Book Description
for Witnesses to War by Michael Leapman
From Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
The experiences of eight children who suffered at the hands of the Nazis are cogently related in a book that includes many documentary photographs and clear historical backgrounds for context. Seven of the eight lived to tell their stories; the eighth was Anne Frank. Each of the children represents a different kind of persecution and method of survival. Beate Siegel, the daughter of a prominent Jewish lawyer, was sent at age 14 to live with a family in England as part of the Kindertransport. Alexander Michelowksi was one of the thousands of Polish children snatched from their homes to be "Germanized" and adopted into German families. Barbara Richter was a Bohemian gypsy child who was sent to Auschwitz, where she was subjected to experiments conducted by Dr. Mengele. Joseph Steiner and his older sister, Ania, escaped the Warsaw ghetto just hours before it was obliterated by the Germans and lived by their wits for the next few years, sometimes serving as a messengers for the Polish Resistance. All of the stories are as gripping as they are heartbreaking, and most were gathered firsthand by the author. A recent photograph of each survivor is included at the end his or her story. (Ages 11 and up)
CCBC Choices 1998. © Cooperative Children's Book Center, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison, 1998. Used with permission.