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Letter
Montreal Holocaust Museum · small copy hosted here (www.cjhn.ca blocks its images elsewhere)
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Letter

2 images

Held by
Montreal Holocaust Museum via Canadian Jewish Heritage Network (incl. Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives)
Dates
April 16, 1940 (indexed as 1940)
Level
item
Scope & content
One page. Double-sided Narrative: In the 1920’s Serge and Sophie Philipson (nee Orbach) left Berlin for Paris due to rising antisemitism. On July 15, 1930 their daughter Rachel was born. Serge, Sophie and Rachel were Polish citizen, they never got either the German or the French citizenship. In Paris, Serge worked for Les Modes Modernes, the hat factory of his brother-in-law, Henri. When an opportunity to expand the business in Ireland arose, Serge moved to Galway. The new factory opened in July 1938. In August 1939, Sophie, Rachel, and 4 other family members (Rachel’s cousin Stéphane, his maternal grandmother Néné, Serge’s sister Esther and Serge’s sister-in-law Choura) left for Cabourg, in Normandy. After the winter 1939-1940 it became difficult to communicate with Ireland but Rachel and Sophie could still send and receive letter from Serge. At the end of winter 1940, the group moved to Néris and in July 1940, after the occupation of France by Germany, they settled in the zone libre in the village of Cauterets, on the border with Spain. They were reunited with Robert, Serge’s brother. In August 1942, 4 family members (Sophie’s sister Ella and her husband Ernest, their daughter Ruth, Serge’s siblings Robert and Esther) were arrested by local police and deported. They were not seen again. At the beginning of 1943, Sophie, her mother Augusta and Rachel moved to Maubourguet. In April 1943, they moved to Cannes in Hotel Victoria with Henri, Stéphane and Néné. Henri, Sophie and Augusta went into hiding together while cousins Stéphane and Rachel were taken care of by Néné and returned to Maubourguet. In January 1944, Henri, Sophie and Augusta were denounced and arrested. They were transferred to Marseille before being sent by train to Drancy transit camp from where they were deported. It is believed they were killed in a Polish killing centre. In 1944, Rachel moved from one place to another – under a non-Jewish identity - and continued to correspond with her father. In June 1945, she reunited with her father Ireland. They had not seen each other for 6 years. In 1951, Rachel got married. In 1954, she immigrated to Montreal.
In the picture
CalligraphyCountrysideDocumentFamilyGardenGirlHandwrittenHatLetterSchoolSignatureTreeVillageWomanTagged automatically by a vision model; may contain mistakes.
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Extent
Letter : Paper : Beige, blue ; Ht: 26,9 cm x W: 20,8 cm
Genre / form
textual record
Format
Document
Text in the image
Déis, le 16. avril 40Mon cherMon chéri! Je te remercie mille fois de ta lettre du 8.J'aime bien une lettre comme celui-ci, elle me donne beaucoup et au fond je pense comme toi, mon chéri!Le temps passera aussi et les événements montrent, que tout arrivera autrement qu'on pense, peut-être cette guerre finira tout même plus vite. Ce n'est pas une guerre comme toutes les autres, elle nous réserve certainement encore assez de surprise.—J'espère que tu arriveras de compléter ta garderobe.Dans ta situation tu ne peux pas être mal habillé.Je t'ai tricoté un pull-over que je t'enverai un de ces jours. Ta belle cravate vient de la part de Eitel, voilà un petit commencement pour que tu sois beau!Je n'avais pas encore pensé sérieusement de retourner à Paris. Pour la belle saison je resterai en tous cas ici et jusqu'à l'hiver j'espère que la guerre sera finie, et puis je ne prendrais jamais une de ces décisions sans te demander ta permission.—Rachel va très bien. Elle est superbe en ce moment, elle se développe évidemment, elle n'est pas trop grosse, mais elle grandit et large comme une vraie fille de la campagne. On l'aime beaucoup à l'école, je crains seulement, qu'elle n'avance pas beaucoup dans cette école communale d'un village, mais elle est vraiment intelligente et en même temps très enfantine.—Concernant la famille ceRead automatically; may contain mistakes.
Language
French
Harvested
2026-10-19T03:21:16Z · source datestamp n/a · andornot

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