Jacob Birnbaum papers

The Jacob Birnbaum papers consist of an identification card documenting Jacob Birnbaum’s status as a concentration camp survivor and letters Jacob wrote to Rose (Róża) Strzegowska (later Rose Rothschild), an inmate at the women’s camp, while both were imprisoned at Langenbielau concentration camp, a sub-camp of Gross-Rosen, during the Holocaust. Birnbaum had been exchanging letters with Rose’s twin sister, Eve (Ewa), until Eve became too sick to write. Jacob’s letters describe the terrible living and working conditions at Langenbielau, insufficient food and his efforts to obtain more food, and the laundry that he sends to Rose for cleaning, and they encourage Rose to stay strong and to visit him during a coffee delivery her camp would make to his camp. The letters are written on scraps of paper and the backs of factory reports or forms. Four of the letters are accompanied by English translations. Jacob Birnbaum (1922-2007) was born in Piotrków Trybunalski to Faitel Nathan Birnbaum (d. 1942) and Ruda Freida Jurkiewicz Birnbaum (d. 1942). He survived the Dabrowa Górnicza ghetto and the concentration and labor camps at Anhalt bei Auschwitz, Markstadt bei Breslau, Ludwigsdorf, Graditz, and Langenbielau. He was liberated in May 1945, married fellow Holocaust survivor Mira Laudon (1925-2008) in August 1945, relocated to Germany in 1946, and immigrated to the United States in 1949. His parents and sister Chana (1925-1943) were murdered in the Holocaust.