William recalls the joyful celebration of Simchat Torah-the holiday marking the completion of weekly Torah readings- with Rabbi Teitelbaum, the Satmar Rebbe, holding a Sefer Torah (Torah scroll) - in the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp. The celebration took place even though the barrack was surrounded by German soldiers.

Marianna Bergida grew up with little knowledge of most of her family – her mother, sister, cousins, grandparents, aunts and uncles were killed in Auschwitz when she was very young, and her father couldn’t speak about his own experiences during the Holocaust. Determined to not let other descendants of survivors lose their family history as she had, Bergida became an interviewer for the Shoah Foundation and ended up interviewing one of the real-life inspirations of Steven Spielberg’s film Schindler’s List.

Paul Engel was born into a middle-class Jewish family on May 4, 1922 in Vienna, Austria. He had a younger brother, Robert. When World War I broke out in 1914, his father, Eduard, was drafted into the Austro-Hungarian army. Captured as a prisoner of war, he spent six years in Siberia working in a coal mine, finally reuniting with his family in 1920. In Vienna, Eduard owned a perfume wholesale business. Before the war, Paul attended a primary school and was accepted to a Gymnasium in the 14th district of Vienna.

Paul Engel est né le 4 mai 1922 à Vienne (Autriche) dans une famille juive de la classe moyenne. Il a un jeune frère, Robert. Lorsque la Première Guerre mondiale éclate en 1914, son père, Eduard, est mobilisé dans l’armée austro-hongroise. Fait prisonnier de guerre, celui-ci passe six ans en Sibérie à travailler dans une mine de charbon, avant de retrouver sa famille en 1920. À Vienne, Eduard possède une magasin de parfums en gros. Avant la guerre, Paul fréquente une école primaire et entre au lycée du 14ème district de Vienne.

Holocaust survivor testimonies from the Visual History Archive inspired heartfelt works of art, writing and film from students across America in Chapman University and The 1939 Society’s Holocaust Art & Writing Contest.