World War II was certainly one of the darkest days of human history, if not the gloomiest, and the worst part of it was the Holocaust which resulted in the deaths of more than 11 million deaths. It unveiled the horrors that one human was willing to inflict on another. While millions lost their lives to the brutal Nazi reign, many did survive to tell a tale of human spirit and the resilience to survive.
We recently came across one such story of a woman who lived through the grim times and could not keep ourselves from sharing it with you. Jacqueline Kimmelstiel, born in Frankfurt, Germany in the late 1920s, went through it all in the early years of her life, when all that we are concerned with is looking hip and being popular on the social media.
Mrs. Kimmelstiel and her family spent 12 years navigating France, city after city and town after town, trying to escape the Nazis. The closest she came to leading a normal childhood was, she remembers, for a brief time in France, when she even received Hebrew education. But the peace in her life was short-lived as the Germans soon started to arrive. She went through Lougratte, Bellac, and Nice trying to escape the massacre.
She and her mother survived Lyon hiding with eight other women in a convent with the nuns. She recalls how she would see convoys of people brought to the train station every day. Another incident she remembers is spotting her Hebrew instructor being marched to the station and how she barely survived getting captured after he ignored her when she waived at him.
Her hardships finally ended when she, along with her family, moved to New York in 1947. While here, she worked as a seamstress in a garment store, studying English at night. This institution was where, at the age of 20, Jacqueline met her future husband, Albert Kimmelstiel, who himself was a Holocaust survivor. He was imprisoned at the Auschwitz concentration camp, before being freed by the American army on 2 May 1945.
Today, the 89-year-old holocaust survivor lives in her Bronx apartment remembering the dark days of her childhood. One of the worst things, she says, happened to her was that she did not get an education.
She is one of the 50000 holocaust survivors living in the New York City area today, almost twice living in the other parts of the United States. She was also one of the 32 holocaust survivors whose life was portrayed on stage in the NYC as a part of the Witness Theater. She dedicated her performance to her husband who spent his entire life with a number tattooed on his arm. He died last year.
She shares her personal story to remind people of the horrific days of the past and an answer to the people who deny that the Holocaust ever happened.
On 15th October, she will be the guest speaker at the 3GNY’s 5th intergenerational brunch, sharing the tale of her hardships, perseverance, and survival through the Nazi reign.
