Rebecca Gratz to Maria Gist Gratz - July 21, 1839

In response to her friend Margaret (Peggy), Rebecca continues the theme of imaginary travel and romance and tells her of the visits of friends.

Rebecca writes to her sister-in-law Ann, fretting over the health of her brother Ben, who was supposed to visit her in Philadelphia.

Rebecca tells her friend Maria of the frenzy around a famous actor performing in Philadelphia, her family's search for a new house, and muses ironically about creating purpose in her life.

An email from Rudy Boschwitz to Elie Wiesel, with copies to Jean Maras and Frank Berman, discusses a traveling exhibition about Jewish lawyers in Germany in the 1930s. The exhibition, put together by the German government, is touring the U.S. and will make an early stop in Minnesota. Frank Berman, an attorney, is on a committee formed by the Chief Federal Judge of Minnesota to manage the display's arrival. Boschwitz states that he and Frank would like to speak with Wiesel about it and asks for a suitable time. He also conveys personal well-wishes regarding Ellen and mentions a planned Panama Canal cruise. The email concludes with Rudy Boschwitz's contact details and his past diplomatic roles.

Marian Turzanski, born January 18, 1934 in Zupanie, Poland, was one of four sons in a Catholic family who owned large forest land. Before 1939, he recalls good relations with the few Jews in his village, one of whom once hid in the Turzanski home. After the German invasion, hostile Ukrainians threatened to kill Marian’s father; a friendly Ukrainian intervened and urged the family to flee. In Hungary, they moved frequently, settling in Keszthely, where Marian attended a school for Polish children. His parents had left their baptismal papers in Poland, to be used by Samuel Goldreich, the Jew they once sheltered. Life in Hungary after German occupation is detailed: terrorization by the Arrow Cross and German soldiers, ghettoization of Jews and Poles, deportation of Jews and Gypsies. Marian’s father was active in the underground, together with Hungarian Jews and other Christians; Marian and his brothers became messengers. He describes in detail the family’s deportation December 31, 1944, to Germany, via Prague and Vienna in sealed cattle cars and the luxury of bedsheets and decent food at the Wilhelmshaven work camp near Berlin. This contrasts with the starkness of the other camps he mentions briefly: Strashof, Bayreuth, Neumarkt. He describes brutal treatment by Ukrainians at Neumarkt. After liberation by Americans in 1945, he lived in Displaced Persons camps at Neumarkt, Hochenfels, Annsbach, Wildflecken, Heilbronn, Ludvigsburg and Bremenhafen. He came to the United States on August 27, 1949 after losing all of his relatives outside of his immediate family.