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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
January 14, 1941 (indexed as 1941)
Level
item
Scope & content
2 pages, single sided with the date in the upper right corner. 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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Clothing StoreDocumentFactoryFamilyHandwrittenLetterSignatureTypewrittenTagged automatically by a vision model; may contain mistakes.
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Extent
Letter : Paper : Ink : Beige ; Ht: 26,6 cm x W: 20,6 cm
Genre / form
textual record
Format
Document
Text in the image
14th Jan. '41My dear Goldie,I think it is now exactly 15 or 16 years since I saw you on the Continent for the first and last time and I hope you will remember me as I remember you.A lot of things have happened in the meantime and I do not think I need go into details.You may be surprised to hear from me from Ireland but our Parisian house have built, in Galway, a hat factory for ladies, by request and I am here as General Manager since 1937. It is a nice big factory and we have 250 people working here. I have now told you in the above few words my actual position here.I think you will remember my wife Sophie very well. She and my child Rachael are still in France, in unoccupied territory of course, and I receive very little news about them, as a matter of fact I have not had any news now for the past two months.The main reason I wrote this letter to you was to ask you to do me a favour - it is a shame to say that after 15 years I write only for this reason but still it's true.You know my parents and Sarah have been in Poland since the outbreak of war and they are still there and the only news we receive from time to time is from yourself - for this I thank you as it is a great comfort to us. I would now beg you to do anything you possibly can for them in regard to money or anything else and I shall gladly pay all your expenses. Perhaps this will not be possible but at any rate I should be glad if you would write and let me know how matters stand.Read automatically; may contain mistakes.
Language
English
Harvested
2026-10-19T03:21:16Z · source datestamp n/a · andornot

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