Schiff, Tobias

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Description de l'interview extraite du site US Fortunoff / Biographie à venir

Tobias Schiff was born in Tarnów, Poland in 1925, one of two children. He recounts his family's move to Antwerp in 1926; attending a Jewish school; a one-year visit with relatives in Poland in 1935; attending a Jewish school there; attending a Talmudic high school in Belgium; German invasion; fleeing with his family to France; returning after encountering German soldiers; anti-Jewish restrictions including closing of his school and wearing the star; his sister's disappearance (he never saw her again); illegally traveling with his parents to Paris, then south using false papers; their arrest in Bourges; transfer to Pithiviers, then Drancy; deportation in August 1942 to Koźle; separation from his mother (he never saw her again); slave labor in Sakrau building highways; becoming very close to his father; starvation suppressing all other thoughts; transfer to Spytkowice and Trzebinia in winter 1943; separation from his father; assistance from a man from Antwerp when he lost hope; his father assisting him when he became ill; an opera performance giving him hope; moving to his father's barrack; his father buying extra food from Polish civilian workers which helped them survive the cold and starvation; a German transferring him to a privileged position; sharing extra food with his father; transfer in November 1943 to Birkenau; learning of the gas chambers; losing hope his mother and sister were alive; his father's selection for killing in January 1944; transfer to Buna/Monowitz in March; a German prisoner providing him with extra food; encountering British POWs; several privileged positions; assisting a cousin; a death march then train transport to Dora in January 1945; slave labor making V1 rockets; public hangings; transfer to Bergen-Belsen; encountering his cousin again; liberation by British troops; and repatriation. Mr. S. discusses his father's strength in the camps; the inability of language to convey starvation; pervasive painful memories; losing his belief in God; sharing his experiences with his children; traveling with three of them to Auschwitz; speaking at schools; and his belief that nothing is learned from history. He shows a photograph.

(Copyright : Fortunoff Video Archives for Holocaust Testimonies – Yale)

Ressources

Tobias Schiff, Retour sur un lieu que je n'ai jamais quitté, Ed. Benoit Jacob, 2000, 237 pages.

Madame V. Monsieur S, Documentaire de Jean-Marc Turine et Violaine de Villers, Saga Film, 52', 1989.

Dominique Rozenberg et André Goldberg, Le Passage du Témoin. Portraits et témoignages de rescapés des camps, La Lettre Volée, Co-éd Fondation Auschwitz, 2017, Interview de Tobias Schiff pp. 130-136.

Fiche interview

Code interview : YA/FA/047
Date interview : 25/05/1994 et 01/12/94
Lieu interview : Centre Audiovisuel de l’Université Libre de Bruxelles
Durée interview : 9h30
Langue interview : Français
Interviewers : Elisabeth Inchusta et Frédéric Fichefet
Cameraman : Jacques-Yves Le Docte
Consultation : Autorisée
Indexation thématique : Oui
Séquençage interview : Oui