How to Trace Holocaust Survivors and Victims in Your Family History
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How to Trace Holocaust Survivors and Victims in Your Family History
January 27th is the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of Victims of the Holocaust. But did you know that many families actually lost their family history during the Holocaust, when so many family members died or vanished from historical records? For many families, all that are left of aunts, uncles, grandmothers, cousins—are old family photographs and if they are lucky, family memories passed down from survivors who remembered them. With this in mind, it is no wonder why many people ask themselves how it is possible to trace the family history of Holocaust victims and survivors. The following guide will help you learn more about the possibilities of tracing the fates of Holocaust survivors and Holocaust victims in your family history.
Finding Basic Information
If you are looking to trace information about a Holocaust victim or Holocaust survivor in your family, you have several options for basic resources.
However, even the most basic resources will require you to know some basic information about the person, such as their name and if possible, the name where they lived at the time of the Holocaust. If you have this information, look up the town or city where they were living; check out a map and take note of other towns in the immediate area and if you can, search about that area's history during WWII. This may help you find out what the town was called during that time period--if the name has changed--and point you towards potential relatives who could still be in the area.
More Detailed Sources
Next, you'll need to start considering what type of archival tracing sources is available to you. If you have proof that your family member was a survivor or victim of the Holocaust, such as an established death notice or family tree, it will be easier to use these services; priority is typically given to families.
Options include
JewishGen's Holocaust Database is a collection of databases containing information about Holocaust victims and survivors. It contains more than 2.75 million entries, from more than 190 component datasets.
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum ITS Request Form.
The International Tracing Service which operates out of Bad Arolson in Germany. Arolsen Archives
Yad Vashem, which includes "Pages of Testimony" where survivors or family register the names of people who died in the Holocaust. You may be able to locate a family member due to someone else registering them before you started your own research. Yad Vashem also has both a photo archive and documents archive that can help you learn more about the history of a Holocaust victim in your family.
In the UK you may contact The Holocaust Educational Trust a registered charity T +44 (0)20 7222 6822
In the US you may contact The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Survivor Resource Center at 1-202-488-6112 or 1-202-488-6130 to find out what your options are in regards to locating records related to your family member and their fate.
Remember: it may be difficult to find concrete information about Holocaust survivors and victims in your family history. For many people, very few—if any records—were left behind due to entire towns and even generations of families being killed. However, it is more important now than ever to uncover and record the histories of our families.
Support for Survivors and their families is available from Shalvata and the Association of Jewish Refugees
To learn which is the best software for doing a family tree click here.
To learn which are the best DNA test sites available in the UK click here.
To learn how to film your grandparent with a smart phone click here.
