Vera Gissing interview

Abstract

An interview with Vera Gissing, a Holocaust survivor, conducted by Dr. Sidney Bolkosky, Professor of History at the University of Michigan--Dearborn. Vera Gissing was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1928. She lived in Celakovice, outside of Prague, with her mother, father, and sister, Eva. After the Germans invaded their town, Vera's mother contacted Nicholas Winton about having the girls sent to England. Vera and her sister left Czechoslovakia in July 1939 and were put into foster care with two separate families. Vera stayed with the Rainfords, a poor Christian family, before enrolling in a Czech refugee school in England where she spent the duration of the war. After the war, Vera went back to Prague to study and became a literary translator but eventually moved back to England. While being interviewed by the Welsh BBC, Vera revealed her diaries that she kept of her experience during the war and decided to translate and publish the entries in the book Pearls of Childhood.