors in the legacy catalog:
- Use the title Holocaust survivors to find a complete list
Find memoirs, biographies, and autobiographies (for materials cataloged before 2015):
- Choose "Standard Number" from the dropdown menu
- Type *PWZ and hit the "enter" key
- Click "refine search" to narrow your results by subject heading, date, and language
Survivors' Stories
The Dorot Jewish Division holds the American Jewish Committee Oral History Collection, which includes 238 oral history interviews with Holocaust survivors (out of 2,250 general interviewees).
Access the collection:
View digitized interview transcripts of Holocaust survivors in NYPL's Digital Collections
Browse the NYPL's Legacy Catalog using the title Holocaust survivors to find a complete list
Read interview summaries in the Catalogue of memoirs of the William E. Wiener Oral History Library.
Request interview transcripts and/or audio in advance of your visit by emailing dorotjewish@nypl.org
The Library's collection includes papers of individual Holocaust survivors, as well as archival materials from organizations that helped Jewish refugees.
- The Holocaust: extermination of Lithuanian Jews, by Leyb KoniuchowskyThe accounts describe Jewish life in Lithuania before the war, and the persecution, deportation, and murder of Jews by Nazis and Lithuanian supporters after the outbreak of war. Included is testimony of residents of the towns and counties of Alytus, Anykshtsiai, Heidekrug (Shilute), Kaishiadorys (Trakai), Kedainiai, Kovno (Kaunas), Kretinga, Lazhdijai, Marijampole, Mažeikiai, Marcinkonis, Rasieniai, Shakiai, Shventzionys, Tawrik (Taurage), Telšiai and Vilkavishkis. NYPL also has a published book based on this research, titled The Lithuanian slaughter of its Jews : the testimonies from 121 Jewish survivors of the Holocaust in Lithuania.
- Holocaust Studies - Jewish Studies in the Manuscripts and Archives Division, NYPLResearch guide listing archival collections related to Holocaust Studies, including personal papers, international relief organizations, and survivor narrative, found in NYPL's Manuscripts and Archives Division.
- Mary Löwenkopf Weiss PapersThe Mary Löwenkopf Weiss Papers document the years that Mary Löwenkopf, a Jewish refugee from Vienna, spent in The Netherlands during 1938-1946, when, at age 13, she left Nazi-occupied Vienna and settled in Arnhem, The Netherlands.
- Sala Garncarz Kirschner collectionCorrespondence received by Sala Garncarz of Sosnowiec, while a teenage inmate of various Nazi slave labor camps (1940-1945), including Geppersdorf (Germany) and Schatzlar (Czechoslovakia), and as a displaced person and American war bride (1945-1946). Photographs of Sala Garncarz, family and friends, before, during and immediately after the Second World War. Documents relating to her status as a displaced person and immigrant to the United States.
Many Jewish Holocaust survivors lived in displaced persons camps (DP Camps) immediately following the war. They published newsletters and other periodicals as part of the effort to reestablish community life. The New York Public Library's collection includes some of these periodicals.
Suggested Subject Headings
Illustration: Passover Seder Service : Deutsches Theatre Restaurant (1946)
יידישע בילדער. Yidishe bilder = Jewish pictures. by Publication Date: 1947-1948- מדבר. Ba-midbar / פערנוואלדער אלמאנאך /Fernvalder almanakh by Publication Date: 1947
- אונדזער שטימע Undzer shtime by Publication Date: 1945-1947
- אונדער וועג = Unzer weg = Our way by Publication Date: 1948-1949
- אונטערוועגס. Untervegs by Publication Date: May 1946
- יידישע צייטונג. Yidishe tsaytungPublication Date: 1947
- נצח ישראל. Netsaḥ Yiśroel.Publication Date: 1948
- צויטן : בעלזענער בלעטלעך. Tsoyṭn: Belzener bleṭlekh. by Publication Date: 1947-
Access the collection:
Look up yizkor books by town/city name in NYPL's Yizkor Books Guide.
85% of the Library's yizkor books have been digitized. The guide includes links to the physical and digitized versions of the books.
Most yizkor books are in Hebrew and/or Yiddish. English translations for many are found on JewishGen and in print.
- AHEYM Project: Archives of Historical and Ethnographic Yiddish Memories (University of Indiana, Bloomington)Linguistic and oral history project with Holocaust testimonials.
- Blavatnik Archive Foundation - Veteran Testimonies & Ephemera of Russian Jews1,200 unique video interviews with Russian Jewish men and women who fought in the Soviet armed forces and partisan detachments during World War Two.
- Database of Greek-Jewish Holocaust Survivors' TestimoniesDatabase of testimonies and evidence from Greece. Europe, the USA, and Israel.
- Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies (Yale University Library)4,400 testimonies comprising 12,000 hours of video.
- The Harvard Project on the Soviet Social System OnlineDigitized summary transcripts of 705 interviews with refugees from the USSR during the early years of the Cold War.
- Holocaust Survivors' Stories (Wexler Oral History Project, Yiddish Book Center)Oral histories of survivors and their descendants.
- Houston’s Survivors (Holocaust Museum Houston)Survivor testimonies from the local community.
- Jeff and Toby Herr Oral History Archive (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum)One of the largest and most diverse collections of Holocaust testimonies.
- Jewish Survivors of the Holocaust: Oral History Recordings (British Library)280+ interviews with Jewish Holocaust survivors.
- Lithuanian Yiddish Video Archive (LYVA)Interviews with Litvish Yiddish speakers, mainly Holocaust survivors, taped over three decades from 1990 to 2020 in Eastern Europe and beyond.
- USC Shoah Foundation: The Institute for Visual History and Education55,000 video testimonies of Holocaust and genocide survivors.
- Video Testimonies Resource Center (Yad Vashem)Growing collection of survivor testimonies.
- Voices of Holocaust Survivors: Oral Histories and Personal NarrativesLearn how to find personal narratives of Holocaust survivors in NYPL's collection, including oral histories, memoirs, and autobiographies.
- Voices of the Holocaust (Illinois Institue of Technology)Digitized audio of Dr. David P. Boder's interviews with Holocaust survivors.
- Holocaust Oral History Archive (Gratz College)One of the largest collections of audio-taped testimony in the U.S, including interviews with nearly 900 survivors, liberators, resistance force members, those in hiding, rescuers, and other witnesses to the persecution and extermination of the Nazi era, 1933-1945