Child Survivors of the Holocaust: The Youngest Remnant and the American Experience (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780813596525)

2017 Wiener Library Ernst Fraenkel Prize (WLEFP) Finalist

The majority of European Jewish children alive in 1939 were murdered during the Holocaust. Of 1.5 million children, only an estimated 150,000 survived. In the aftermath of the Shoah, efforts by American Jews brought several thousand of these child survivors to the United States. In Child Survivors of the Holocaust, historian Beth B. Cohen weaves together survivor testimonies and archival documents to bring their story to light. She reveals that even as child survivors were resettled and "saved," they struggled to adapt to new lives as members of adoptive families, previously unknown American Jewish kin networks, or their own survivor relatives. Nonetheless, the youngsters moved ahead. As Cohen demonstrates, the experiences both during and after the war shadowed their lives and relationships through adulthood, yet an identity as "survivors" eluded them for decades. Now, as the last living link to the Holocaust, the voices of Child Survivors are finally being heard.

Author: Beth B. Cohen
ISBN-10: 0813596521
ISBN-13: 9780813596525
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Language: English
Published: 03/28/2018
Pages: 230
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.70lbs
Size: 9.22h x 7.82w x 0.53d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 11/01/2018