Zhenja Gurevich / Zhenja Zaretzka (F / Lithuania, 1927), Holocaust survivor

Zhenja Gurevich / Zhenja Zaretzka (F / Lithuania, 1927), Holocaust survivor

• KEYWORDS : <Vilna Ghetto> <Stutthof>

USHMM Oral Interview

Zhenja Gurevich (née Zaretzka), born in Svencionys, Lithuania in 1927, discusses her early family life; attending school and her religious education; the arrival of the Germans; being moved to a former Polish military camp in Poligon, Lithuania; establishment of the ghetto in Svencionys, Lithuania; the death of her mother and two brothers; being sent to work on the railroad being built in Nova Svencionys (Svencioneliai), Lithuania; the underground organization in the Svencionys ghetto, including Markov, a folk-shule teacher who urged people to use a weapon to leave the Svencionys ghetto and ultimately became a partisan commander in the forests; liquidation of the Svencionys ghetto; hiding in the forest; work in the Vilna (Vilnius) ghetto; rebellion in and liquidation of the Vilna ghetto; her work near Riga, Latvia in Strazde, Latvia, moving construction materials; being transferred to Kaiserwald and returning to Strazde; traveling by boat to Stutthof; the evacuation of Stutthof; liberation; being taken to a hospital in Lwówek Slaski, Poland, where she received treatment for typhoid fever; working in a field hospital; traveling back to Vilna via Kovno (Kaunas), Lithuania, and eventual arriving in Svencionys; reuniting with a surviving cousin; her marriage in 1947; her arrival in Israel after its independence in 1948; life in Israel; and returning with her daughter, Miriam, to Svencionys on the fiftieth anniversary of liberation.