What is Holocaust Testimony UK?
Holocaust Testimony UK is the initiative of Lord Pickles, the UK Special Envoy for Post-Holocaust Issues, and the Association of Jewish Refugees (AJR), the national charity representing and supporting Holocaust refugees and survivors and their families.
The creation of the portal was announced by Lord Pickles in April 2023 at the International Forum on ‘Collecting, Preserving, and Disseminating Holocaust Testimony’, a two-day conference hosted by the Association of Jewish Refugees, which brought together cross-disciplinary experts from British and international institutions, refuges and survivors and their descendants. You can see recordings of all the thought-provoking sessions here and read the report here.
It is due to the excellent collaboration of the institutions who attended the Forum (and others) and their commitment to share the testimonies and the metadata they have gathered, that we were able to construct this new digital resource.
19 April 2023: International Holocaust Testimony Forum, Lancaster House, London • Image Adam Soller / AJR
Kurt Marx BEM: Kindertransport Travel Document
Image courtesy of Kurt Marx / AJR
Lady Zahava Kohn MBE wearing a yellow star, Amsterdam ca1942 & the yellow star still in her possession, London, 2016 • Image courtesy of Lady Zahava Kohn / AJR
About
Holocaust Testimony UK
What is the aim of Holocaust Testimony UK?
The aim of the portal is to feature the collections of archives and institutions which have collected audio and video Holocaust testimonies.
The portal will provide an innovative way to access and compare interviews in each collection and interviews given by the same person to different collections. The portal will serve as a digital signpost and digital repository for smaller and larger collections, held by institutions in the UK and abroad. A dedicated page with learning resources will provide information about the history of the Holocaust and present materials relating to the history of testimony collection and teaching with testimonies in the classroom. Another section of the portal will present interviews with collection holders, who are going to give us an insight about their collections and will reflect on the challenges of capturing and archiving Holocaust testimonies.
We hope that the portal will encourage diverse audiences to engage with and learn from the many interviews conducted with the survivors and refugees from Nazism who settled in the UK and built up new lives.
Natan Zohar, March 5, 2024
AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive
Blogs
Updates from Holocaust Testimony UK and our partner institutions