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

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Held by
Montreal Holocaust Museum via Canadian Jewish Heritage Network (incl. Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives)
Dates
December 28, 1939 (indexed as 1939)
Level
item
Scope & content
One page. Typewritten in black ink. 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.
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DocumentImmigrationJewish CommunityLetterLetterheadSignatureTypewrittenTagged automatically by a vision model; may contain mistakes.
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Extent
Letter : Paper : Beige, black ; Ht: 25 cm x W: 20,5 cm
Genre / form
textual record
Format
Document
Text in the image
28th Dec. '39I. Philipson,Esq.,119 Castellain Mansions,London.My dear fellows,Yours sincerely,I thank you for your last few letters which I have received and I have noted all your remarks.I have already made an application here for the four people but of course Christmas time has delayed things a bit, I hope, however, to have some news within the next ten days. It is very difficult for me to say whether I shall be successful or not but at any rate I am doing everything possible to hurry up the matter. It was very good to hear that you had made every possible effort to send them money and if it is necessary I shall help myself as much as I can.If you get news from Mr.Gleckson will you please let me know immediately.The amount of £80 per person is a very high amount of money to have to pay to bring them to Brussels and I shall wait until I know the decision here and then we can see what we shall have to do.I was very sorry not to be in a position to cross over for the Christmas and I cannot even say now when I shall be able to go over, however, I wish you all a very prosperous and healthy New Year and please give my regards to all.Read automatically; may contain mistakes.
Language
English
Harvested
2026-10-19T03:21:16Z · source datestamp n/a · andornot

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