- Primo Levi
Primo Michele Levi (July 31, 1919 - April 11, 1987) was a Jewish Italian chemist, Holocaust survivor and author of memoirs, short stories, poems, and novels. He is best known for his work on the Holocaust, and in particular his account of the year he spent as a prisoner in Auschwitz, the infamous death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. - Maximilian Kolbe
Maximilian Kolbe, also known as Maksymilian or Massimiliano Maria Kolbe and "Apostle of Consecration to Mary," born as Rajmund Kolbe, was a Polish Conventual Franciscan friar who volunteered to die in place of a stranger in the Nazi concentration camp of Auschwitz in Poland. He was canonized by the Catholic Church as Saint Maximilian Kolbe on October 10, 1982 by Pope John Paul II, and declared a martyr of charity. - Rudolf Vrba
Rudolf 'Rudi' Vrba, born Walter Rosenberg, was a professor of pharmacology at the University of British Columbia. In April 1944, Vrba and his friend Alfréd Wetzler became the second and third of only five Jews to escape from the Auschwitz concentration camp and pass information to the Allies about the mass murder that was taking place there. - Rudolf Höß
Rudolf Franz Ferdinand Höß (in English commonly Hoess or Höss or rarely Hoeß; November 251900; April 161947) was an "SS-Obersturmbannführer" (Lt. Colonel) and from May 4, 1940 to November of 1943 was commandant of Auschwitz concentration camp, where an estimated 1.1-1.6 million people were killed. - Witold Pilecki
Witold Pilecki (May 13, 1901 - May 25, 1948; pronounced ['vitɔld pi'leʦki]; codenames "Roman Jezierski, Tomasz Serafiński, Druh, Witold") was a soldier of the Second Polish Republic, the founder of the resistance movement, Secret Polish Army ("Tajna Armia Polska"), and a member of the Home Army ("Armia Krajowa"). During World War II, he became the only known person to volunteer to be imprisoned at Auschwitz Concentration Camp. - Edith Stein
Edith Stein (October 12, 1891 - August 9, 1942) was a philosopher, a Carmelite nun, martyr, and saint of the Catholic Church, who died at Auschwitz. In 1922, she converted to Christianity, was baptized into the Roman Catholic Church and was received into the Discalced Carmelite Order in 1934. She was canonized as Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (her Carmelite monastic name) by Pope John Paul II in 1998; however, she is still often referred to, … - Rutka Laskier
Rutka Laskier (1929-1943) was a Jewish teenager from Poland who is best known for her 1943 diary chronicling four months of her life during the Holocaust. - Mel Mermelstein
Mel Mermelstein is a Hungarian-born Jew, sole-survivor of his family's extermination at Auschwitz concentration camp who defeated the Institute for Historical Review in an American court and had the occurrence of gassings in Auschwitz during the Holocaust declared a legally incontestable fact. Before World War II broke out, Mermelstein lived in Munkacs, in Ukraine. On May 19, 1944 he was deported to Auschwitz along with the rest of the Jewish community. - Eduard Wirths
Dr. Eduard Wirths was the Chief SS doctor (SS-Standortarzt) at the Auschwitz concentration camp from September 1942 to January 1945. Thus, Wirths had formal responsibility for everything undertaken by the nearly 20 SS doctors (including Josef Mengele, Horst Schumann and Carl Clauberg) who worked in the medical sections of Auschwitz between 1942-1945. - Tadeusz Borowski
Tadeusz Borowski (1922-1951) was a Polish writer and journalist, and a Holocaust survivor. Tadeusz Borowski was born in 1922 into the Polish community in Zhytomir, Ukraine, then part of the USSR. His parents became victims of the USSR spy-hunting psychosis. In 1926, his father, whose bookstore had been nationalized by the communists, was sent to a gulag in Karelia. His mother was arrested later the same year and sent to a gulag in Siberia, … - Hans Krása
Hans Krása, was a Bohemian composer. Krása was born in Prague to a Czech father, a lawyer, and a German-Jewish mother. He learned both the piano and violin as a child and went on to study composition at the German Music Academy in Prague. After graduating he went on to become a vocal coach at the Deutsches Landestheater, where he met the conductor and composer Alexander von Zemlinsky, who had a major impact on Krása's career. - Hannah Szenes
Hannah Szenes (or Chana Senesh) (July 17, 1921 - November 7, 1944) was a Hungarian Jew, one of 17 Jews living in Palestine, now Israel, who were trained by the British army to parachute into Yugoslavia during the Second World War in order to help save the Jews of Hungary, who were about to be deported to the German death camp at Auschwitz. Szenes was arrested at the Hungarian border, imprisoned and tortured, but she refused to reveal details of her mission, … - Xawery Dunikowski
Xawery Dunikowski was a Polish sculptor and artist, notable for surviving Auschwitz concentration camp, and best known for his Neo-Romantic sculptures and Auschwitz-inspired art. Dunikowski was born in Kraków, a city he had an affinity for and would also use as the basis for a collection of art. When he was twelve his family moved to Warsaw, and after finishing his education in a technical school he studied sculpture under Boleslaw Syrewicz and Leon Wasilkowski. - Hana Brady
Hana Brady (May 16, 1931 in Nové Město na Moravě - 1944) was a Jewish girl and Holocaust victim. She is the subject of the 2002 non-fiction children's book "Hana's Suitcase" by Karen Levine. Along with her brother George, Hana was imprisoned by the Nazis as a Jew, and sent to the Theresienstadt (Terezin) prison camp. In 1944 she was transferred to the Auschwitz concentration camp. While her brother survived imprisonment by working as a laborer, Hana was killed. - Heinrich Schwarz
Heinrich Schwarz was camp commandant of the Auschwitz III Monowitz concentration camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. Schwarz was posted to the Auschwitz I camp within the town of Oświęcim (Auschwitz) itself, and as of 30 September 1941 he was active in the Work Assignment Department (Abt. IIIa). In November 1943, Rudolf Höß was appointed leader of Office Group D in the "SS" Economic and Administrative Main Office (SS-WVHA) and left Auschwitz. - René Blum
René Blum, choreographer, was the founder of the Ballet de l'Opera at Monte Carlo. He was the brother of the Socialist Prime Minister of France, Léon Blum. In 1931, he was hired to form the Ballet by Prince Louis II of Monaco. In 1943, the Italian army invaded and occupied Monaco, setting up a Fascist administration. Shortly thereafter, following Mussolini's collapse in Italy, the Wehrmacht occupied Monaco and began the deportation of the Jewish population. - Anna Heilman
Anna Heilman, born Hana Wajcblum (1928-), referred to in other sources as Hanka or Chana Weissman, is one of the surviving Auschwitz ex-prisoners who were in on the plot to blow up the crematoria. She, her sister Estusia, and other women smuggled gunpowder out of the Union munitions factory and passed it from insider to insider until it reached the Sonderkommando. - Dina Babbitt
Dina Gottliebova Babbitt (formerly known as Dinah Gottliebova), born January 21 1923 in Brno, Czechoslovakia, is a Holocaust survivor, who is now a US citizen. She resides in Santa Cruz, California. In 1944, while in Auschwitz Concentration Camp, she was ordered by Dr. Josef Mengele to draw portraits of the Gypsies. As of now, seven watercolor portraits survive, all located in the "Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum". - Hermann van Pels
Hermann van Pels (31 March 1898-October 1944) was a German-Jewish refugee who hid with Anne Frank and her family during the occupation of The Netherlands by Nazi Germany, and who was killed in the Auschwitz concentration camp after they were betrayed to the Gestapo. When Anne Frank's diary was published in 1947 the names of all those mentioned apart from those of the Frank family were changed. Van Pels was given the pseudonym Herman van Daan. - Vladek Spiegelman
Vladek Spiegelman, her husband Wolfe and their daughter Bibi. Wolfe and Tosha also took in Lonia, another niece of Anja. When the ghetto was being evacuated, Tosha poisoned herself and the three children she harbored. Wolfe was later shot. After they got out of Auschwitz, Vladek and Anja searched orphanages everywhere to see if the rumors about Richieu being poisoned were true. The never found Richieu so they came to the conclusion that he was poisoned. - Kurt Gerron
Kurt Gerron (May 11, 1897 - November 15, 1944) was a German Jewish actor and film director during the Nazi period. Born Kurt Gerson to Jewish parents in Berlin, Germany, Gerron initially studied medicine but became a stage actor in 1920. He appeared in such films as "The Blue Angel" opposite Marlene Dietrich, and on stage originated the role of Brown (the chief of police in London) in the premiere production of "Die Dreigroschenoper" in Berlin in 1928. - Joel Brand
Joel Brand (April 25 1906-July 13 1964) was a Hungarian Jew who played a prominent role in trying to save the Hungarian Jewish community during the Holocaust from deportation to the German death camp at Auschwitz. Described by historian Yehuda Bauer as a brave adventurer who felt at home in "underground conspiracies and card-playing circles," Brand teamed up with fellow Zionists in Hungary, in or around 1942, to form the Aid and Rescue Committee, … - Charlotte Delbo
Charlotte Delbo, (August 10, 1913- March 1, 1985), was a French writer chiefly known for her haunting memoirs of her time as a prisoner in Auschwitz, where she was sent for her activities as a member of the French resistance. - Petr Ginz
Petr Ginz was a young Jewish boy who was deported to the Terezín concentration camp, during the Holocaust. At age fifteen, Ginz was deported to Auschwitz concentration camp, where he died in a gas chamber. Ginz was a very talented boy. At the age of fourteen, he became the first and only editor-in-chief of the magazine "Vedem", written, edited, and illustrated entirely by young boys at Terezín. He also wrote an Esperanto-Czech dictionary. - Gideon Klein
Gideon Klein was a Czech pianist and composer of classical music. He was born in Přerov and, showing musical talent early, studied piano with Růžena Kurzová and Vilém Kurz, and composition with Alois Hába. In December 1941 he was deported by the Nazis to Terezín concentration camp, where along with Leoš Janáček's pupil Pavel Haas, Hans Krasa, and Schoenberg's pupil Viktor Ullmann he became one of the major composers in that camp, … - Dora Gerson
Dora Gerson (March 23, 1899 - February 14, 1943) was a Jewish German cabaret singer and motion picture actress of the silent film era who was notoriously killed with her family at Auschwitz. - Karl Gebhardt
Karl Gebhardt was a German medical doctor; personal physician of Heinrich Himmler and one of the main coordinators and perpetrators of surgical experiments performed on inmates of the concentration camps at Ravensbrück and Auschwitz. Gebhardt was born in Haag in Oberbayern, Bavaria. In 1919, he took up studies in medicine in Munich. He habilitated in 1935 and got a post as associate professor in Berlin the next year. As of 1937, he held a chair of orthopedic surgery. - Karl Fritzsch
"SS-Hauptsturmführer" Karl Fritzsch, German National Socialist functionary. SS#7287; NSDAP#261135 Karl Fritzsch was born the son of a stove builder in Bohemia, and since the family had to move very often in search of work, he never received a normal school education. For some years Fritzsch worked on ships plying the Danube. His marriage in 1928 to Franzishe Stich produced three children, but ended in divorce in 1942. In 1930 he joined the Nazi Party and the SS. - Stanisław Ryniak
Stanisław Ryniak was the Polish political prisoner imprisoned in Auschwitz concentration camp (no. 34) - Otto Selz
Otto Selz, (14 February 1881-27 August 1943) was a German psychologist who formulated the first nonassociationist theory of thinking, in 1913. Selz used the method of introspection, but unlike his predecessors, his theory developed without the use of images and associations. Wilhelm Wundt used the method of introspection in the 1880s, but thought that higher-level mental processes could not be studied in the scientific laboratory. - Arnošt Lustig
Arnošt Lustig is a renowned Czech Jewish author of novels, short stories, plays, and screenplays whose works have often involved the Holocaust. As a Jewish boy in Czechoslovakia during World War II, he was sent in 1942 to the Theresienstadt concentration camp, from where he was later transported to the Auschwitz concentration camp, followed by time in the Buchenwald concentration camp. - Alfréd Wetzler
Alfréd Wetzler (May 10, 1918 -1988), who later wrote under the alias Jozef Lánik, was a Slovak Jew, and one of a very small number of Jews known to have escaped from the Auschwitz death camp during the Holocaust. Wetzler is known for the report that he and his fellow escapee, Rudolf Vrba, compiled about the inner workings of the Auschwitz camp. The 32-page Vrba-Wetzler report, as it became known, … - Hans Münch
Dr Hans Münch was an SS Physician at the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland from 1943 to 1945. He was the only accused person acquitted at the 1947 Auschwitz trials in Kraków. Later on, he worked as a practising physician in Roßhaupten in Bavaria. - Branko Lustig
Branko Lustig (born June 10, 1932) is a prominent film producer. He is the only Croatian person to have won two Academy Awards. Lustig was born in Osijek, Kingdom of Yugoslavia (Croatia) to a Jewish family. During World War II, as a child he was imprisoned for two years in Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. He received his first Oscar in 1993 for the production of "Schindler's List", a film based on the novel of Thomas Keneally (which is, in turn, … - Kurt Julius Goldstein
Kurt Julius Goldstein (November 3 1914 is a German journalist and a former broadcast director born in Dortmund, Germany. Even at school, he experienced Germany's growing Anti-Semitism and it had the effect of politicising him. In 1928, he joined the Young Communists League and two years later, the Communist Party of Germany, then headed by Ernst Thälmann. When the Nazis took power in 1933, Goldstein fled. He first lived in Luxembourg, working as a gardener, … - Wolf Biermann
Karl Wolf Biermann (born 15 November 1936 in Hamburg) is a former East German dissident who works as a German Liedermacher (songwriter). Biermann's father, who worked in the Hamburg docks, was a member of the Communist resistance. In 1943 he was murdered in Auschwitz concentration camp as a Jew who had sabotaged Nazi warships. Wolf Biermann was one of the few children of workers who attended the "Heinrich-Hertz-Gymnasium" (high school) in Hamburg. - Ala Gertner
Ala Gertner, referred to in other sources as Alla, Alina, Ella, and Ela, was one of four women hanged in the Auschwitz concentration camp for her role in the "Sonderkommando" revolt of October 7, 1944. - Austin App
Austin Joseph App was a German-American professor of medieval English literature who taught at the University of Scranton and LaSalle University. He is known for his work on the Holocaust, and he has been accused of Holocaust denial by mainstream historians. In 1973 App laid out eight "axioms", or what he described as "incontrovertible assertions" about the Holocaust in his 1973 pamphlet "The Six Million Swindle": # Emigration, not extermination, … - Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski
Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski , Polish-Jewish industrialist and Zionist activist, functioned as the Nazi-nominated head of the "Judenrat", or Jewish authorities in the Łódź Ghetto. Some remember him for his haunting and controversial speech, "Give Me Your Children". Before the Nazi German invasion of Poland, Rumkowski, a Russian Jew by origin, had had a career as an unsuccessful businessman and director of an orphanage. - Halina Birenbaum
Halina Birenbaum is a Holocaust survivor, writer, poet and translator. Born in Warsaw, Birenbaum spent her childhood in a Warsaw ghetto and later on in Nazi concentration camps: Majdanek, Auschwitz (Oświęcim), Ravensbrück and Neustadt-Glewe, from which she was liberated in 1945. In 1947 she moved to Israel, where she started a family. In March 2001 she was awarded a title of Person of Unity 2001 by Polish "Rada Chrzescijan i Żydów".
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